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Category: voip

  • D2 Technologies Showcases its mCUE Converged Communications Client with Embedded VoIP for Android


    D2 Technologies has demonstrated its mCUE converged communications client for Android-based devices at an event designed to promote the adoption of Google’s Android operating system beyond mobile phones.

    During this demonstration, the embedded IP communications software platform specialist showed OEMs and ODMs how embedded software products such as mCUE can enable VoIP, video chat and other IP communications capabilities in stationary Android-based embedded equipment and consumer electronics devices.

    The company showed how, with mCUE, these devices can offer premium multi-service unified communications capabilities and deliver simultaneous interoperability with any communication service provider, Instant Messaging (IM) community or social networking platform.

    The client enables all popular communication modes to be converged to a single communications user interface (UI), including circuit switched voice (PSTN or cellular), VoIP, Instant Messaging (IM), SMS and video chat.

    mCUE includes D2 Technologies’ carrier-class vPort MP VoIP platform that is completely integrated into the Android framework, Linux kernel and hardware platform BSP.

    The free event in Tokyo, Japan, was sponsored by the Open Embedded Software Foundation (OESF).

    Doug Makishima, vice president of marketing and sales at D2 Technologies, said the OESF’s goal of ‘Android Anywhere’ will facilitate the expansion of the Android platform beyond mobile phone applications to many different embedded applications and consumer electronics devices.

    He said as an embedded VoIP technology specialist, D2 is working closely with OESF members such as MIPS Technologies and RMI.

    The aim is to develop and promote the adoption of IP communications and VoIP technology extensions to the Android framework for digital consumer devices.

    "These include mobile internet devices (MIDs), DTVs, digital picture frames (DPFs), portable and home media players, and set-top boxes," he said.

    Developed by the Open Handset Alliance, the Android platform is a Linux-based software stack for mobile devices that includes an operating system, middleware and key applications.

    D2 Technologies was the first to demo a complete communications interface, mCUE, on the HTC G1, the first commercial smartphone to market running on the Android mobile operating system.

    Formed in March 2009, the 25-member OESF is focused on expanding market reach for the Android platform.

    Founded by ARM, KDDI, Japan Cable Laboratories, Alpine Electronics and Fujitsu Software, the organization works with member companies on sharing technical information, co-development and co-marketing initiatives.

    The OESF and its member companies are working on standards and development of Android for embedded equipment such as consumer electronics and in-car navigation systems other than mobile phones.

  • VOXOFON Launches Mobile VoIP for Palm Pre


    VOXOFON has expanded the availability of its low-cost international calling services by offering a mobile VoIP application for the Palm WebOS platform.

    The application is aimed at the Palm Pre smartphone. VOXOFON plans to make the new application available on the Palm App Catalog later this year.

    After installation the callers can simply click on the VOXOFON icon on the phone screen to place a low-cost international call.

    The application works anywhere the phone has coverage and does not require a Wi-Fi connection. In addition, there are no monthly fees or contracts.

    Beginning at 1.3 cents per minute, with no additional fees, VOXOFON international calling services allow customers to call using their smart phone, computer, land line, or a cell phone.

    VOXOFON has been a leader in providing convenient mobile applications for its VoIP service, beginning with a web application for iPhone that was introduced in the summer of last year.

    In September 2008, VOXOFON was the first to announce an application for the Android platform – one that offered transparent cost optimization for international calls.

    The company followed with an identical application for BlackBerry smartphones in January of this year.

  • Mindspeed Extends Access VoIP Processor Family


    Mindspeed Technologies has announced the addition of two new devices to its Comcerto 300 Series of highly-integrated VoIP processors.

    The supplier of semiconductor solutions for network infrastructure applications said the new devices provide a performance/cost ratio targeted at eight and 16 port fiber-based access (FTTx) equipment.

    Kurt Michel, VoIP marketing director of Mindspeed’s multiservice access business unit, said that since the launch of the Comcerto 300 Series in January 2008, the devices have been selected by more than two dozen customers for over three dozen designs, across all major regional markets.

    A majority of these designs are within Tier 1 carrier FTTx equipment.

    "These new devices extend and complement a product family that has already experienced tremendous market acceptance with FTTx access equipment manufacturers worldwide since its launch 18 months ago," he said.

    According to Dell’Oro Group, access VoIP port shipments will grow at a 51 per cent compound annual growth rate (CAGR), from 11 million ports in 2008 to 85 million ports in 2013.

