March 2006

Luxembourg – March 9, 2006 – Skype™, the global Internet communications company, today announced Skype for Business, a solution designed to help small businesses easily manage communications, improve productivity and reduce costs. Skype for Business expands existing Skype small business offerings to include: Skype for Business Web site, a resource dedicated to business support; new Skype hardware from Plantronics; and new features in Skype for Business Control Panel (formerly named Skype Groups) to simplify management of grouped users and pre-paid services.

Skype for Business introduces a dedicated Web site aimed at simplifying global communications and group administration for companies with fewer than 10 employees, a market represented by more than 50 percent of businesses already using Skype. This new resource, available now at the Web site skype.biz, makes it easy for companies to use Skype and find valuable resources to maximize security and improve productivity. Other useful features include integration with the Microsoft Outlook toolbar and new products optimized for small businesses are also available through Skype for Business.

“We know from listening to our more than 75 million customers that 30 percent of them are regularly using Skype for their businesses and most of these are small companies,” said Niklas Zennström, Skype CEO and co-founder. “Skype is dedicated to being the champion of these companies by making it incredibly easy for them to be productive, save money and have access to a sophisticated global communications solution that helps them compete.”

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS FEATURES
Skype for Business allows administrators to centralize the management of company-wide paid services and usability tools. Skype for Business Control Panel is available in 18 major languages: Chinese (simplified), Chinese (traditional), Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Portuguese (Brazilian), Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and six currencies: Brazilian real, British pound, euro, Japanese yen, Polish zloty and U.S. dollar. The Skype for Business Control Panel offers a new auto-management feature that enables group administrators to make large credit purchases to one account and simultaneously distribute Skype credits, topping-off all customer accounts. Skype credits can be used for Skype premium offerings including SkypeIn, SkypeOut, voicemail, personalization and third-party conference calling.

“We’re using Skype and it has reduced our voice communications costs significantly.” said Mark Ehr, Director of Product Marketing, Proxima Technology (www.proxima-tech.com), a company that makes service management software. “We frequently hold international four-way conference calls between our offices in Australia, the US and the UK, with usually a mix of Skype and SkypeOut, and it has the potential to save us thousands of dollars. We also use Skype to forward our office phones to our SkypeIn numbers when we're travelling, it's great to be at a hotel in London, receiving free SkypeIn calls, and my callers don't realize that I'm not sitting at my desk in Denver.”

SKYPE CERTIFIED BUSINESS HARDWARE
Plantronics today announced its Internet-optimized Voyager 510 Bluetooth headset solution featuring a plug-and-play USB Bluetooth voice adapter. “Skype for Business coupled with our new Bluetooth headset is the ultimate tool for small businesses,” commented Philip Vanhoutte, EMEA Managing Director, Plantronics. “You no longer need to carry a multitude of devices. Our Voyager 510 Bluetooth headset solution is multipoint, allowing customers to switch seamlessly between mobile phone and Internet calls.”

Other available high-quality products optimized for small businesses include:

Actiontec: Vosky Exchange allows company PBX systems to connect with up to four Skype callers
Linksys: Cordless Internet phone provides freedom of movement; a convenient alternative to Skype calls on the PC
Polycom: Computer Calling Kit, an option for Polycom’s SoundStation2™ and SoundStation2W™ (wireless) conference phones, enables the conference phones to also serve as the microphone and speaker for Internet calling
USRobotics: USB Internet Speakerphone enables hands-free, high-quality Skype calls
THIRD PARTY BUSINESS SERVICES
Skype has partnered to offer enhanced services to business customers. Examples include:

Convenos: The Skype Certified Convenos Meeting Center delivers an on-demand Web collaboration and conferencing tool so customers can run productive, cost-effective meetings (convenos.com)
Digitrad: 1Touch Connect translates the following languages into English: Cantonese, French, Mandarin and Spanish
(share.skype.com/directory/live_interpreter_by_1touch_connect/view/)
Salesforce.com: Skype for AppExchange brings Skype features to Salesforce and all the on-demand applications on AppExchange (appexchange.com)
Vapps: High-speed conferencing service enables Skype customers to create moderated calls for up to 500 Skype, wireless, or telephone participants (highspeedconferencing.com)
WebDialogs: Unyte allows Skype enabled businesses to share documents, presentations, applications and/or PC desktops with anyone connected using a Web browser (webdialogs.com/unyte)
Skype already offers small companies the market advantage by lowering operating costs and increasing productivity. Existing Skype features that increase productivity in the workplace include:

