Google then entered the service area of voice over internet protocol (VoIP) to provide calling features to the world through your Gmail account customers.
Through Gmail, the user can call traditional phone numbers anywhere, at the same time receive phone calls Google Voice in the number concerned.
"This is a good breakthrough. Because, Gmail users can now call directly through their Gmail page," said Craig Walker, Product Manager for Real-Time Communication, Google, as quoted from the BBC website.
Unfortunately, until now a new Gmail customer that comes from the U.S. and Canada only can enjoy this service. During this year, the U.S. and Canada Gmail users can call a local number for free.
U.S. Gmail users a call to England, France, China and Germany will be charged a fee of U.S. $ 2 cents per minute. While from a phone call from U.S. to home in Jakarta will be charged a fee of U.S. $ 3 cents. However, calls to mobile numbers in Indonesia will be more expensive, ie U.S. $ 11 cents.
This feature appears in the chat window on the left page of Gmail. An option 'Call Phone' will appear right under our name, which then will bring up a virtual phone keypad to enter a destination phone number you want.
For now, this feature will not be found in the Google Apps mobile application. However, Google is estimated to be expanding in the near future.
Google's move is certainly threaten Skype, VoIP service provider company, with 560 million subscribers and 124 million active users each month. Moreover, the end of this year, Skype plans to soon conduct an initial public offering (IPO) to the public.
Google did not launch how many digits must be Gmail users. To CNet, Gmail product manager Todd Jackson said simply, there are hundreds of millions of Gmail users worldwide. VoIP feature itself has been developed by Google after the company acquired Gizmo5 VoIP, in November last.
To market this new service, Google also is conducting discussions with various parties involved plan to provide VoIP telephone common on college campuses and airports, to provide local communications for free.