    It is expected that ninety per cent of the access ports in 2013 will be in multi-dwelling units (MDUs), Internet protocol digital subscriber line access multiplexer (IPDSLAMs) and multiservice access nodes (MSANs) for FTTx, a segment specifically targeted by the Comcerto 300.

    With carrier-grade Comcerto 300-based FTTx equipment deployments now in process, Michel said its customers can expect to gain a time-to-market advantage from the Comcerto 300 product offering, which includes both devices and production-tested VoIP processing software.

    He said Mindspeed’s total system solution removes much of the system complexity and risk, which often plagues new equipment development.

    The two new devices bring the benefits of the Comcerto 300 family to lower-performance/lower-density applications at a lower cost, while retaining software, application programming interface (API), and footprint compatibility with the rest of the Comcerto 300 family.

    The M82351 targets eight ports of complex VoIP, while the M82352 targets 16 ports, further improving the industry’s most scalable VoIP solution.

    Michel said the company is very pleased to have a product family that clearly addresses the critical needs of the FTTx equipment market, at a time when that market is experiencing rapid growth.

    "We also look forward to providing our Comcerto 300 customers a continually evolving set of advanced capabilities and features that the platform was designed to support – including high-speed fax relay and wideband (high definition) voice," he said.

    "We believe that these features will ensure that Mindspeed customers stay on the leading edge of next-generation network (NGN) evolution."

    Comcerto 300 Series access processors integrate a complete media access gateway in a single device by combining signaling and control processing, packet processing and a rich set of interfaces and features.

    Michel said that by enabling VoIP on a line card, the Comcerto 300 Series reduces system complexity and leverages the Ethernet-based access equipment architectures that already support xDSL termination line cards.

    He said the family is also well suited for Enterprise IP-PBX applications.

    The Comcerto 300 Series M82351 and M82352 devices are now available in two packaging options (RoHS/standard) for production volumes.

  • IPsmarx Partners with DIDX to Extend DIDs Reach


    IPsmarx Technology and DIDX have agreed a partnership with the aim of allowing VoIP service providers to extend their global reach.

    The VoIP solutions provider delivers Softswitch and Calling Card Solutions to operators in 63 different countries.

    Ludymar Reveron, sales manager with IPsmarx, said that by partnering with DIDX, their clients will now have the opportunity to take advantage of DIDs from all over the globe.

    They will also be able to integrate the DIDX API to their website.

    The agreement also means service providers can have automated DID ordering through the DIDX API.

    "By partnering with DIDX and offering integration with their API, our clients will have the advantage of expanding their client base globally and automating their sign up process, which will ultimately help them cut costs while expanding their markets," he said.

    Suzanne Bowen, vice president of Super Technologies and DIDX said the combination of DIDX API for local international phone numbers and IPsmarx solutions gives entrepreneurs, carriers, calling card businesses, and ISPs a global presence in 60+ countries and affordable quality CRM and billing.

  • Touch Screen and Portability Key To Media Phone Success

    INTERVIEW: In the last six months the likes of AT&T, Verizon and Korea Telecom have launched media phones as the market for connected entertainment products begins to grow.

    But Oz Zimerman, corporate vice president of marketing for the DSP Group, told voip.biz-news that such devices must offer consumers something different – rather than trying to compete with the next generation of PCs.

    The media phone product is currently in its fledgling state but there’s no doubt the segment has the potential to be huge.

    A recent In-Stat report forecast it would become the 4th screen in the home and could also become a next generation business IP phone.

    Devices such as the Verizon Hub and AT&T HomeManager, which support both IP communications and the delivery of Internet information and multimedia content, have already been launched on the market.

    But Oz Zimerman, corporate vice president of marketing for the DSP Group, said that if manufacturers don’t try and differentiate these "4th screens" from the next-generation of PC then they are missing something.

    The DSP Group is currently working on more than 10 projects with OEMs and ODMs involving multimedia devices.

    Oz Zimerman, corporate vice president of marketing, DSP Group

    As well as including a tablet device Zimerman told voip.biz-news that they are developing two multimedia handsets, which he describes as iPhone-like cordless phones.

    He said that in order to be successful media phones need to offer something the other three screens do not have – and at a lower price.

    "In my mind the high end of the media phone, as represented by products such as Verizon’s Hub, may miss the point because they compete with next-generation PCs," he said.

    "We believe the multimedia screens which come with the phones should provide a different value at a different price point."

    To this end, Zimerman said these devices ought to include a phone but not necessarily have a powerful browsing capability.

    "They need to provide instancy and be always-on, have better portability and be easy to use," he said.

    One important aspect of this is getting easy and quick access to information that’s used frequently – something Zimerman said is best achieved using a touch screen.

