Skype to Sell First Mobile Phone Through 3

3 still hasn’t officially confirmed the partnership yet, but its been one of the worst kept secrets in the mobile phone industry. The deal will mean that 3 will sell Skype’s first mobile phone. Timescales haven’t been released but it expected to be live available before Christmas.

A Skype spokesman said that 3 and Skype “are working together on a new product to make Skype completely mobile,” but declined to give full details.

3 already offers access to free Skype calling via a service on its X-Series phones. However, the new product will see much tighter integration with the eBay-owned VoIP software. The current implementation fudges slightly by using the voice channel to connect to the phone mast before the network converts the call to a true VoIP.

It is though that the new phone will be avialable in all the countries in which 3 operations, UK, Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Austria, Denmark, Italy, Ireland, and Sweden.

Three currently has over 10 million customers worldwide, while Skype has 246 million registered customers around the world, with about 10 million people using the service at any one given moment.