Daniel Berninger, senior analyst at Tier1 Research, says that competition in the emerging voice over IP technology industry could be in jeopardy if policymakers take an approach similar to the one they took with the traditional local telephone services. If the FCC does not take appropriate action, the industry could fall into the hands of only a few major providers and lack healthy economic competition.
Read more at Telecomweb.
OnInstant's new innovation, "Follow Me!" will allow individuals to have voice over internet protocol (VoIP) calls automatically re-routed to any voice-enabled device.
According to webitpr:
Called ‘FollowMe!’, the new feature is part of the latest innovation from OnInstant, and is a major enhancement of the Internet business-to-business communications network. The ‘FollowMe!’ service increases business efficiency and availability by using a unique and patent-pending technology that puts through calls automatically to a sequence of pre-set numbers until connection is established.
‘FollowMe!’ is enabled through an agreement between OnInstant and Level 3 Communications for Level 3’s IP-based voice termination service.
Read more: OnInstant introduces ‘FollowMe!’
Cisco Systems, which is already delivering VoIP to Boeing and Ford Motor, now has signed a deal to bring VoIP technology to Bank of America.
According to CNET News.com:
The Bank of America deployment will occur in three phases during the next three years. The company is currently conducting a pilot program, which will conclude at the end of this year. The first phase of the production deployment will begin in early 2005, said Craig Hinkley, senior vice president of network architecture and strategic direction for Bank of America.
Read more: Cisco notches new Net phone deal
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Michael Powell expects that Skype's VoIP software, because it offers high-quality peer-to-peer voice communication for free, will inevitably change the world.
According to ZDNet:
Because of its peer-to-peer architecture, Skype requires absolutely no infrastructure and only minimal capital investment compared with phone companies that own their own lines and switches. Rather, Skype's 750,000 daily users create the network on the fly, sharing computer resources to manage traffic flow and ensure call quality. Skype claims its network can grow organically without the need to add new equipment to support increased traffic demands.
Read more: Can Skype live up to the Net phone hype?
AT&T is currently working with a number of application developers, equiment manufacturers, and chip providers to deliver new capabilities to the VoIP market. The name of the program is the VoIP Innovation and Interoperability Program.
According to NewsFactor Network:
In the long run, AT&T hopes to spur the development of VoIP-enabled devices ranging from chipsets and telephone adapters to telephones, game consoles, set-top boxes, routers and modems.
Participating companies have been working with AT&T to certify their products as being AT&T VoIP-service compatible. They include chip makers Broadcom, Centillium, Intel and Texas Instruments; equipment manufacturers D-Link, Linksys, and Netgear; and PBX vendors Alcatel, Avaya, Cisco, Nortel Networks, Siemens and Sonus Networks.
As the number of VoIP deployments rises, interoperability becomes more of an issue to service providers like AT&T, especially for their enterprise customers, Yankee Group senior analyst Danny Klein told NewsFactor.
Read more: AT&T Builds VoIP Alliance
A new report by AT&T and the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) titled "Voice over IP Comes of Age" states that VoIP will become the standard for voice traffic.
According to CRN:
The EIU surveyed more than 250 senior executives and found that 43% were either using or planning to implement VoIP within the next two years, while a further 18% expected to deploy the technology in the long term.
Executives' interest in the technology is driven both by the perceived cost savings in network consolidation and by the wide range of possible IP telephony services and applications. While an overwhelming 87% of respondents cited telecommunications cost savings as an important factor in the decision to implement VoIP, an equally impressive 71% were motivated by the ability to deploy advanced IP telephony features.
Read more: Survey: VoIP To Become The New Standard For Voice Traffic
SBC Communications will install a Cisco Systems VoIP network to connect Ford Motor Company's 50,000 employees in 110 locations across Michigan.
According to InformationWeek:
The new network, which will be deployed over three years, will combine a number of Ford networks into a single IP-based network.
SBC says the Ford network will be its largest IP telephony deployment and one of the largest in the country. It will provide substantial savings to Ford by reducing network costs and making it easier to make adds, moves, and changes on the network, the company says.
Read more: Ford Gears Up For VoIP
Business Week Online's technology editor Alex Salkever offers a good beginner's guide to getting started with VoIP. Below is his answer to the question, "How much money will I save?"
From Business Week Online:
One well known VoIP provider, the Lingo service offered by Primus, is offering a $19.95-a-month plan that includes unlimited talk time on all local and domestic long-distance calls as well as calls to Canada and Western Europe.
Even the VoIP plans offered by big cable operators, long-distance providers such as AT&T (T ), and the larger upstarts such as Vonage undercut the cost of traditional phone plans by as much as 50%. Skype Technologies is offering a VoIP service that allows any Skype user to talk to any other user of the service over the Net for free, using a PC or phone-like device.
Read more: The ABCs of VoIP
According to a new report by IDATE, 40% of all business telephone lines will be voice over internet protocol (VoIP) or telephony over internet protocol (ToIP) in 2009, a huge increase from a 2.5% share in 2003.
