Skype Journal: iBasis $'s and Skype
May 7, 2005 09:34 AMBased on a tip from a reader I took a look at the latest iBasis results. iBasis is a Skype partner who just announced tremendous growth numbers. iBasis lists Skype as one of their major customers. Note the comparison numbers with first quarter one year ago. SkypeOut was not officially launched until July 27, 2004.
Minutes of use on The iBasis Network(TM) in the first quarter rose to 1.8 billion minutes, a 72% increase over the 1.0 billion minutes carried in the first quarter 2004, and a 17% sequential increase over the 1.5 billion minutes in the fourth quarter of 2004. Average revenue per minute was 5.0 cents per minute in the first quarter of 2005, unchanged from Q4 2004 iBasis Report YahooDo the back of the envelope numbers and consider the many minutes still unclaimed and Skype's cash flow looks positive.
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Comments (4)
Stuart, I am not able to repeat the calculation that you did. Can you please elaborate on it? They say that their average revenue is 5 cents per minute and Skype charges around 2 cents. So there is a shortfall. So any clarification you may provide will be useful.
Posted by: Aswath at May 7, 2005 2:17 PM
Aswath,
The 2cents only applies to the 21 countries that are at 1.7 euro cents. This suggests that many calls are being made on expensive minutes... or relatively expensive. You need relatively few calls to india or nigeria to find that your weighted average goes way up. Implies that cost is a real driver on those types of international calls. Similarly where the rates are highest broadband is probably either very expensive or hard to get.
Posted by: Stuart Henshall at May 7, 2005 4:40 PM
Does Skype use other companies like iBasis for SkypeOut? Also, does iBasis provide these services to Skype only in the US or other countries as well?
thanks...good post.
michael
Posted by: Michael Parekh at May 8, 2005 8:46 AM
Yes, Skype uses other partners besides iBasis - see http://www.skype.com/partners/current/, "Carrier Partners" section for some logos.
Posted by: Jaanus Kase at May 9, 2005 4:53 AM