Business News Holding

Category: voip

  • Hosted VoIP Solutions Provider Aptela Works with ClearSight to Resolve Network Issues


    Hosted VoIP solutions provider Aptela has announced that its working with ClearSight Networks’ Network Time Machine (NTM) to diagnose problems on customer and carrier networks.

    Matt Smith, vice president of technology and client services at Aptela, said the solution allows them to quickly and easily maintain network uptime and stave off unexpected outages.

    Since Aptela works with so many customer and carrier networks in addition to its own network, it used to be nearly impossible to pinpoint specific issues and their origins.

    He said NTM works like a metal detector for finding needle-in-a-haystack problems across all points within the network.

    "Now, with ClearSight’s NTM, we can take retroactive network data, pull up metrics on any call, and identify the source of the problem.

    "We are able to resolve issues and performance bottlenecks for our customers and carriers faster, more accurately and with less overhead."

    As a hosted-PBX and VoIP service provider, Aptela routes customers’ voice and data traffic via the Internet.

    For SMBs with limited IT resources and budgets, this method provides the benefits of a scalable and powerful VoIP system without the associated price tag.

    However, it also means that Aptela does not have visibility into the network hardware at each customer location. Smith said that using ClearSight’s NTM and pre-established metrics, the company now has greater insight and better visibility into any VoIP call, fax, email or phone registration over the network—and may quickly identify possible causes of latency, jitter and other call quality problems.

    Hosted VoIP services are on a strong growth trajectory, with a recent Infonetics Research report showing that the VoIP services market grew 33 per cent to USD $30.8 billion in 2008.

  • Fine Point Acquires VoIP Gateway Seller Sonic


    Fine Point Technologies has agreed to buy the German software and systems integration service provider Sonic Telecom.

    Sonic has been an authorized reseller of Fine Point’s device management technologies since 2005 – but also selling VoIP gateway systems and services.

    Fine Point says the deal will broaden its reach in European markets and offers it the potential to sell its software solutions to more communications providers.

    The NYC-based company will retain Sonic’s engineering and sales staff who are already knowledgeable in selling and supporting Fine Point’s products.

    Fine Point will also maintain Sonic’s existing facility in Germany, and rename the entity Fine Point Technologies, Inc.

    Financial terms for the transaction were not disclosed.

  • T-Mobile Deutschland Reverses VoIP Ban, Levies Surcharge


    T-Mobile has confirmed that it is to end its ban on mobile VoIP applications within its German network – but will charge customers upwards of EURO € 9.95 per month for the service.

    The operator justified the surcharge by explaining that billions of euros invested by operators in the roll-out of networks in recent years were based on rate costings with income from voice telephony and mobile data.

    Georg Pölzl, managing director of T-Mobile Deutschland, said that if this basis is no longer certain, then neither is the operational future of the networks.

    "T-Mobile wants to continue offering its customers state-of-the-art technology in future and needs a reliable basis to do so," he said.

    Vodafone is expected to announce a similar policy for the use of Skype or other VoIP applications on smartphones.

    Pölzl said the T-Mobile VoIP service will be available this summer.

    He said pricing would be staggered and customers would be able to use the VoIP services of different providers.

    "In this way, we are building a bridge between the different customers’ needs for the most competitively-priced and innovative services," he said.

    Pölzl said the charges were necessary because additional investment in the network is necessary for simultaneous, "always on" use of VoIP applications".

    He added: "It would not be fair to customers who don’t use VoIP if these additional costs were to be shared across all customers.

    "For this reason, we are making it possible to use Internet telephony via optional rates, while keeping it otherwise barred."

  • Sipgate Launches VoIP Assault on US Landline Market


    Sipgate has launched a free VoIP service in the US aimed at capturing a share of the 100 million users that make up the landline market.

    Called sipgate one, the new internet-based service uses a VoIP phone – or softphone – and offers a fully-featured service.

    The package provides a free telephone number, no set-up costs and no monthly charges or minimums.Users can also make free calls to other Sipgate users.

    Sipgate says it only charges USD $1.9 cents per minute for calls made or received from wireline or mobile phones – which it says is cheaper than Skype’s rate.

    Thilo Salmon, CEO of Sipgate, said that other features offered include click-to-dial, flexible call routing, and an online voicemail interface.

    Based in San Francisco, Sipgate is a well-established in Europe where it has been operating its "network agnostic" phone service since 2004.

    "There is simply no barrier to people disconnecting their old phone lines anymore," he said.

    "Phone and cable companies have long been pushing voice plans in the region of USD $25 to $40 per month – which end up being as much as $60 or more with extra charges – and that’s just ridiculous.

