As MobileMag reports, Skype Technologies announced at the Voice On the Net (VON) conference in Toronto, that a mobile version for smart phone will be available this year.

Skype is a free global telephony application that allows for VoIP communications, it currently runs on Mac OSX, Windows and Pocket PC, Skype plans to release a version for Embedded Linux, Symbian or Windows Mobile devices later this year.

"We will encourage hardware manufacturers to deploy Skype on their devices." said Zennstrom, co-founder and CEO. "SkypeMobile for mobile devices (our unofficial name for the new Skype) will be targeted to hardware manufacturers for integration into new dual-mode (GPRS + WiFi) mobile devices once made available to carriers. Our guess is that whichever manufacturer will adopt Skype first is the platform SkypeMobile will be released for."

Skype for mobile phones sounds good but I wonder if carriers will pick-up this idea. For me it's the same like iTunes on mobile phones which isn't picked-up by a single carrier yet. Since 95 % of the cellular revenue comes from voice calls, why should carriers support VoIP on their devices.
I'm sure there will be a free version downloadable later this year anyway. which can be installed on smart phone such as Windows Mobiles or Symbian devices but another questions is if carrier will go to block such kind of services, at least in their self-controlled data package networks (such as GPRS and UMTS networks).

Cheers ~ Arne

Related Links : [More Information] Source : [MobileMag]