Presence: Colleagues can see at a glance whether their co-workers are online, are forwarding their incoming Skype calls, or are unavailable. This allows callers to form ad hoc conference calls or online meetings instantaneously, a competitive advantage over the old ways of organizing a conference call
Mobility: Skype customers can log into any computer, laptop or PDA anywhere around the world and access their Skype account and contact list
Contact List and Global User Directory: Skype eliminates the need for address book maintenance with its central contact list – callers can send contacts and share entire groups of contacts in their buddy list with others
Privacy: Skype calls are end-to-end encrypted for superior privacy
Ease-of-use: With Skype, there is no expensive equipment to buy
About Skype
Skype is the world’s fastest-growing Internet communication offering, allowing people everywhere to make unlimited voice and video communication for free. Skype is available in 27 languages and is used in almost every country around the world. Skype generates revenue through its premium offerings such as making and receiving calls to and from landline and mobile phones, as well as voicemail and call forwarding. Skype also has relationships with a growing network of hardware and software providers. Skype is an eBay company (NASDAQ: EBAY). To learn more visit skype.com.

Skype is not a telephony replacement service and cannot be used for emergency calling

Link

Consumers in Europe will now have access to a dedicated shop-in-shop on the www.pixmania.com web site in which they will be able to access the full range of Skype certified products, with special packages and exclusive offers, as well as constantly updated information about the Skype functionalities and the latest Skype certified products.

Paris, 28 March 2006

Skype has today announced the signing of a pan-European marketing and sales partnership agreement with PIXmania, the European leader in Internet sales of high-tech and digital leisure products.

The agreement, covers seven European countries: France, UK, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Germany and Estonia. In each of these countries, consumers will have access to the full Skype world, through the www.pixmania.com site. They will be able to search, compare and buy the complete range of Skype certified products (headsets, earpieces, USB telephones, cordless telephones, etc), with a constantly updated range of packages and special offers. They will also be able to access information about Skype , how to use it and the latest innovations from the Skype ecosystem.

PIXmania is established in 25 countries and is Europe's largest e-commerce site for the sale of high-tech and digital leisure products (photo, DVD, video games, camcorders, tv video, audio, IT, telephony, consumables, accessories, photo printing). With an estimated 2006 turnover of 380 million euros (fiscal year 1 April to 31 March 2006) and a staff of 650, the company has more than 4 million customers and delivers its products in 24/48 h anywhere in Europe. Thanks to a state-of-the-art logistics platform and unique know-how, PIXmania also offers customers a complete range of innovative services, making extensive use of consumer testimonials on video.

"Thanks to our agreement with the e-commerce leader PIXmania, we now have a real on-line "Skype Corner" accessible to all European consumers, said James Bilefield, General Manager Skype Europe. "This is an extremely important step in the development of our distribution channels in Europe".

"An alliance with Skype looked seemed to us: a common target, two strong brands, sharing the same values based on consumers and innovation," said Jean Emile Rosenblum, Vice President of FotoVista.

Taking full advantage of PIXmania's expertise in e-commerce of high-tech and digital leisure products, the area dedicated to Skype is divided into three headings:

* Getting to know Skype – which contains instructions about the solution and how to install it
* More about Skype – which gives access to Skype pay services, the full range of certified products and Skype packages, including a range of PIXmania exclusive offers
* Skype News – constantly updated information about everything that's new in the Skype environment.

With an extremely user-friendly layout, consumers can examine and compare all the products in the range as and when they want to, with the added bonus of having access to a number of user testimonials on video.

About PIXmania

PIXmania was created in 2000 and is today Europe's largest general public e-store with more than 40,000 references at the most competitive prices on the market. PIXmania owes its success to its product availability, low prices, quick delivery and many associated services. The site had 4,000,000 customers at the end of December 2005 and receives more than 9 million one-off visitors per month.. PIXmania is also www.mypixmania.com, a portal dedicated to digital photo printing and free photo archival. With more than 450 employees, PIXmania is established in 25 European countries, achieved a turnover of 247.5 M€ ex. VAT at the end of March 2005 and anticipates turnover of 380M€ for the current year. PIXmania is a brand of the Fotovista group.

About Skype

Skype is the world’s fastest-growing Internet communication offering, allowing people everywhere to make unlimited voice and video communication for free. Skype is available in 27 languages and is used in almost every country around the world. Skype generates revenue through its premium offerings such as making and receiving calls to and from landline and mobile phones, as well as voicemail and call forwarding. Skype also has relationships with a growing network of hardware and software providers. Skype is an eBay company (NASDAQ: EBAY). To learn more visit skype.com.

