Wengo was at the beginning of 2004 a subsidiary of French telecom service provider Neuf Cegetel. As of February 2012, Wengo employs 80 people in the Paris headquarters, and is a subsidiary of Vivendi. Wengo is now repositioned as an online personal and consulting services marketplace. Voice over IP Wengo was founded in September 2004, launching its service at the beginning of 2005 based on what is now known as the "WengoPhone, classic edition". In September 2005, Wengo opened its visiophony service at the same time as Skype on a cross platform (Windows, Linux and Mac OS X). In 2006, Wengo integrated the Gaim project into its software, allowing its users to communicate via Instant Messaging with other users on the MSN, Yahoo! or Google Talk networks. Wengo and Skype started offering free PSTN calls in 2006, which accelerated the commoditization of telephony calls. In June 2006, Wengo offered a two-month unlimited calling plan to several destinations including Belgium, Guadeloupe, India, Martinique, Poland and Vietnam. The offer was posted on many websites, including FatWallet, and attracted many new customers. Wengo later suspended many of these accounts, in the company's interests, after many people began abusing the unlimited calling system. WengoPhone Originally, Wengo was supporting the development of WengoPhone. WengoPhone was a free and open source (GPL) VoIP (including video conferencing, SMS and chat) softphone through which it offered PC to PSTN phone calls. This software used the free and open SIP protocol, it was developed under the name WengoPhone by the OpenWengo project. Their Firefox browser extension was the first browser-based VoIP client for OS X. The VoIP service was presented on the French market as an attempt to compete with Skype, Yahoo and other virtual network service providers. The economic model of this activity, however, was not sustainable. Wengo decided that WengoPhone was outside its core business, and in February 2008 transferred the project to a partner called MBDSYS — another French startup. WengoPhone and the OpenWengo community have since rebranded themselves as QuteCom. Social marketplace In June 2006, Wengo launched a social marketplace that gives its users the opportunity to create toll-free telephone number and paying services so that they can sell their expertise over the phone. This marketplace is the core business of Wengo (no more VoIP activities). History 2011 November: Wengo experts also answer paid questions (in addition to phone advice) July: Launch of the iPhone