    "Even with calls to other landlines and mobile phones, most users will spend less than $5 a month using sipgate one.

    "And for those people only receiving incoming calls on their VoIP phone, the service is completely free."

    Sipgate also announced plans to roll out a multi-user edition of the service, which will target small businesses also seeking to drop expensive landline offerings.

    Other features include:

    • Need to write down a number while driving? Record any phone conversation by pressing *6
    • Want to customize your voicemail? Upload an mp3
    • Want your calls to follow you? Have your home, office and mobile phone ring in parallel
    • Left your mobile phone at home? Simply go online and divert calls to your office line
    • Want to talk to friends in an ad-hoc conference? Bridge them with the touch of a button
    • Missed calls while on a flight? A list is waiting for you in your email

  • SoliCall Broadens Reach of its VoIP Voice Quality Software

    SoliCall has signed three international deals with companies from the UK, US and India for its noise reduction and echo cancellation (AEC) technology.

    The Israel-based provider of software for VoIP solutions, mobile phones and IP PBXs has developed patent pending algorithms for audio improvement.

    Shlomi Simhi, director of marketing for SoliCall, said SoliCall SDK would provide the three companies with features for audio improvement that is suitable for all VoIP applications.

    He said the new clients would be using the software for a variety of uses:

    • a British company will be implementing SoliCall SDK across its new video conferencing servers
    • a New-York based company will be using the technology for its gaming applications
    • an Indian software company will integrate the solution as part of distributed Internet-based multiparty, multimedia interactions for on-line education

    Simhi said the new deals align with SoliCall’s vision to deploy its voice quality solution on any voice platform and to ensure high standards of call quality and reliability.

    "The variety of the companies who will be using our solution both on the client side and on the server side, only emphasizes the on-going demand for our solution," he said.

    SoliCall has developed a personalized voice pass filter that identifies the voice of the speaker and extracts it from the audio signal.

    The company offers a free SoftPhone add-On for private users, which controls the filtering of the incoming audio; live graphs of the audio (before & after filtering); recording options (in WAV or in MP3 format).

  • Positive Signs For Interoperability Between VOIP Systems


    It would appear that efforts to address problems of compatability and interoperability between the various VoIP protocols, packages and services are making some headway.

    For users – and especially small businesses – the issue has been of growing concern as the popularity of VoIP has led to a huge increase in the number of VoIP services.

    As Erica Stewart points out in her NetSquared blog, these potential users may want to adopt VoIP for their communication needs – but compatibility issues prevent them from fully entrusting their operations to such a service.

    However, she goes on to say that developments have been made since Stefan Oberg, Skype’s Vice-President for Business, announced the launch of a development program with Digium (the developers of Asterisk) last autumn.

    The partnership aims to incorporate Skype with the Asterisk system in a way that will allow the Asterisk PBX handle Skype calls more clearly and efficiently.

    Stewart says clients using this service now have the capability to make and receive Skype calls from within their existing Asterisk software and hardware systems.

    She says the partnership between the two well-known VoIP providers points to the growing interoperability between the various VoIP systems.

    "A small business owner can become more at ease in knowing that despite the multitude of both open source and proprietary voice codecs available in the market, there are efforts to be able to connect them to one another," she says.

    "These moves towards partnerships and idea and technology sharing, only bodes well for the goal of interoperability between Voice over Internet Protocol systems."

  • Skype Update With Screen Sharing – and Reinstated Extras


    Skype has released a beta version of its software for Windows which includes a screen sharing feature.

    The Skype 4.1 release also reinstates some extras that were removed in the previous update – much to the disappointment of many subscribers.

    With the screen sharing feature, which is view-only, users get the choice to record the full screen or a region.

    It is also possible to shift between full and partial screen modes. With one-way viewing, the "guest" sees only the screen selected.

    This addition moves Skype into the realm of low-cost international business communications, although it is limited to two users – host and guest.

    It would seem logical for the screen sharing function to be expanded in the future to group calls.

    Screen sharing was made available to Mac users in the last beta version of the Mac client in January – so Mac users now have the possibility of sharing screens with PC users.

    The Windows beta has also reintroduced two features dropped from the 4.0 version – birthday reminder alerts and contacts-sharing.

    The former simply send an automatic reminder on a contact’s birthday if this detail is available on their profile.

    Skype 4.1 also reinstated are a screen reader accessibility tool and a contacts import function from Gmail, Windows Live Hotmail, AOL and LinkedIn.

  • NextGenTel Buys Tele2 Norge Broadband/VoIP Operations


    Norway’s second largest broadband supplier, NextGenTel, has bought the broadband and VOIP business of Tele2 Norway.

