Over 10 years ago, Skype used to be an extremely popular video chat and teamwork application in the world, including Vietnam. In March 2011, when it was at its peak, the platform used to have 30 million concurrent users online.
But now, this application has strangely disappeared, people no longer use Skype to call each other.
When the Covid-19 epidemic appeared, everyone had to work from home, but Skype that should have been the first choice for both businesses and individuals seemed to disappear, instead Zoom was chosen.
According to a study, in 2021, in the UK, Teams will account for 20% and Zoom will have 55% of the video call market share, and Skype will account for only 7%. In the US, Skype holds 4% market share, while Zoom’s up to 60%. The worst part is its disappearance from cultural discourse, people no longer “Skype” each other.
In May 2011, Microsoft acquired Skype for .5 billion. This makes many people expect Microsoft to take Skype to the next level. They redesigned the app and tried to make it more attractive, youthful and fresh, but didn’t focus on improving the quality of video calls, on Skype’s most iconic and distinctive feature.
The app received bad reviews, and received a lot of negative feedback, causing the average rating on the Skype app store to drop from 3.5 stars to 1.5 stars.
Om Malik, a partner at investment firm True Ventures, said he gave up on Skype because it got complicated, the interface got worse, and the performance was terrible.
Meanwhile, other services like Zoom began to add related features and improve call quality.
Even Microsoft admits they have problems with Skype. In November 2016, Microsoft launched Teams, a work application with integrated video calls. By September 2017, Microsoft had made a sideline announcement that Skype would soon be replaced by Teams.
When Covid broke out, the demand for a reliable video call system with fast speed increased dramatically. People look to Zoom because it offers the features they’re looking for and ignore Skype, which they know is about to be discontinued anyway from Microsoft’s statement.
Zoom works quickly without complicated settings, the ability to connect to calls without any obstacles are important reasons for the success of this application. Which Skype can no longer guarantee.