    He said the result will be an iPhone-like cordless phone with DECT and WiFi, along with a 7-8" touchscreen for accessing multimedia and data.

    Integrated Chips

    DSP, which has been involved in semiconductor development for over two decades, has become a global provider of wireless chipset solutions for converged communications at home.

    Zimerman said the company has 70 per cent of the global market in the wireless home domain – and 100 per cent of that market in the US.

    Its system-on-a-chip solutions enable the combination of wireless voice communications with IP connectivity and multimedia processing.

    The company provides a range of chipsets integrating DECT, Wi-Fi, PSTN and VoIP/CoIP technologies with application processors.

    This enables converged voice, audio, video and data connectivity across diverse consumer products – from cordless and VoIP phones to home gateways and infotainment centers.

    "Our customers are trying to save on investment in R&D," said Zimerman. "They are more willing to work with a more integrated solution that will bring them faster to market with lower risk."

    Bringing VoIP to the Handset

    Earlier this month, DSP announced that its XvoiP Vega Firebird (PNX8181) system-on-a-chip (SoC) solution has been chosen by D-Link Corporation to drive its next-generation cordless-over-IP (CoIP) products.

    D-Link is using DSP’s XvoiP Vega Firebird in its dual-mode IP/DECT phone solution to take advantage of the growing popularity of IP-centric devices in the home.

    This continues to increase through the usage of IP phones, WLAN routers, surveillance cameras, tablets and IPTV.

    Zimerman said that with many current VoIP phones the "VoIP" part ended at the wall, with end users getting none of its capabilities.

    He said this termination plays a big part in the perceived lower quality of VoIP calls.

    "With our solution, the VoIP chips will enable the VoIP features to get to the handset," he said. "So, for example, HD Voice will be get all the way to the handset."

  • Tadiran Telecom Eyes VoIP market in Africa, Partners Teledata


    Tadiran Telecom has signed a distribution agreement with Teledata Technologies in a collaboration aimed at targeting "vast" VoIP opportunities in the African telecom market.

    The IP business telephony and communications supplier has also announced the appointment of Zeev Aviv as acting President and CEO.

    Until recently, he served as VP Sales and Marketing.

    He will be replacing Eitan Livneh, who served as President and CEO since early 2007.

    Aviv said Africa is one of the most valuable emerging markets, with opportunities abounding in Kenya and by extension the wider East and Central Africa region.

    "It is a fertile market that has great opportunities for telecom growth," he said.

    Aviv said numerous tenders are currently advertised for corporate telephony solutions that specify IP-PBX platforms.

    He said the demand for VoIP telephony services in the region has drastically increased due to improved cost-benefit awareness.

    Many corporate organizations are decentralizing regionally (with Nairobi as the region’s hub) and are looking for converged solutions with maximum ROI.

    In many organizations, the older-generation, traditional PABXs are now being phased out due to the emerging technological trends and the related cost benefits.

    Requirements are expected to increase drastically with the advent of the TEAMS undersea fiber optic cable project (linking the East Africa region) and due to the increase of Internet bandwidth IP converged solutions.

    Duke Onkundi, of Teledata, said his company’s knowledge of the Kenyan evolving market, enabled it to determine Tadiran Telecom’s solution as the most suitable fit.

    "It will facilitate a seamless move to VOIP with no loss of investment in legacy systems and combining the best aspects of both quality and financial feasibility," he said.

  • Skype Users Rise by 37m, Revenues up 25% in Q2


    Skype’s subscriber base just keeps on climbing, with another 37 million people added in the second quarter – taking the total year-to-date increase to 75 million.

    Growing subscribers also means growing revenues and the VoIP company saw Q2 revenue jump 25 per cent year-over-year to USD $170 million.

    The Skype figures were contained within parent company eBay’s financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2009.

    Its news was not quite so good. The ecommerce company posted second quarter revenue of USD $2.10 billion, a $97.7 million year-over-year decrease.

    The year-over-year revenue growth of PayPal and Skype was offset by the effects of the stronger dollar and a modest decline in the Marketplaces business.

    Another healthy quarter of growth under its belt will do no harms to Skype’s Initial Public Offering (IPO) price as eBay prepares to take the VoIP company public in early 2010.

    Provided the P2P technology lawsuit gets settled first.

  • Sipgate Launches Cloud-Based Business VoIP Service


    sipgate has launched a new and entirely web-based service version of its US telephony service that replaces both phone systems and phone lines.

    The VoIP company said that its "Team Edition" will allow small and mid-size companies to move their corporate phone service to the cloud.

