RSSMicrosoft Acquires VOIP Provider Teleo
By Nate Mook | Published August 31, 2005, 10:16 AM
Further emphasizing the growing importance of Internet telephony, Microsoft said late Tuesday it has acquired VOIP provider Teleo. Founded in 2003, Teleo offers a service for making voice calls from a PC to a traditional telephone number. Microsoft plans to integrate the technology into its MSN services.
Like fellow instant messaging clients, MSN Messenger currently offers PC-to-PC calling. But the additional of Teleo would mean calls could also be made to standard national and international phone numbers directly from the software.
Teleo's service also integrates with Outlook and Internet Explorer to enable one-click calling while browsing the Web or viewing an e-mail. Microsoft says it "ultimately projects delivering new VoIP consumer applications in future releases of MSN services."
The move puts added pressure on VOIP pioneer Skype, which counts millions of subscribers to its free voice messaging software. The company recently launched a fee-based service dubbed SkypeOut for making outbound calls and is exploring compatibility with mobile devices.
Yahoo, meanwhile, has focused on stealing some of Skype's market share with its recent release of Yahoo! Messenger 7.0. The service offers voice calls to other Yahoo users, but the company has not yet enabled calls to traditional phone numbers.
Likewise, AOL is planning to bolster its AIM Talk feature next spring in a future update to AOL Instant Messenger, currently code-named Triton II. "AIM Talk Plus" will provide users with the ability to make calls anywhere in the world directly through AIM.
"Teleo has great technology to deliver superior VoIP quality and an excellent overall customer experience,” said Blake Irving, corporate vice president of the MSN Communication Services and Member Platform group at Microsoft. "This acquisition opens up infinite opportunities for Microsoft to enable even more relationship-centric communications experiences for our customers in the future."
Microsoft did not disclose financial details of the acquisition.
I'm actually real encouraged because MS is considering two options: either low-rate OR free-sponsored by ads.
At the very least this will continue accelerating VOIP downward price pressure-- which is inevitable, but hopefully for us it won't take years to materialize.
What i'm talking about is what you currently see in the European model-- it costs almost nothing because telecommunications providers use it as a loss-leader hook/extra to lure more subscribers. This in sharp contrast to back here in the states where for instance, a clueless TimeWarner is trying to get an extra $36 a month for it(& to boot for this you need to already be enrolled w/ a higher level than Basic, otherwise it's even higher). I don't know which subscriber in their right mind would sign up for that.
So yes, this move by MS(along w/ yahoo & google) benefits ua all immensely.
For MS' sake i hope they handle this better than their ill-fated foray into broadband at the turn of the century-- what they should've done way back then with their huge cash hordes, is what Google is poised to do now: become an isp by purchasing fiber & snapping up smaller providers.
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Company innovates and makes a killing.
MS Steps in, buys said company, kills products via feature bloat and bugs.
Open Source community steps in and makes confusing, undocumented clone of original product.
See? MS supports OSS.
:P (If you think I was at all serious, you need to update your sarcasm filter.)
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enjoyable i must say, enjoyable indeed.
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"sarcasm"
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Do you have to bash on Microsoft for everything? Why don't you back off once in awhile. Go work on your Linux box you AOL script kiddie!
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"Sarcasim" is the correct spelling of Sarcasm on the planet Flembot-Q11423 of the Windarian Galaxy. Please learn your alternate intergalactic spellings before taking a cheap shot at our poor intergalactic friends.
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If there's anyone out there who doesn't know what the phrase "One fool makes many" means - this would be the place to find out.
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IF there's any one out there who doesn't know what the phrase "No sense of humor" means, this would be the place to find out.
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