A lot of speculation will be made here at Mobile World Congress about Skype and the iPhone and them becoming a mobile phone player. Many will jump to the conclusion that SKype is going to be a global mobile operator of sorts.
I think that while it’s potentially possible, Skype won’t go in that direction just yet. The reason is simple. Since the start Skype has worked very hard to avoid the regulators. They do a lot to avoid being a provider of E911 services and tend to work via interconnection partner to make their calls to PSTN and even SIP bridges possible.
The costs to be a global E911 player will be staggering for them. What’s more they would have to register in every country they would be operating in, and at least one would likely require them to surrender their algorithm to allow lawful intercept.
So while Skype may make great software that stimulates peer to peer communications, I don’t think that on either front their ready to say “I do” and become something that would be potentially damaging to their original strategy.