It already has 2.3 million daily active users, up from 2 million in December, and wants to give them more options to be productive, collaborative, and transparent.
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Both executives thought that it is a wiser idea to invest more in Skype than burning $8 billion on Slack. While still in the testing phase, the feature is available to everyone, and it may be followed up on by other much-needed features such as video calls and screen sharing. For now the new feature just covers voice calling, but Slack has revealed it’ll be adding video calling into the mix soon. It’s even possible, if a company really standardizes on Slack, that it could replace Skype and Google Hangouts. The company added that it is also working on a Linux version of the app. That’s quite a bit more than the current backchannel talk that puts Slack’s valuation at just around $3.5-4 billion dollars, based on the company’s current solicitations for a new $150-300 million financing round. It’s still waiting to be provided to mobile apps on android and iOS. Also, colleagues can send direct messages and documents between them and communicate through group chats.
Reportedly, Slack is not slacking.
However, 95 percent of Slack users said the app has improved communication in their organizations, according to BetterCloud.
Among its distinctive characteristics, Slack allows work teams to create “Channels of communication” for specific projects, or topics, that can be public for all co-workers or private for selected teams.
The announcement of the update to the voice calling feature underscores a significant move by Slack.
“Escalation to voice and video from a team collaboration solution is nearly becoming table stakes as many other solutions already have this capability embedded”, Thompson said.
The company affirms that video chats are also being developed, which it initially announced in 2015 after buying Screenhero.
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Slack has been a rising star in the world of productivity apps and has been rising in a manner like no other.
