VoIP Business and Virtual PBX
Communications

How's Skype Doing At MSFT? Usage Jumps 50%

In May of last year, Microsoft acquired everybody’s favorite VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) and chat provider, Skype, for a cool $8.5 billion. It was a big move for Microsoft and a landmark deal, which it officially closed in October. But, as Frederic pointed out before this week, other than getting to wear the brand’s pin on its lapel, Microsoft has seemed content to let Skype exist as a stand-alone service. Nevertheless this morning the company announced that it will be integrating Skype into its office productivity suite, powering the “presence” feature in Outlook and becoming a default piece of every version of Office shipped — among other things.

As part of its quarterly revenues announcement this afternoon, Microsoft as well shed some light onto just how then Skype has been performing since it joined MSFT’s ranks. One notable milestone to come out of those stats? Users logged 115 billion minutes of calls on Skype over the quarter — a number that was up 50 percent over the prior quarter.

The other good thing for Microsoft

The other good thing for Microsoft, given Skype’s seeming continuing popularity, is that it’s been a boost for the overall numbers in its entertainment. Revenue in its Entertainment and Devices division, which isn’t specifically barren, grew a significant 20 percent — by $292 million — which primarily reflected the inclusion of Skype. Clearly, on the flip side, Microsoft’s cost of revenue increased in Q4, related to Skype’s acquisition, deep down because it had to deal with all the related costs of onboarding Skype’s team, paying a bunch of new people, etc.

But, it’s safe to say with Xbox 360 shipments dropping from 1.7 million to 1 million, in other respects the Xbox LIVE boost in subscriptions, and that big increase in rev, most of that $292 million likely comes from Skype, potentially a good look at what the company’s quarterly earnings look like. Which is interesting, because Skype has never been a public company, in spite of being owned by eBay until 2009 — so it’s been hard to get a sense of just how profitable the business is, in spite of having millions of users. Myself included.

115 billion minutes of Skype calls logged is nothing to scoff at — and the 50 percent jump from the last quarter shows some strong growth for such an established business. Though, annoyingly, there was no mention of the number of paid calls. Just the same, anyway at the surface, it looks of the same type Microsoft reach could already be paying off.

Microsoft, founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen, is a veteran software company, best known for its Microsoft Windows operating system and the Microsoft Office suite of productivity software.Starting in 1980 Microsoft formed a partnership with IBM allowing Microsoft to sell its software package with the computers IBM manufactured. Microsoft is widely used by professionals worldwide and largely dominates the American corporate market.Additionally, the company has ventured into hardware with consumer products just as the Zune and...

Software application that allows users to make voice

Skype is a software application that allows users to make voice and video calls and chats over the Internet. Calls to other users within the Skype service are free, during calls to both traditional landline telephones and mobile phones can be made for a fee using a debit-based user account system. Skype was founded by Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis who were as well the founders of the file sharing application Kazaa.Skype has as well become popular for its additional...

More information: Investorguide
References:
  • ·

    Voip News