Skype – 2.6 bil $ web success made in Estonia - old article from 2010

[Äike]

Skype – 2.6 bil $ web success made in Estonia

There is no doubt that Skype has managed to make the world a better place. It has infinitely simplified the way we communicate internationally. Nevertheless, very few people know that the foundation of Skype, the software that allows users to make free calls over the internet, has been called by the worldwide tech press ”a real baltic success story”.

Baltic development made Skype happen

The application software Skype was initially developed by Estonian developers Ahti Heinla, Priit Kasesalu and Jaan Tallinn, the same developers that have started the peer-to-peer file sharing software Kazaa. Jaan Tallinn, the main engineer behind Skype, is now a well known worldwide specialist in P2P technologies and is the only one of the 3 initial developers which is still around the company, performing various tech tasks.

Even though the company is based in Luxembourg and most of the management and marketing jobs are done in London, the main development center for Skype is in the Estonian capital, Tallinn, and this is where over 80% of the Skype employees work. Due to this successful team of web developers, Estonia is now the country, which could be called the homeland of 2 technological super achievements Skype and Kazaa. Not to mention that Hotmail is another great Estonian development success.

The sky is the limit for Skype

Skype Limited, the company that operates Skype, was founded in 2003 by the Swedish entrepreneur Niklas Zennstrom and the Danish entrepreneur Janus Friis. The name of Skype comes from the initial idea of „sky peer-to-peer”. The 2 founders have decided to hire the same successful Estonian developers that made Kazaa possible for the development of the new Skype.

eBay acquired Skype Limited in September 2005 for 2.1 billion € (2.6 billion $) and later on, during november 2009 decided to sell a majority stake of 70% to a consortium comprising Silver Lake Partners, CPPIB, Andreessen Horowitz, and the original founders.

Skype recently reached 500 million registered users worldwide and the sky seems to be the limit for the plans that Skype owners have for their business.

From Skype to Erply

For Estonia, Skype’s international success has meant more than just 3 happy Estonian engineers who earned worldwide fame. It has also meant a big push to start new successful tech startups, looking more actively at international markets, something that has been very limited until now. A recent Estonian success, Erply, won the 2009 Seedcamp and is already profitable, proves that we will be hearing more and more great things about Estonian web startups.

Dedicated to Vasa

Also, an update to the 2010 article. Today in 2013, Estonia has the most start-ups per person in the entire world.

[Ultra]

Vasa does not like Estonians or?

[Äike]

Vasa does not like Estonians or?

Nah, he just said that Skype is a Swedish invention and I'm stupid for saying otherwise... The fact is that Skype was created in Tallinn, by 3 Estonians. Even to this day Skype is led from Tallinn, as it was invented here.

Skype is an Estonian IT success story. Estonian IT has advanced quite rapidly since year 2000 and now in 2013, Estonia is an IT titan on a global scale.

[RussiaPrussia]

Nah, he just said that Skype is a Swedish invention and I'm stupid for saying otherwise... The fact is that Skype was created in Tallinn, by 3 Estonians. Even to this day Skype is led from Tallinn, as it was invented here.

Skype is an Estonian IT success story. Estonian IT has advanced quite rapidly since year 2000 and now in 2013, Estonia is an IT titan on a global scale.

Estonian IT success story? The company was led in luxembourg until it got bought up by americans, microsoft.

[Styggnacke]

Zennström founded the company, and he's a big player in the IT market. If he hadn't invested in the project and said that this software was good, some other software would have succeded instead (there were many competitors). So the reason Skype is big today is simply because of Zennström, and partly due to ebay and Microsoft for further developing the company.

[alb0zfinest]

Nah, he just said that Skype is a Swedish invention and I'm stupid for saying otherwise... The fact is that Skype was created in Tallinn, by 3 Estonians. Even to this day Skype is led from Tallinn, as it was invented here.

Skype is an Estonian IT success story. Estonian IT has advanced quite rapidly since year 2000 and now in 2013, Estonia is an IT titan on a global scale.

I congratulate those Estonians on the success of Skype, but Estonia is not an It titan on a global scale, sorry to say. It definitely is a big achievement, but still not an IT titan.

[Äike]

Zennström founded the company, and he's a big player in the IT market. If he hadn't invested in the project and said that this software was good, some other software would have succeded instead (there were many competitors). So the reason Skype is big today is simply because of Zennström, and partly due to ebay and Microsoft for further developing the company.

The Skype software did not exist before the 3 Estonian IT guys created it.

I congratulate those Estonians on the success of Skype, but Estonia is not an It titan on a global scale, sorry to say. It definitely is a big achievement, but still not an IT titan.

The NATO cyber-defence centre of excellence of the world is located in Tallinn, because we are the most competent IT nation in NATO. Also, practically of all new EU IT-solutions come from Estonia.

Estonia is the only country in the world that is developed enough in the IT-sphere that we can vote in the elections, through our computers. Even if I was in Antarctica, I could still vote in the elections of Estonia, even if the nearest EU embassy was thousands of kilometres away, because of our ID-cards and our IT-technology.

[Styggnacke]

The Skype software did not exist before the 3 Estonian IT guys created it.

What is it you don't understand? IP-telephony wasn't exactly created by these three Estonians. Even today there are similar software competitors, like Ventrilo and TeamSpeak. The reason Skype got big is simply because of Zennström and his money. Got it now?

[Thor2009]

I'm still disappointed that it was turned into a surveillance tool when the Americans bought it.
It was such a great, decentralized system beforehand.

[glass]

Nah, he just said that Skype is a Swedish invention and I'm stupid for saying otherwise... The fact is that Skype was created in Tallinn, by 3 Estonians. Even to this day Skype is led from Tallinn, as it was invented here..

skype is indeed swedish/danish invention, your country was used as place with cheap rent and cheap programmers to do simple lowskilled job.