Microsoft to shut down Skype in May, urges users to migrate to Teams 

The tech giant acquired Skype in 2011 for $8.5 billion but struggled to keep it competitive against newer platforms.

Jeff Teper, president of Microsoft 365 collaborative apps and platforms, confirmed this decision in an interview with CNBC on Friday.

“We’ve learned a lot from Skype over the years that we’ve put into Teams as we’ve evolved Teams over the last seven to eight years. But we felt like now is the time because we can be simpler for the market, for our customer base, and we can deliver more innovation faster just by being focused on Teams,” Teper said.

The company is encouraging users to migrate to its free Teams app, marking the end of an era for one of the pioneers of online communication.

As part of the transition, Microsoft will discontinue monthly Skype subscriptions. However, users with Skype credits will still be able to use them within Teams.

Teper acknowledged Skype’s impact over the years in pioneering online audio and video calls, expressing gratitude for its impact over the years.

“This is obviously a big, big moment for us, and we’re certainly very grateful in many ways. Skype pioneered audio and video calling on the web for many, many people,” he said.

Microsoft stated that over the next few days, users will be able to sign into Teams using their Skype credentials, with contacts and chats transferring over automatically. Additionally, Skype users will be able to export their data.

Skype’s decline was largely attributed to its underlying technology, which was not optimized for smartphones.

When the COVID-19 pandemic increased the demand for online business calls, Microsoft focused on Teams by integrating it with other Office apps to attract corporate users, who were once a major base for Skype.

Founded in 2003 by Janus Friis and Niklas Zennström in Estonia, Skype gained massive popularity in the early 2000s for its low-cost audio and video calling services

Despite efforts to modernize Skype by incorporating it into Windows and other Microsoft products, the service struggled to compete with more user-friendly alternatives like Zoom and Slack.