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Barcelona, 13th February, 2006 —Skype, the Global Internet Communications Company, is to establish a huge new retail presence in Europe, through the creation of a new distribution and retail programme with Dangaard Telecom. The new programme will give Skype Certified products the potential to reach shoppers across more than 34,000 European retailers, who will initially include Mediamarkt, Media-Saturn, Merlin, Dansk Supermarked and Surcouf.

This agreement supports Skype’s growing presence in Europe: Dangaard’s network of consumer electronic, hypermarkets and mobile phone vendors will help expose Skype’s unique worldwide free communications offering to a broad new audience of potential customers. Further, these retail stores will provide consumers with a place to shop for new Skype Certified products, including co-branded products from Simply Phones, Ipevo, Labtec, Sennheiser Communications and VoIPvoice.

The initial product selection will include starter packs, headsets, USB phones, and webcams – all in uniformly-sized packaging with consistent colouring and branding. The product price range will be €10–40 with an entry-level focus. To showcase the products, retailers will be offered plug-and-play ‘Skype Stand’ display units, ready-stocked with Skype certified products, that can be placed anywhere in the store.

“Skype is on the look-out for innovative retail channels, and Dangaard is known for helping build markets for new products, particularly in communications products,” said Saul Klein, Skype’s vice president of marketing. “Customers should love the convenience of being able to view and purchase from an array of Skype Certified products to enhance their communications.”

“Our retailer customers are already purchasing Skype Certified products, and have asked us if they can promote these in a Skype environment,” said Mogens Jakobsen, General Manager, Dangaard Telecom’s VoIP Division. “Our retail programme enables retailers to implement a complete portfolio of Skype Certified products very quickly, and the brand recognition created will certainly attract shoppers. It’s exactly what our customers are looking for.”

In mid-March, Dangaard Telecom will launch the programme into its existing accessories programme, which currently includes 3,500 points-of-sale across Europe. In late March, Dangaard will work with Skype to expand the programme across its 34,000 retail locations in 12 countries (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Holland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Switzerland, Spain and Sweden).
The Skype–Dangaard programme is open to new retailers. Those interested in featuring Skype Certified accessories in their stores should contact Thomas Friis on mail: skype@dangaard.com, or phone +45 7330 3080.

About Skype

Skype is the world’s fastest-growing Internet communication offering, allowing people everywhere to make unlimited voice and video communication for free. Skype is available in 27 languages and is used in almost every country around the world. Skype generates revenue through its premium offerings such as making and receiving calls to and from landline and mobile phones, as well as voicemail and call forwarding. Skype also has relationships with a growing network of hardware and software providers. Skype is an eBay company (NASDAQ: EBAY). To learn more visit skype.com.
Skype is not a telephony replacement service and cannot be used for emergency calling.

About Dangaard

Dangaard Telecom has its headquarters in Padborg, Denmark, and is Europe's largest distributor of mobile phones and original accessories for mobile phones. Through new services, the company has developed the traditional distributor role and is today the preferred Value Adding Distributor for a number of Europe's largest manufacturers of mobile phones, tele operators and retail chains. Dangaard Telecom has subsidiaries in 14 countries. You can visit Dangaard Telecom at 3GSM World Congress in Hall 2, Stand no E102, or at www.dangaard.com

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Luxembourg – March 9, 2006 – Skype™, the global Internet communications company, today announced Skype for Business, a solution designed to help small businesses easily manage communications, improve productivity and reduce costs. Skype for Business expands existing Skype small business offerings to include: Skype for Business Web site, a resource dedicated to business support; new Skype hardware from Plantronics; and new features in Skype for Business Control Panel (formerly named Skype Groups) to simplify management of grouped users and pre-paid services.

Skype for Business introduces a dedicated Web site aimed at simplifying global communications and group administration for companies with fewer than 10 employees, a market represented by more than 50 percent of businesses already using Skype. This new resource, available now at the Web site skype.biz, makes it easy for companies to use Skype and find valuable resources to maximize security and improve productivity. Other useful features include integration with the Microsoft Outlook toolbar and new products optimized for small businesses are also available through Skype for Business.

“We know from listening to our more than 75 million customers that 30 percent of them are regularly using Skype for their businesses and most of these are small companies,” said Niklas Zennström, Skype CEO and co-founder. “Skype is dedicated to being the champion of these companies by making it incredibly easy for them to be productive, save money and have access to a sophisticated global communications solution that helps them compete.”

