TeleGeography estimates that cross-border Skype-to-Skype calls (including video calls) grew 48 percent in 2011, to 145 billion minutes. Although the volume of international traffic routed via telephone companies remains more than three times greater than Skype’s cross-border volumes, their growth rates differ dramatically. In contrast to international phone traffic, Skype’s cross-border traffic has continued to soar. This growth rate was less than one-third of the industry’s long-run historical average of 13 percent annual growth. According to new data from TeleGeography, international long-distance traffic grew four percent in 2011, to 438 billion minutes. International long-distance traffic growth is slowing rapidly. From the TeleGeography press release (emphasis added): The declines are coming at a time when the prices of long-distance calls are heading south. The latest data from research firm TeleGeography shows that international voice traffic - typically the most lucrative part of a phone company’s business - is declining sharply. Skype (now a division of Microsoft), which at its very basic level is a people-to-people connectivity service, has become everything the phone companies feared it for. However, the Internet’s deflationary impact is on full display in the international long-distance market, where Skype (s MSFT) has started to take away any and all growth from the phone companies. The shifting fortunes of Wall Street brokers and travel agents are good examples.
The Internet is a great deflator, squeezing out the middlemen and lowering prices.
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