Skype coming to the iPad soon
After plenty of success with the iPhone version of the Skype app, the company is finally releasing an official version for the iPad. Skype hasn't announced a date for release yet, but video of the app has leaked out online, and the app is expected to be approved soon.
Context & Ripple Effects
Skype's move to the iPad completes an eighteen-month mobile push that began with the CD-quality 3G iPhone app promised in early 2010 and continued when it brought video calling to the iPhone 4 last December. A leaked video of the tablet version suggests App Store approval is imminent, though Skype has named no date.
The timing matters beyond the product cycle: the launch lands while Microsoft's acquisition of Skype is still pending and just months after the company started running ads in its client's Home tab in March, so the iPad app arrives as part of a business already being reshaped for new owners.
First-order effects
- iPad owners gain a native Skype video-calling option, putting Skype in direct competition with Apple's FaceTime, which until now was the default video call experience on the tablet.
- Skype extends its installed base from the phone screen to the larger-screen device, protecting the ad inventory it introduced in March across more sessions.
Second-order effects
- FaceTime's position as the iPad's only first-party video caller weakens: every cross-platform Skype contact becomes a reason not to need an all-Apple device chain, pressuring Apple to keep improving its own service.
- Under pending Microsoft ownership, a successful independent iPad app sets up a strategic question for Redmond about how committed the combined company will be to non-Windows, non-Windows Phone platforms.
Third-order effects
- Video calling is consolidating into device-agnostic services layered on top of hardware ecosystems rather than features tied to one vendor's devices — a structure that will shape how regulators and carriers treat VoIP on mobile networks.
- If free over-the-top video calling keeps spreading across tablets, carrier voice and video revenue faces structural erosion regardless of which app wins.
The trend: Mobile video calling is migrating from smartphones to tablets as platform-independent services like Skype challenge vendor-locked offerings such as Apple's FaceTime.