Skaap, a South African voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) service emerging from a partnership with Global Telecom and the Singaporean-listed network integrator MediaRing, has over 500 users in the local market.
It is primarily a niche service targeting South Africans looking to connect to friends and family in other countries, says GM Brett Magrath. The most popular destinations are the US, the UK and Australia - with New Zealand, Israel and Canada growing in popularity among the users.
"It's going very well from our point of view." He adds that most of the interest has been in the dial-in services, rather than Skaap's IP solutions.
"Dial-in is simple, no hardware is required," notes Magrath, adding as broadband penetration levels increase, Skaap should see more interest in the IP solutions.
Skaap Talk, an instant messaging and PC phone solution which will be interoperable with Google Talk (through MediaRing's membership to the Google Federation) will be available by late November.
Magrath says there is relatively limited awareness of VOIP technology in SA. "As much as VOIP is technologically advanced, the local end-user market is still going through an educational process."
Related story:
Global Telecom debuts Skaap
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