Facebook is always up to something or the other to improve the overall experience of the user or introduce some new features to make it even special. Now, however, the company is on the verge of outdoing their previous accomplishments in the mobile industry.

Per reports, the social networking giant, at the MWC 2013, has just announced that the company might just make a momentous impact on how carriers view their messaging-related business models.

In a nutshell, Facebook is basically offering either free or discounted access to its popular Messenger feature via as many as 18 carriers in 14 different countries, and most of them being emerging markets.

As far as cross-platform instant messaging services are concerned, they have already been on a rise for some time now, and this, accordingly, has contributed to the decline in the use of SMSs and revenue for carriers.

However, with Facebook’s announcement of free Messenger service via 18 carriers around the world, it could mean that this will be an end to the life of the SMS.

“Through this promotion, free or discounted data access will be available in the coming months on Messenger for Android, Messenger for iOS and Facebook for Every Phone, which is now optimized for chat,” Facebook states.

“Operators committed to special pricing for Facebook messaging include TMN in Portugal, Three in Ireland, Airtel and Reliance in India, Vivacom in Bulgaria, Backcell in Azerbaydzhan, Indosat, Smartfren, AXIS and XL Axiata in Indonesia, SMART in Philippines, DiGi in Malaysia, DTAC in Thailand, Viva in Bahrain, STC in Saudi Arabia, Oi in Brazil, Etisalat in Egypt, and Tre in Italy.”

A new Next Web report also states that Facebook has been making its way into the mobile ecosystem with its Messenger app. For example, “the social network recently introduced free calling within North America. However, the free Messenger service is more basic, given that the company is targeting mostly emerging markets. These are mostly markets in which data is considered a premium service, and where subscribers would usually opt for basic calling and texting services rather than persistent data connections”

However, it still remains to be seen if the use of free Messenger will actually result in the death of SMS, and although it could actually turn out to be true in the near future, this, as Android Authority writes, “is limited by the fact that carrier access to the free service is limited to Facebook’s partners.”