8x8's International Calling Service, MobileTalk, Comes to New BlackBerry Smartphones

Targeting handheld devices that analysts predict will double their share of the cell phone market by 2013, a Santa Clara-based company today announced that its mobile international calling service is now available for popular smartphone models.

 

Officials at 8x8 Inc. – provider of Virtual Office and Packet8 broadband business, residential, video and mobile communications services – say their “MobileTalk” service, which already works with nearly 700 cell phone models, now works with Research In Motion’s Blackberry Android (News - Alert), Storm (pictured below) and Bold smartphones.

 

“MobileTalk utilizes a downloadable software application that can reside on any Windows, Palm, RIM, Symbian-based or iPhone (News - Alert) mobile phone to seamlessly connect international calls from that device to the 8x8 digital communications network,” company officials say. “Unlike calling card, callback and other reduced-rate international mobile calling services, which require the user to dial numerous key strokes or make calls through cumbersome software applications, MobileTalk users can dial calls directly and natively from their mobile handset, contact list or speed dial directory with no additional keystrokes.”

 

More importantly, especially in this slower economy, the service helps cell phone users maintain the flexibility of calling overseas from their mobile devices while cutting back on those costs.

 

For example, MobileTalk offers rates of 1 cent per minute to China, 3 cents per minute to Mexico, 4 cents per minute to the United Kingdom and less than 6 cents per minute to India.

 

The product – which customers can sign up for here – is being released at a very good time.

 

As TMCnet reported, officials at In-Stat say that worldwide smartphone sales will remain strong in 2009 – in some ways, a nod to the power of mobile solutions to weather this recession – and especially strong in the United States.

 

According to Frank Dickson, vice president of the market research firm’s mobile Internet group, strong demand is being driven by device manufacturers leveraging open OS device to re-invent the mobile phone experience.

 

“New and prospective smartphone buyers are drawn to new mobile applications, even though the median number of applications downloaded for all platforms, including the Apple (News - Alert) iPhone, is relatively modest – below five applications per user for each platform,” Dickson said.

 

Those applications appear to drawing buyers.

  

According to a new survey from ABI Research, 16.5 percent of U.S. smartphone users who installed applications on their devices spent between $100 and $499 last year.

 

MobileTalk also uses a downloadable software application, which can reside on any Windows, Palm, RIM, Symbian (News - Alert)-based or iPhone mobile phone to connect international calls from that device to the 8x8 digital communications network.

 

“Unlike calling card, callback and other reduced-rate international mobile calling services, which require the user to dial numerous key strokes or make calls through cumbersome software applications, MobileTalk users can dial calls directly and natively from their mobile handset, contact list or speed dial directory with no additional keystrokes,” company officials say.

 

Specifically, the new software release – already compatible with the Apple iPhone – applies to the Blackberry Android (G1), Bold (9000 model), Storm (9500 and 9530 model) and all other Blackberry devices with OS Version 4.6 and 4.7. Go here for a full list of supported devices.