From eMarketer:
Many telecoms have already announced plans to migrate classic TDM networks to IP networks. NTT has committed to full IP migration (Global V2oIP), and BT is rolling out its 21CN project. For its part, Telecom Italia deployed a packet-based voice transport infrastructure for international traffic in late 2003. The reasons behind these migrations are: a single network to manage, lower price of IP routers, lower administration and maintenance costs, demand from customers for convergent services and the ability to launch new services.
Read more: VoIP Goes Big Business
With AT&T's Simple Reach plan, customers can dial long distance at local rates. Vonage has recently introduced the ability for VoIP customers to acquire virtual phone numbers from Mexico City.
According to the Chicago Tribune:
"VoIP is absolutely going to kill institutions we are familiar with," said Barnich, former chairman of the Illinois Commerce Commission. [...]
This year AT&T said it would stop marketing traditional local and long-distance phone service to residential customers and instead would actively promote VoIP. It is doing so by offering unlimited VoIP calling in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada and the U.S. Virgin Islands for just $20 a month for the first six months and $35 thereafter.
Read more: Long-distance takes local route
3Com is coming close to launching a new Linux version of its high-end VoIP softswitch.
According to CRN:
The new products are part of 3Com's continuing push to expand its enterprise networking, VoIP and security business.
President and CEO Bruce Claflin said 3Com will soon release a Linux-based version of its VCX softswitch that channel partners can sell to mid- to large-sized customers.
"With the release of this, we expect to open the aperture of sales, leveraging the channel base," Claflin said during a conference call to discuss the Marlborough, Mass.-based company's quarterly financial results.
Read more: 3Com Preps New Enterprise Products, Eyes Possible Acquisitions
VoIP performance management software provider Telchemy has redesigned and expanded their VoIP troubleshooting Web site, available at VoIPTroubleshooter.com.
According to Boardwatch:
Live today, VoIPTroubleshooter.com includes over 60 pages of diagnostic information related to VoIP call quality. Two new features include: an Open Speech Repository, i.e., data base, and an IP Network Impairment Simulator. The Open Speech Repository provides high quality audio recordings of speech files in several different languages that test engineers can use for testing and related applications without any restrictions, except for source credit.
Read more: Telchemy Offers VOIP Help
The VoIP market in the U.S. is growing albeit slowly. Yankee Group estimates that there will be 1 million VoIP users in the U.S. by the end of 2004, up from 131,000 in December 2003. Lowering costs may be the number one reason for the growth.
According to the Boston Globe:
Old-line phone giants like AT&T Corp. and Verizon Communications Inc., cable TV companies, and start-ups like Vonage have stormed into the market in recent months.
But all projections indicate that by decade's end, Internet phone plans will still lag far behind the 100 million-plus regular US phone lines.
What sells Internet calling more than anything else are unlimited domestic phone calls for $30 or $35 a month, and international rates such as 3 cents a minute to London and Rome and 4 cents to Tokyo.
Read more: Is this call for you?
Voice over internet protocol (VoIP) is beginning to transform the telecom industry. Service providers should not ignore this emerging technology, according to some at Light Reading's Next Generation Services (NGS) forum.
According to Light Reading:
"Voice is a uniquely powerful communication medium," said keynote speaker Odlyzko, director of the Minnesota’s Digital Technology Center, Digital Technology Center. [...]
In fact, if anything, Odlyzko says that in examining new opportunities, service providers should be careful not to ignore voice. [...]
"ATM, RSVP, multicasting, streaming real-time media, 3G: these are all technical successes, but failure in the marketplace."
Read more: VOIP: King of New Services
Cisco Systems Inc. announced today plans to purchase Dynamicsoft Inc. Dynamicsoft makes VoIP software based on Session Initiation Protocol.
According to InfoWorld:
Cisco will pay $55 million in cash for the Parsippany, N.J.-based Dynamicsoft, assuming the vendor's $3.8 million in debt, according to a statement from Cisco. The acquisition fills out Cisco's software portfolio for carriers interested in providing converged applications to subscribers, such as presence management and unified messaging.
With its acquisition, Cisco is targeting broadband service providers looking to deploy converged voice/data services to consumers and businesses.
Read more: Cisco to buy VoIP software vendor
Skype Technologies, a leader in peer-to-peer VoIP technology, has officially launched Skype for Pocket PC 1.0, allowing Wi-Fi-enabled PDA users to make unlimited free telephone calls from anywhere with wireless access.
According to NewsFactor:
This is essentially a mobile version of the company's global VoIP service based on peer-to-peer software, and also delivers instant messaging without voice over GPRS wide-area networks. Conference calling is also available. [...]
"Skype is delivering VoIP to the masses," said IDC analyst Alex Slawsby, "providing voice communications on a mobile device or a PC."
Read more: Skype Delivers Mobile VoIP
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