Tesco launches VoIP internet phone service
Published January 20th, 2006
Britain’s largest supermarket chain Tesco PLC this morning announced the launch of a new telephone service allowing customers to make cheap calls over the internet.
The service, using voice over internet protocol (VoIP) technology to route calls over the web, pitches Tesco against the established telecoms players, including BT Group PLC, and virtual upstarts like EBay Inc’s Skype and Vonage.
Subscribers, who must have broadband internet access, will first buy a special handset that plugs into their home computer for £19.97 .
Calls to UK landlines will then be charged at 2 pence per minute, with the same tariff applying to many other countries around the world, including the USA, Canada, Australia and Ireland. UK mobile phone calls will cost 10 pence per minute.
Andy Dewhurst, chief executive officer of Tesco Telecoms, hopes that the new service can make VoIP, hitherto a ‘niche product, previously the domain of tecchies’, a mass market product.
Australian internet phone group Freshtel is providing the technology behind the new service, added Tesco.
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