Facebook end relationship with Skype

folarin okunola

April 29, 2015 5:51 PM

With the launch of video calling in Facebook Messenger iOS and Android now, it is clear that Facebook and Skype have ended their relationship.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg

Back in 2011, Facebook and Skype were the happiest of couples, telling whoever cared to listen how they working on making video calling a reality on Facebook Messenger.

At the time, Mark Zuckerberg had even said he and then-Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer were “really aligned on this.”

But with the launch of video calling in Facebook Messenger iOS and Android now, it is clear that Facebook and Skype have ended their relationship.

Even though there has not been any official announcement, the tech community the world over had been having suspicions of the rocky relationship since 2013, when Facebook introduced a voice calling option for messenger using its own technology.

Microsoft and Facebook have a long history together. Microsoft had invested $240 million back in 2007 when Facebook was just starting out. Now that Facebook is a tech giant in its own right, it no longer needs to depend on others for tech such as voice calling and search. Beside, keeping things in house gives Facebook more control.

Microsoft refused to comment on the end of the Skype deal with Facebook. Skype may have been a casualty of Facebook’s mission to never ever let its users leave the site even for a single second.

folarin okunola