Skype likes WiMAX

Skype COO, Scott Durchslag, on a business trip to Taiwan, has been talking up the VoIP over WiMAX opportunity.

While 'traditional' mobile operators clearly have strategic issues at stake with VoIP, since there is potential it might cannibalise circuit-switched voice revenue, new WIMAX entrants - using an all-IP network - clearly have no legacy voice revenues to protect.

And Durchslag, according to local Taiwanese reports, certainly feels that VoIP service providers face conflict with mobile operators, although there are signs that this may be changing with the recent announcement by mobilkom, an Austrian mobile operator, to let its customers access the mobile VoIP client from Fring.

Durchslag went on to explain there is more scope for cooperation with WiMAX players than mobile operators as there will be new applications to work with. What new applications Durchslag was actually referring to, however, was not made clear.

In addition to visiting PChome Online, Skype's local service operator in Taiwan, Durchslag was also - according to local reports - exploring opportunities to cooperate with Taiwan-based makers of handsets and mobile devices.

Resource - Wimax Vision