SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Google Inc.'s effort unveiled earlier this week to expand the use of its Internet-calling service by enabling easy access through email accounts is likely to increase its status as a competitive threat to an already-wary telecommunications industry.
Google Voice was met with sharp criticism last year from traditional telecom giants such as AT&T Inc. /quotes/comstock/13*!t/quotes/nls/t (T 26.60, -0.10, -0.38%) , which argued with the U.S. Federal Communications Commission that it should be regulated as a traditional telecom service. Google countered that as a free Internet service, Google Voice is exempt from such regulation. See story about the FCC's examination of Google Voice.
Cell tower for your homeWalt Mossberg tells us about solution for people who have weak or no cellular service in their homes and why the big wireless companies are keep quiet about it.
Now, Google /quotes/comstock/15*!goog/quotes/nls/goog (GOOG 451.00, +0.02, +0.00%) is making it easier to use Google Voice, by providing instant access through the company's Gmail accounts.
The Mountain View, Calif.-based Internet major is also deploying a related marketing campaign, which will have it placing at least five custom-made phone booths at airports and college campuses around the U.S., where potential users can pick up a hand set and sample the service.
Google on Wednesday unveiled its Gmail voice service, which enables users to call any phone on Google Voice directly through their email account. Calls made to phones within the U.S. and Canada are free, at least until the end of the year, while charges for international calls are billed at rates as low as 2 cents a minute.
Google said that by midday Thursday, over 1 million calls had been placed through the service. Google spokesman Randall Sarafa said rates charged from international calls enable the company to subsidize the free calls in North America.
Challenging rivals
The availability of Google Voice through email presents a new potential challenge to other companies, including Skype S.A., the Internet-calling service provider that filed for an initial public offering of shares earlier this month.
Google's Gmail voice service is designed to avoid some of the steps required to use Skype, by working inside of an Internet browser rather than through software downloaded to a computer.
In addition, Google's free calling through Gmail to phones in North America compares to Skype's rate of 2.1 cents a minute for calls to phones in the U.S.
Skype is partially owned by online auctioneer eBay Inc. /quotes/comstock/15*!ebay/quotes/nls/ebay (EBAY 22.73, -0.43, -1.86%)
The Gmail voice service also represents a threat to more traditional telecommunications companies, which are already seeing customers scrap their landline service in favor of other options.
"It certainly is an indirect threat, and over the long term, it could evolve to be a direct threat," Gartner Inc. analyst Ray Valdes said of Google Voice.
While online call quality may not yet be able to exactly match what a traditional telecom can provide, Google is likely to continue improving the tool, Valdes said.
"Google's big enough that eventually it will be stepping on different industry players," including Skype, telecoms and even other Internet firms offering an increasing array of communications services, the analyst said.
An AT&T spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment. A Verizon Communications Inc. /quotes/comstock/13*!vz/quotes/nls/vz (VZ 29.39, -0.11, -0.37%) spokesman also did not respond to a request for comment.
AT&T fired off a letter to the FCC last year, complaining that Google Voice is a "creatively packaged" traditional telecom service, and that Google's practice of blocking certain, costly calls on the service violates the same so-called network neutrality principles that Google has long espoused. See story about AT&T's complaint about Google Voice.
The FCC has in the past penalized companies for blocking calls that result in expensive termination fees for carriers.
According to network neutrality proponents, all traffic and services should be allowed equal access to a network. The FCC has backed that view, though its ability to regulate the issue has been called into question. Operators maintain that they should be free to restrict some services on their networks that hog bandwidth and hinder quality for other users.
Google's Sarafa declined to comment on how the Gmail voice service might be received by traditional telecoms. He deferred to statements publicly posted last year by Google's Washington telecom and media counsel Richard Whitt, where Whitt writes that telecom carriers' argument that Google Voice should be regulated "doesn't fly."
Whitt acknowledges that Google does block some calls on Google Voice, but only those connected to "traffic pumping schemes" aimed at gouging higher fees from carriers.
In addition, Whitt writes: "The FCC's open Internet principles apply only to the behavior of broadband carriers -- not the creators of Web-based software applications."
Earlier this month, Google and Verizon jointly published a public policy proposal that riled network neutrality proponents, because it did not call for strict network neutrality principles to be applied to wireless networks or certain future services. See report on Internet neutrality proposal from Google and Verizon.
John Letzing is a MarketWatch reporter based in San Francisco
No comments:
Post a Comment