According to Google, the rollout has started now, and will be coming to all regions over the next 24 hours to all users, but as first impressions go, there's a lot to like about Duo.
However, the question that was on our mind - and one that a lot of people have been wondering about - is what this means for Hangouts, Google's existing messaging platform, which supports voice, text, and video.
Fulay acknowledges that there are now a lot of different communication platforms that Google is running, but says that Google sees these different apps as complementary, not competing.
"The way I see it, there are three pillars, first there's the user, for whom we've got apps like Allo and Duo, which are really simple and fast," he explains, "so if you just want to call someone then this is what you would do. It's as easy as making a phone call."
"Then, there are carrier services, so we're working to develop RCS, which is an evolved form of SMS and MMS," he adds. This will add more functionality to the Messaging app on Android phones.
"And finally, there's collaboration, and that's where we see Hangouts having an important role to play," he finishes. "It's great for productivity and collaboration, it's got Calendar support, so if you're an Apps user, it completes the suite."
But is there really a need for another video calling application? If you want to, you can video chat using Skype, or Facetime, or Messenger, or any number of other options already. But according to Fulay, most of these come with some compromises - the video chat will be buried behind menus, or there will be platform limitations, or it will only work well on some devices and some networks. "Duo is simple, it's multi-platform, it's fast, and it's focused on doing just what it does very efficiently," says Fulay.
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