Skype is expanding. Today, we announced in Czech Republic that we are going to establish an engineering office in Prague in early 2007, to complement our other locations in Tallinn, London, Luxembourg, North America and elsewhere. Tallinn continues to be our most important engineering facility, but we need to expand beyond Estonia to sustain our growth rate.

Some Skype people actually went scouting through many Central European countries earlier this year, looking for a new location based on a number of factors. We chose Czech Republic simply because it had the best mix. (I asked if good beer was one of the factors, but didn't receive direct comments. )

We already are in Czech Republic. Sort of. A while ago, we launched a co-branded version of Skype with Centrum.cz, the country's second-largest Internet portal. Now, in addition to just having a local version of the software, we will have an actual office there where you can come and work and help us build the "next great thing" from Skype.

So if you're from Czech Republic and would like to learn more about how you can join, take a look at the current Prague vacancies. And check back often, as we're just now busy building the local version of our jobs site and preparing other information.