One of America’s biggest software makers, Microsoft, made a big decision that can have a severe impact. This big decision is that Skype is coming to an end which is bad news for those who are loyal Skype users. This is especially sad news since many users became used to this platform after it was implemented two decades ago.<\/p>\n
Skype was launched in 2003 in Estonia and was quickly seen as the best method to make free calls worldwide. This was one of the notable perks of the platform considering international calling on traditional phones used to be severely expensive back then. The service quickly became popular and a fan favourite. It is because of this that eBay bought it in 2005 for $2.6 billion. However, the partnership did not work out as anticipated, and eBay sold its 65% stake in Skype to an investor group for $1.9 billion in 2009 just before Microsoft bought it in 2011.<\/p>\n
This tragic news come after Microsoft bought Skype 14 years ago for $8.5 billion in cash. This marked the company\u2019s largest-ever acquisition at that time. Also, Microsoft integrated the service into some of its other products, like Office for example and its ill-fated mobile operating service Windows Phone.<\/p>\n
Microsoft is bringing Skype to an end. Skype, an internet-based phone and video service, was once the dominant mode of remaining connected in the mid-2000s. This platform will no longer be available<\/em> to use starting in May 2025. The company stated on X that users can use their log-in information on Microsoft Teams\u2019 free tier in the days ahead.<\/p>\n According to the president of Microsoft 365 collaborative apps and platforms, Jeff Teper, Skype played an imperative part of shaping and forming the modern communications system and supporting countless meaningful moments He added that Microsoft is honoured to have been part of the journey with Skype.<\/p>\n He further added in a blog post that, the company is excited about the new opportunities that Teams brings and are committed to assisting users to remain connected in new and meaningful ways.<\/p>\n Skype does not have as much impact in today’s society any, not as much as it did in the early 2000s. Back then many of the online communication channels that exists now and is extremely popular now, did not exist back then. Now, Skype has too many platforms to compete with – that offers the same services users used to receive only from Skype.<\/p>\n In addition, Skype\u2019s popularity has faded in recent years, with all the other applications that became extremely popular over the recent years. This was evident with the pandemic, that gave other platforms like Zoom, Google Meet, and Cisco Webex more fame. These communications platforms became significant competitors for Skype. Also, Microsoft Teams became very popular during the COVID-19 pandemic, especially amongst the vast majority of businesses.<\/p>\n Additionally, Skype has also faced increased competition over the last decade. As many of us became extremely technology driven, apps like Apple\u2019s FaceTime and Meta\u2019s WhatsApp, are some of the platforms many people are using these days. Plus, it was stated that, Microsoft has been investing severely in Teams, which basically offers many of the same services.<\/p>\n Those few users who are still loyal to Skype, needs to be aware of the changes that is coming in May 2025. If not yet, they have to familiarise themselves with other platforms that can provide them with similar services. The question now remains, which platform will take up the fan favourite position as Skype had for many years. This is a difficult question because there are many services clients can use that will give them the same results.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" One of America’s biggest software makers, Microsoft, made a big decision that can have a severe impact. This big decision is that Skype is coming to an end which is bad news for those who are loyal Skype users. This is especially sad news since many users became used to this platform after it was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1724,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"subtitle":"","format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"hide","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"1","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"custom","post_date_format_custom":"m\/d\/Y H:i","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"0","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"no-crop","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-715"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gcn.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The impact of Skype<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Skype’s competing edge against major platforms<\/strong><\/h2>\n