    It provides each employee with online access to their inbox containing phone logs, faxes, recordings and voicemail messages.

    Thilo Salmon, CEO of sipgate, said collaboration features like forwards, labels and comments allow coworkers to be more productive.

    It also allows employees to return calls at the click of a button, or sign and send faxes through a WYSIWYG interface on the company letterhead.

    Most functions such as call forwarding, call recording, and 3-way calling can be activated with a single click on the interface.

    Salmon said this makes features previously hidden in phone systems accessible for employees and, consequently, businesses more productive.

    He said the aim is to make telephone service as easy to use as email.

    sipgate team starts at USD $2 per user per month, and a 30-day free trial is available.

    "If you can use email, you now know enough to run your company’s corporate telephony system," he said.

    "We think this service will resonate particularly well with entrepreneurial companies and firms that have already realized the benefits from other cloud-based services like hosted CRM or email."

    In June, sipgate launched a free VoIP service in the US aimed at capturing a share of the 100 million users that make up the landline market.

    Salmon said the new Team service allows each employee to stay in control over where to answer calls and even have their VoIP, landline and mobile phones ring in parallel – the call is routed through to whichever handset is picked up first.

    He said that during a call, it is simple to bridge-in other callers, transfer the call or even record it.

    Employees given administrative privileges can add new users, office locations and blocks of phone numbers at the click of a button, with new additions available to use from the moment ordered.

    The system has been designed to be simple for administrators to set up and maintain, cutting down the time, effort and cost of traditional telephony systems.

    sipgate is running an introductory offer for companies with up to one hundred users, and costs from just USD $2 per user per month and is offered as a one month rolling contract.

  • Mobile Broadband Could Reach 418m in 2017


    There could be 94 million people using VoIP hardware over mobile broadband connections across Europe by 2017, according to new research.

    Figures from the Coda Research Consultancy suggest the uptake of mobile broadband will continue to expand significantly.

    This could potentially change business practices as more people have the option of working from home rather than heading into the office.

    Global mobile broadband connectivity is forecast to reach 418 million over the same timeframe as the flexibility of the technology appeals to more people.

    The researchers predict that portable laptop and netbook users accessing the internet via mobile broadband will produce USD $48bn in operator revenues in 2017 and will generate and consume an immense 1.8 exabytes of traffic per month – a forty fold increase over 2009.

    Steve Smith, founder of Coda Research, said: "With enormous growth in traffic and considerable decline in average revenue per user, operators will need to be ruthlessly efficient."

    The most significant growth will occur in the Asia-Pacific region, where users will amount to 162m by 2017. Europe will account for 94m users, and North America for 58m users.

    The Coda report says the impact of Long Term Evolution (LTE) will be dramatic, with half of all mobile broadband via netbook and laptop users employing LTE worldwide in 2017.

    Three quarters of users in Europe and nearly two thirds of users in North America will employ LTE in 2017.

    This contrasts with just over half of users in Asia Pacific, and 12 per cent in Central and South America.

    Smith said LTE take up will be greatly skewed toward European and North American markets in the short to medium term, where ARPU will be highest.

    "However, we will also see significant take up in China, and we may also see countries like India bypass 3G altogether, and move straight to LTE," he said.

  • Cellcom Israel To Offer HD VoIP-enabled Mobile Calling


    AudioCodes has teamed up with MailVision to offer a mobile soft client (Pico) and a versatile mobile clients’ Distribution Platform to Israel’s leading mobile service provider, Cellcom.

    As a result, Cellcom is to offer a new service called Cellcom Link, which allows roaming subscribers to initiate voice calls and send text messages (SMS) over a Wi-Fi connection, via their current mobile handsets at low rates.

    Leev Lerner, CEO of MailVision, a provider of SIP Mobile Platforms for Wireless and NGN Service Providers, said its Pico Client delivers high voice quality to subscribers allowing them to utilize their personal handset and telephone number when travelling abroad.

    He said the PICO software has the ability to retain a mobile phone’s existing address book contacts, enabling users to use their regular phone interface.

    "Mobile operators are now able to offer an alternative to low cost PC based calls," he said.

    "By selecting to use our advanced mobile VoIP solution platform, Mobile operators can offer roaming end-users the ability to make calls at a significantly reduced rate."

    Adi Cohen, vice president of marketing at Cellcom, said the service is not intended to replace the existing Cellcom Abroad service.

    "Rather (it is) to serve as an additional solution for customers travelling abroad who make many phone calls with Wi-Fi supported devices and would like to cut costs, while retaining their personal cellphone number," he said.