3UK has deepened its relationship with Skype, with the telco rolling out free Skype calls in two stages: The first will start on May 1 when 3’s existing pay-as-you-go customers will not need to top up their credit to use Skype, and later 3 will sell SIM cards for £1.99 (US$2.92) which customers of other operators’ will be able to use to make free Skype calls on their unlocked 3G handsets. The free services include voice calling and instant messaging to other Skype users (ie, no data charges), but calls to landlines or standard mobile phone numbers will require payment—and it’s UK only reports ZDNet UK.

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3UK CEO Kevin Russell said: “We believe that, once you come to 3 and use Skype, you will use other services on 3…We are targeting anyone who uses Skype today”. Many other telcos are banning Skype on their service, not agreeing with the argument that offering free or extremely cheap commoditized services will let companies profit from selling more valuable services—it will be interesting to see how 3 goes. Russell said that free Skype calls would help 3 differentiate the brand and the data traffic used would not be “significant relative to the investments [3 is] already making in mobile broadband”.