China is not going to allow for charged VoIP
calling services just yet, Financial Times reported yesterday.
The government "is not going to issue VoIP licenses until 2008" said Wang Leilei, the chief executive of the Chinese Internet portal, Tom Online in the Financial Times report.
Tom Online along with joint venture partner Skype (News - Alert) currently offers free five-minute telephony calls for computer-to-computer users in China and recently introduced a free computer-to-telephone service for users.
According to the report, Skype told Financial Times in November that it was talking with Chinese telecoms to offer SkypeOut, a computer-telephone service.
But according to the Financial Times the report, Chinese fixed-line operators are hesitant to accept SkypeOut's capabilities to provide lower rate calls, worried about the possibility of weakening their core business.
Mr. Wang is also quoted in the article as saying he is not disappointed about the possibility of not launching SkypeOut commercially.
"Revenue [from SkypeOut] is not important to us because we have not put in a lot of cost."
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Stefania Viscusi is an established writer and avid reader. To see more of her articles, please visit Stefania Viscusi’s columnist page.
Voice over IP (VoIP) | X |
A real-time communications system that converts voice into digital packets containing media and signaling data that travel over networks using Internet Protocol....more |