Data Communications - Daum, Skype to Roll Out VoIP in Korea
December 21, 2004
Daum Communications, South Korea's largest portal and e-mail service provider, recently announced that it would expand its business to include VoIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol). Daum has sealed an agreement with European VoIP service provider Skype Technologies to jointly market Internet phone services to the portal's more than 34 million registered customers.
Daum is expected to roll out PC-to-PC phone services as soon as the end of this month. The company has said that it will provide basic voice services free-of-cost, and will develop premium pay services through its alliance with Skype. Daum plans to connect VoIP applications to most of the portal's main services, which include online communities, e-mail, real-time messenger, and a search engine. Daum sees the addition of VoIP service as a vehicle to advance from offering only a text-based Internet platform to developing more multimedia applications.
The Korean government is promoting VoIP services as a means to increase competition in the fixed-line telephony and broadband Internet markets. The relatively low cost associated with VoIP technology has made for minimal entry barriers to the market. The government estimates that Korea will complete the transition to IP-based telephony by 2010, generating 5.3 trillion won (US$5 billion; US$1 = 1,058.12 KRW) in total service revenue. In October 2004, the South Korean Ministry of Information and Communication announced the creation of a dedicated dialing code for VoIP calls, 070.