Just moments after the news broke that Google had acquired AdMob, TechCrunch has broken news that Google has purchased VoIP startup Gizmo5.
At the moment the terms of the deal are unknown. Gizmo5 was reported to have been in play with Skype when the IP behind Skype’s P2P technology was in legal quandary.
Gizmo5 was founded in 2003, and has raised a total of 6 million dollars to date. The rumored price was around $30 million.
Michael Arrington points out that: “Gizmo5 is a good fit with a number of Google products. Google Talk allows voice calls between users but has no PSTN link to allow incoming or outbound calls to real phones. Gizmo5 does this well already… This looks to me like Gizmo5 will be the glue that puts Google Voice and Google Talk together into a single product. And that product looks a lot like a Skype competitor.”
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If that is true or not, it does seem that Google is pushing to expand its voice operations in one way or another. This combined with the AdMob news, and you begin to wonder if Google could build an ad-supported calling network, or any other combination of voice and advertisement.
It seems doubtful that we will see a strategic announcement from Google explaining their plans for Gizmo5, indeed what is more likely that the company will disappear into its new parent for a seeming eternity, before it reappears under new guise.
For now what Google is up to is anyone’s guess.
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