Move fast
Why speed might be your biggest advantage right now
đ Hey, Iâm George Chasiotis. Welcome to GrowthWaves, your weekly dose of B2B growth insightsâfeaturing powerful case studies, emerging trends, and unconventional strategies you wonât find anywhere else.
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âThatâs interesting,â I thought to myself.
âI wonder if thatâs for real and how they did it.â
Minutes later, I found myself in a rabbit hole.
Hereâs what I uncovered.
Context
On February 28, Microsoft announced the winding down of Skype.
That wasnât the first time Skype was acquired.
According to Microsoft:
âFounded in 2003, Skype was acquired by eBay in September 2005, and then acquired by an investment group led by Silver Lake in November 2009.â
Over a decade later, they decided that itâs time to retire it.
According to Jeff Teper, Microsoftâs president of collaborative apps and platforms, the move allows Microsoft to âmore easily adapt to customer needsâ and deliver innovation more rapidly by concentrating development on Teams.
Microsoftâs decision to retire Skype is part of a broader strategy to streamline its consumer communication services and focus on Microsoft Teams, which has become the companyâs flagship platform for messaging, video calls, and collaboration.
Put simply: Microsoft Teams is a priority. Skype is not.
And in case youâre confused, hereâs a quick timeline:
Following the announcement, searches for âskype alternativeâ peaked.
Iâm assuming search interest also spiked for other related terms, from people looking for an alternative solution to Skype.
And, of course, Reddit was shaken up by the news.
So, an incumbent acquires a SaaS and, after a few years, decides to kill it.
So, whatâs all the fuss about?
Jumping on the opportunity
Meet Denis, a young engineer from Austria:
Read his Twitter bio:
âBuilt a Skype replacement to call my granny from abroad yadaphone.comâ
And then read this Reddit post and check the engagement:
(I know that looks promotional, but I guess the dev community has a different level of solidarity between them that doesnât apply to us marketers.)
Hereâs what Yadaphone looks like:
According to Denis:
âIn the first month, I got 290 paying customers and 2 enterprise clients.â
And according to another post on Twitter, the tool now has 1,000 users.
You donât have to do the math.
There are 7 days between Microsoftâs announcement and Denisâ announcement on Twitter.
To reiterate:
There were seven days between Microsoft announcing that Skype would be gone and an indie hacker launching an alternative and posting about it on Twitter.
âSkype is closing down, so Iâve made my own app to call my bank and IRS when Iâm abroad. ITâS NOW LIVE ON http://Yadaphone.comâ
And, Iâll do some more back-of-the-envelope math for you.
According to the founder, Yadaphone is now sitting at $4K in MRR.
Thatâs $48K in ARR.
With a super conservative valuation on the lower end, a 2â3x ARR multiple, this tool could now be sold for $96K to $144K.
Not bad for a quickly built Skype alternative, right?
Now, the MRR or the valuation here may be irrelevant.
You may argue that Denis's experience as a Telekom engineer positioned him perfectly for this opportunity.
And youâd be right.
The real point here is that succeeding in SaaS is (for lack of a better word) imperative.
Also, both the time and cost to launch have decreased significantly due to AI.
To be clear:
Iâm not saying that you can vibe code your way to a Skype alternative.
But the reality is that:
Things are moving faster
The cost of building things is decreasing
Opportunities like this donât present themselves every day.
At least not when youâre not actively looking for them.
But when they do, you need to be readyâand act fast.
Final thoughts
I know this note isnât the typical GrowthWaves note youâd expect to read.
I typically share strategies, case studies, frameworks, mental models, and content that can broaden your horizons and help you grow faster.
But I think this story is telling of how fast things are changing.
And how quickly we can become irrelevant if we donât adapt and get left behind.
(Yeah, I know that sounds a bit harsh.)
The point of this note isnât to stress you out.
Just to highlight one of the elements of success in the current landscape:
Move fast