Whatsapp now officially a part of Facebook

Facebook’s Whatsapp acquisition is complete after approval of EC and now Whatsapp is an officially a member of the Facebook family. This acquisition is expected to create a way for MVNOs i.e., mobile virtual network operators. Ovum in its recent statement mentioned how the ecosystem of mobile operators can be altered by the developments in VoIP technology. Even though the US Federal Trade Commision approved this acquisition 6 months ago, the deal was approved in Europe recently sealing $19 billion acquisition. The largest IP – based messaging and voice service i.e., Whatsapp is now a part of Facebook along with instagram (acquired 2 years back) and its own messenger.

Since the last few years, the native messaging and voice services have been largely replaced by the Whatsapp and Facebook messenger. The QoS of these platforms is consistently improving and the messaging experience is almost the same as that of the native services. With more improvements to come, these services can be delivered directly to the users replacing the native services through an MVNO model. According to some statements released, the existing wireless connections will be leased by Whatsapp from their mobile operators and will be used by users to send messages and make calls via a Whatsapp SIM. According to Ovum, a german operator e – plus has already brought out Whatsapp prepaid SIM this april, setting up Whatsapp as an MVNO on the network. It is also being said that mobile commerce and payment modes may soon be added to both Facebook messenger and Whatsapp to make them a complete suite of services. If this model comes out successful, a number of new and small players may come out in the industry that may provide a large number of IP – based services.

The already stiff market competition is predicted to intensify further. The acquisition has been made with the aim of making world a more connected place. With this service, people will be able to send any type of content to any number of people or group they want. And Whatsapp provides such a service that people love to use. Whatsapp provides a quick, fast and reliable service used by approximately 450 million people. According to statistics around 1 million new users add to the Whatsapp group. However the operation terms of Whatsapp within Facebook are independent. There will be no changes to roadmap of the product and Facebook will continue to work along with Whatsapp for making internet services economically feasible for everyone. Facebook messenger allows you to chat with your Facebook friends and Whatsapp keeps you in contact with your other friends too who are outside Facebook. Since the both products serve such different but important purposes, Facebook will keep investing in them.