Etisalat to take on Skype with legal internet calls

The UAE's Etisalat is set to offer internet-based phone calls by the end of June - in a market where similar services, including Skype, are banned.

Essa Haddad, Etisalat's chief commercial officer, told Reuters that the operator would launch international voice over internet protocol (Voip) services in the second quarter of this year.

The UAE operator said in October it had developed a mobile application called ePlus, which will allow UAE residents to make cheap national and international calls via their mobile phones.

When launched, the app will be one of the first legal uses of voice over internet protocol (Voip) services in the UAE.

Osman Sultan, the chief executive of the rival telecommunications firm du, has also said his company is looking at new Voip technologies.

Etisalat and du are the only companies in the UAE officially licensed to operate Voip services.

Other internet-calling services, such as Skype, are banned - but still in widespread use by residents.

Mohamed Al Ghanim, the director general of the UAE's Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA), said on Wednesday that he welcomed applications from Voip players to operate legally in the UAE.

"It is purely a licensing matter," Mr Al Ghanim wrote on Twitter, during a question-and-answer session with the public and media.

Skype uses Voip technology to allow users to chat for free between computers, and make very cheap international calls to phones.

Etisalat is yet to announce how much it will charge for calls made via its internet service.

Matthew Reed, a senior analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media, said this meant it was difficult to say how successful Etisalat's Voip service is likely to be.

"One tricky thing is that they haven't said anything about how they're going to price it," said Mr Reed.

He said that Etisalat's ePlus service was "one way the operators can fight back against" services such as Skype.