    The deal will strengthen NextGenTel’s position in the Norwegian market by adding 97,000 broadband subscriptions – of these 23,000 are VOIP subscriptions.

    It also brings with it technical assets and key supplier contracts.

    A subsidiary of TeliaSonera, NextGenTel is to pay NOK 100 million (approx. USD $15.5 million) for the business, cash and debt free.

    The acquisition requires the approval of the Norwegian Competition Authority.

    But once completed, NextGenTel’s market share on the ADSL market will increase from 15 per cent to approximately 22 per cent.

    Håkan Dahlström, president of broadband services at TeliaSonera, said that both the Tele2 national network and the customers’ equipment will be easily integrated with NextGenTel’s network.

    He said Tele2’s broadband and VOIP business is an attractive asset that will strengthen NextGenTel’s position in the Norwegian market.

    "The increased customer base will also result in improved capacity utilization of the network," he said.

  • Ingate and Dialogic Announce Secure SIP Trunking for Legacy PBX


    Ingate Systems and Dialogic Corporation have announced a partnership that will allow enterprises using legacy PBX and Contact Center systems to adopt SIP trunks as a replacement for traditional PSTN voice services.

    The companies said they have completed the necessary testing to validate the Dialogic 2000 Media Gateway Series (DMG2000) as interoperable with Ingate SIParator and Ingate Firewall products.

    Steve Johnson, president of Ingate Systems, said most SIP trunking providers and resellers focus on getting SMB customers to migrate from PSTN service, along with an upgrade to a SIP-ready IP-PBX system.

    He said this strategy remains logical and compelling – but added that there is also a significant opportunity to migrate Enterprise class customers who maintain legacy (non-SIP) PBX and contact center systems.

    "The combined security features of the Ingate SIParator with the SIP to PBX trunk conversion capability of a DMG2000 gateway enable a cost effective, secure and reliable SIP trunk interface for these customers," he said.

    With this interoperability solution, both Ingate and Dialogic products are deployed on the customer premises to support the SIP trunking service.

    The Ingate products are deployed at the network edge between a wide area IP network and the corporate LAN, securely passing SIP signaling and VoIP media streams to and from the corporate LAN.

    The Dialogic gateway resides on the corporate LAN and is connected to the legacy PBX or contact center via traditional T1/E1 trunk ports.

    The DMG2000 gateway passes the SIP Trunk signaling and media from the Ingate SIParator to the PBX by emulating traditional PSTN trunk services.

  • IP Desktop Market Revenues to Decline Until 2011


    The IP telephony endpoint market will be affected by the economic downturn – despite the fact an increasing number of enterprises are recognizing the benefits of both IP desktop phones and enterprise soft clients.

    That’s the conclusion of Melanie Turek, principal analyst at Frost & Sullivan, which has just released its latest global study of the sector’s enterprise market.

    She says that IP desktop phones are rapidly proliferating in the enterprise, displacing their analog and digital predecessors.

    Today, this is largely due to declining prices and clear productivity benefits, according to Turek.

    "Last year, we anticipated that PC soft phones offered a natural transition to more sophisticated UC clients," she said in her No Jitter blog.

    Melanie Turek, principal analyst Frost & Sullivan

    "Today, we can confirm that this new generation of soft clients is quickly penetrating the market, often replacing their old counterparts."

    Turek said that thanks to the strong case around UC and the continued shift from hardware-based to software-based solutions, more telephony vendors are aggressively pursuing bundling strategies.

    This includes combining platforms, server software, advanced UC clients, and access to either a-la-carte or bundled applications.

    She said this has considerably boosted the penetration of enterprise soft clients such as PC desktop soft phones, advanced desktop UC clients, and mobile clients (FMC and UC).

    The world enterprise IP desktop phone market continued to grow in 2008, generating USD $2.57 billion in total revenues, a 3.1 per cent increase over 2007, according to the Frost & Sullivan report.

    Steady revenue decline is expected until the end of 2010, but the market is expected to gradually recover by 2011 and continue with a healthy growth pattern until at least 2015.

    Turek said the world enterprise IP soft client market has more than doubled its size, from 1.0 million units shipped in 2007, to almost 2.4 million clients in 2008.

    "This prominent increase in client shipments has been driven not so much by a swell of customer demand, but rather by the effective penetration strategies that many IP telephony providers have been implementing," she said.

    As a result, Frost & Sullivan estimates that less than 45 per cent of total enterprise soft clients shipped in 2008 are being used as a primary tool for voice communications.

    Although PC desktop softphone revenues are expected to considerably decrease over time as UC offerings penetrate the market, the higher profit margins granted by advanced UC clients and mobile FMC/UC clients are expected to largely offset this revenue decline.