Skype announced yesterday that the overall winning entry in their 2007 Mashup Competition is PamFax from PamConsult. A mashup is a software application or service that combines data from more than one source into an integrated experience. It has paralles in the hip-hop music practice of mixing two or more songs.

PamFax allows you to send a fax to any fax machine in the world and easily pay with your Skype Credit. No registration is needed, no pre-payment. Optionally, you get fax status notifications via Skype chat, SMS or email. You can look up where the recipient(s) are located in Google Maps. Get it here.

Developers from all across the world have been creating and submitting mashups for Skype since the competition was launched on July 1st by the Skype Developer Program (SDP) team. All entries were judged against the same criteria of Skypeness, Usability, Coolness, Stability, Usefulness, Flair and Layout.

One of the Mashup Competition Judges, Jim Courtney of Skype Journal said of PamFax, "As I judge I found many excellent entries that demonstrate the value of various aspects of the Skype ecosystem. However, the winners have gone beyond the normal "just add Skype" and taken a broader advantage of the entire Skype ecosystem to turn their Skype Extra into a full business opportunity. For instance, PamFax demonstrates that the Skype Extra program not only provides API's into Skype but also provides a flexible set of licensing terms and a unique means to quickly collect revenues via the Skype Extras transaction engine."

Responding to the news, Dick Schiferli, CEO of PamConsult said: "We are very excited to be the winner of the Skype Mashup Competition with our application PamFax. We want to specifically thank the SDP team at Skype, who are a great team of people to work with, for the support they give to us. They are a pivotal part of our success."

The judging panel consisted of Paul Amery, Antoine Bertout, Lester Madden, Damon Williams, Adam Trachtenberg, Phil Wolff, Jim Courtney, John Musser, Jack Dorsey and Julian Bond.

The Mashup Cup was presented to Dick Schiferli and Christoph Bünger (CTO PamConsult) by Paul Amery and Sten Tamkivi of Skype at Skype’s Developer and Beta Tester event last night in Prague. Details and photos the event can be found at DeveloperZone

USA and Japanese specific mashup winners will be announced at San Jose and Tokyo developer events respectively.

The Skype Developer Program provides a global opportunity for developers to innovate and create new businesses and software that enrich the Skype experience for users. To date, there are more than 5,000 developers registered in the Skype Developer Program, which are creating a new generation of exciting software to allow users to do more on Skype.

For more information on the Skype Developer Program, including a view of the Extras Gallery, Mashup entries and tips and tools on developing Extras, visit the Skype Developer Zone.

All Mashup entries can be found from here.

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About Skype www.skype.com

About PamConsult www.pamconsult.com