Google Voice announced last week that it is now offering number portability, potentially broadening the appeal of the nascent and controversial service.
Previously users of Google Voice had to adopt a new Google phone number. However, consumers can now utilize their existing mobile phone numbers and gain access to Google Voice, albeit a select group of features.
In related news, Google mistakenly revealed confidential information last week in its filings at the FCC. Although later redacted from the documents, Business Week managed to get ahold of the originals before Google acted upon the error and replaced the documents originally made public.
The invitation-only Google Voice app has grown to 1.419 million users — 40% or 570,000 of whom use the service every day. In comparison, when Google first acquired the service from GrandCentral there were only ‘tens of thousands’ of users.
Google also revealed its list of industry partners that enable the Google Voice app: Level 3 Communications, Global Crossing, Broadvox Communications, Bandwidth.com, and Pac-West Telecomm are all involved.
IBasis, an international voice carrier and wholesale provider, is responsible for connecting outbound international calls, and Neustar provides “porting and carrier lookup services.” Syniverse Technologies provides the free text-messaging service.
Learn more about Google Voice.
Read the Business Week article.
