Zuckerburg’s recent acquisition, WhatsApp, is to add voice calls to its service offering during the second quarter of this year. This was revealed by the company CEO, Jan Koum at the ongoing Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Spain.
Koum had said, “We are driven by the mission that people should be able to stay in touch anywhere and affordably. Our goal is to be on every mobile phone in the world.” Therefore instead of WhatsApp seen as a competitor, it should be seen as a partner to telecom operator. He added that WhatsApp has partnered with KPN’s E-Plus for the launch of a WhatsApp-branded mobile service in Germany.
The target goal is to reach the next one billion users and Koum said that Facebook’s acquisition would not alter his road-map for working with carriers in established markets to bring value to end users. Advertising will also not be added to the service.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, also speaking at Mobile World Congress, agreed with Koum that there would be no changes to WhatsApp, saying the company is a good fit for Facebook.
“WhatsApp is a great company and is a great fit for Facebook. WhatsApp is on a path of connecting more than a billion people and there are very few services in the world that can reach that level,” Zuckerberg said.
He added that WhatsApp’s vision is linked to the goal of Internet.org initiative. This initiative with the slogan “Everyone of us. Everywhere. Connected” is a global partnership between technology leaders, nonprofits, local communities and experts who are working together to bring the internet to the two thirds of the world population that do not have it.
He concluded, “It is a model for this industry that can deliver internet to ultimately everyone in the world and in doing so build a profitable model with more subscribers for carriers and get everyone online,”
