Zoom announces Skype certification for Zoom's innovative Model 5900 Phone Adaptor for Skype. The Model 5900 allows someone to use any phone, even a cordless phone, for Skype calls; and even allows cell phone users to remotely access their Skype service to make international calls. This can save hundreds of dollars per month for mobile phone users who make international calls.

Skype is a popular phone service all over the world, with over 200 million registered users and rapid growth. Skype certification is achieved after Skype's rigorous testing and review of a product's features, performance, instructions, and packaging.

Most people use Skype by plugging a headset into their Windows PC and running Skype application software, which can be downloaded free. Skype reduces the cost of phone calls, and also provides extra features such as video calling and "presence," where an on-screen list shows whether friends and business contacts are ready to receive a Skype call.

The Model 5900 unties a Skype user from his or her computer and headset. Model 5900 lets a Skype user enjoy the familiarity, intimacy, features, and styling of whatever phone the user chooses. Plugging a cordless base station into the Zoom Adaptor lets someone use a cordless phone for Skype calls in the kitchen, bedroom, home office, or anywhere else that's convenient.

Plugging the Adaptor into a working telephone "landline," a phone line with dialtone, provides these extra features:

• The phone plugged into the Adaptor can make and receive both Skype and conventional calls.
• Emergency calls can be placed reliably by the family and household visitors, including the babysitter, even when there is a power failure.
• The Adaptor can bridge calls from mobile phones to the Skype network, so mobile phone users can make international calls and other calls at low Skype rates.
• The Adaptor makes it easy to have a 3-person conference call between a remote Skype user, someone using a phone connected to the Adapter, and someone calling the Adaptor's landline.

The estimated retail price for the Model 5900 Phone Adaptor is $39.95. Zoom's paper: How To Use a Mobile/Cell Phone with Skype describes Adaptor setup for use with a mobile phone. The paper also compares the cost of international phone calls with and without the Adaptor for mobile phone customers of AT&T and Verizon Wireless.