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS FEATURES

Skype for Business allows administrators to centralize the management of company-wide paid services and usability tools. Skype for Business Control Panel is available in 18 major languages: Chinese (simplified), Chinese (traditional), Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Portuguese (Brazilian), Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and six currencies: Brazilian real, British pound, euro, Japanese yen, Polish zloty and U.S. dollar. The Skype for Business Control Panel offers a new auto-management feature that enables group administrators to make large credit purchases to one account and simultaneously distribute Skype credits, topping-off all customer accounts. Skype credits can be used for Skype premium offerings including SkypeIn, SkypeOut, voicemail, personalization and third-party conference calling.

“We’re using Skype and it has reduced our voice communications costs significantly.” said Mark Ehr, Director of Product Marketing, Proxima Technology (www.proxima-tech.com), a company that makes service management software. “We frequently hold international four-way conference calls between our offices in Australia, the US and the UK, with usually a mix of Skype and SkypeOut, and it has the potential to save us thousands of dollars. We also use Skype to forward our office phones to our SkypeIn numbers when we're travelling, it's great to be at a hotel in London, receiving free SkypeIn calls, and my callers don't realize that I'm not sitting at my desk in Denver.”

SKYPE CERTIFIED BUSINESS HARDWARE

Plantronics today announced its Internet-optimized Voyager 510 Bluetooth headset solution featuring a plug-and-play USB Bluetooth voice adapter. “Skype for Business coupled with our new Bluetooth headset is the ultimate tool for small businesses,” commented Philip Vanhoutte, EMEA Managing Director, Plantronics. “You no longer need to carry a multitude of devices. Our Voyager 510 Bluetooth headset solution is multipoint, allowing customers to switch seamlessly between mobile phone and Internet calls.”

Other available high-quality products optimized for small businesses include:

• Actiontec: Vosky Exchange allows company PBX systems to connect with up to four Skype callers


• Linksys: Cordless Internet phone provides freedom of movement; a convenient alternative to Skype calls on the PC 


• Polycom: Computer Calling Kit, an option for Polycom’s SoundStation2™ and SoundStation2W™ (wireless) conference phones, enables the conference phones to also serve as the microphone and speaker for Internet calling


• USRobotics: USB Internet Speakerphone enables hands-free, high-quality Skype calls

THIRD PARTY BUSINESS SERVICES

Skype has partnered to offer enhanced services to business customers. Examples include:

• Convenos: The Skype Certified Convenos Meeting Center delivers an on-demand Web collaboration and conferencing tool so customers can run productive, cost-effective meetings (convenos.com)


• Digitrad: 1Touch Connect translates the following languages into English: Cantonese, French, Mandarin and Spanish
  
  (share.skype.com/directory/live_interpreter_by_1touch_connect/view/)


• Salesforce.com: Skype for AppExchange brings Skype features to Salesforce and all the on-demand applications on AppExchange (appexchange.com)


• Vapps: High-speed conferencing service enables Skype customers to create moderated calls for up to 500 Skype, wireless, or telephone participants (highspeedconferencing.com)


• WebDialogs: Unyte allows Skype enabled businesses to share documents, presentations, applications and/or PC desktops with anyone connected using a Web browser  (webdialogs.com/unyte)

Skype already offers small companies the market advantage by lowering operating costs and increasing productivity. Existing Skype features that increase productivity in the workplace include:

• Presence: Colleagues can see at a glance whether their co-workers are online, are forwarding their incoming Skype calls, or are unavailable. This allows callers to form ad hoc conference calls or online meetings instantaneously, a competitive advantage over the old ways of organizing a conference call


• Mobility: Skype customers can log into any computer, laptop or PDA anywhere around the world and access their Skype account and contact list


• Contact List and Global User Directory: Skype eliminates the need for address book maintenance with its central contact list – callers can send contacts and share entire groups of contacts in their buddy list with others


• Privacy: Skype calls are end-to-end encrypted for superior privacy


• Ease-of-use: With Skype, there is no expensive equipment to buy  

About Skype

Skype is the world’s fastest-growing Internet communication offering, allowing people everywhere to make unlimited voice and video communication for free. Skype is available in 27 languages and is used in almost every country around the world. Skype generates revenue through its premium offerings such as making and receiving calls to and from landline and mobile phones, as well as voicemail and call forwarding. Skype also has relationships with a growing network of hardware and software providers. Skype is an eBay company (NASDAQ: EBAY). To learn more visit skype.com.

Skype is not a telephony replacement service and cannot be used for emergency calling

Link