Redmond, Washington. The video-calling service Skype, which Microsoft purchased for $8.5 billion in 2011, is shutting down.
The software giant announced on Friday that it will transition some of its services to Microsoft Teams, its flagship videoconferencing platform, and discontinue Skype in May. Users of Skype will be able to access Teams using their current login credentials.
Teams has been Microsoft’s top priority over Skype for years, and the company’s decision to discontinue the brand is a result of a larger change in online communication.
Skype was a pioneer in making phone calls over the internet rather than landlines, having been founded in 2003 by a group of technologists in Tallinn, Estonia. After internet retailer eBay purchased the service in 2005, video calls were enabled.
At an event announcing the impending merger, then-Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer stated that Skype had over 170 million users globally by 2011, the year Microsoft purchased it from eBay.
According to Ballmer, the name Skype has practically become a verb that is associated with phone and video conversations.
When the administration of newly inaugurated President Donald Trump utilized Skype to answer questions from reporters located far from the White House press briefing room in 2017, it was still seen as high-tech.
