One well-placed source in the equipment community says the company is choosing to lease long-haul network capacity from existing carriers, instead of lighting up dark fiber coast-to-coast.

Posted by Dal at 04:20 PM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

As Interim President of Vonage Network, Tim will oversee all of Vonage's network and systems operations globally and manage Vonage Network's staff.

Before joining Vonage in July 2005 as SVP of Network and Systems Infrastructure, Tim worked in various management roles for leading technology companies and organizations including Sun Microsystems Inc., UUNET Technologies Inc. and Wayport, Inc.

"We are thrilled to be promoting from within as we continue to shape our organization and are excited about Tim's new critical role with Vonage," said Vonage CEO Mike Snyder. "Tim has 20 years of experience designing, deploying, operating and maintaining Internet service delivery systems. Vonage will continue to benefit from his demonstrated record of leadership of technical teams and commitment to customer service."

Source: Vonage 

Posted by Dal at 10:26 AM | Direct Link Posted to Vonage

Advanced TCA, the PICMG 3.x family is the latest series of PICMG specifications, targeted to the requirements of the next generation of carrier grade communications equipment. This series of specifications incorporates the latest trends in high speed interconnect technologies, next generation processors and improved reliability, manageability and serviceability to make a new blade and chassis form factor optimised for communication applications.

The newly released SDK marks a significant step forward for VoIP application developers. In releasing a quick start ATCA development platform, Audiocodes have provided a cost effective solution for developers of a wide range of next generation applications such as VoIP gateways, Packet to Packet mediation, media servers, Next Generation switches and IP service platforms looking to take advantage of the next generation of communications hardware. With its comprehensive feature set that covers integrated voice and signalling functionality, the TP-12610 SDK offers considerable flexibility for managing and implementing high density, high availability solutions.

The product is based on AudioCodes cPCI VoIP board, hosted in a cPCI to ATCA adaptor which enables GB Ethernet Base and Fabric interfaces. The new design kit features a high capacity blade of 2016 channels and is based on field proven API which is common to all AudioCodes boards. Customers can use the same API for future platforms and thus reduce their development cycle and time to market.

AudioCodes' support of the ATCA form factor meets the demands of customers for a cost-effective, VoIP building block for the new generation of boards. AudioCodes has developed a software development kit that enables a quick start for building media gateway and media server platforms. The TP-12610 SDK meets the needs of software developers looking for a fully operational platform in the interim stage until the final phase of our TP-12610 is released.

Posted by Dal at 10:19 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

The hack allows users to to install linux by first erasing all traces of the Vxworks proprietary real-time operating system, and this without having to open the unit. "There is now a way to flash a WRT54G/GSv5 without any big modification or opening the unit", stated a message posted on the site, pointing to a forum user as the inventor of the hack.

"Db90h from our forum found a way to generate a flash image which overwrites the original bootloader of the unit", this turns Linksys units running Vxworks into linux compatible units, running dd-wrt.

It should be noted however that you can apparently run only the "light" edition of dd-wrt open sauce due to the low space available on the new "v5" Linksys devices. Linksys bean counters decided to maximise profits by cutting the device storage space thus lowering the bill of materials.

The web page hosting alternative eWRT firmware for the Linksys routers suggested people do not buy the "v5" router running Vxworks, helping visitors identify the 'not cool' version. "The WRT54G/GS version 5 routers contain half the RAM and Flash, and are shipped running vxWorks OS. These devices can be identified with serial numbers starting with CDFB or CGN7".

It seems very few people outside Linksys' accounting division was happy with this new version: it has been described as "a lousy router" in a recent review. Cisco/Linksys re-released the linux-compatible WRT54G as the "WRT54GL" the "L" supposedly standing for "Linux compatible", which has a higher price.

The procedure to kill Vxworks and install dd-wrt linux based firmware on the v5 units is explained in the dd-wrt project site: "After applying this image you can flash this unit with the dd-wrt 'micro edition' without any big troubles" the site reads. The software which allows this has been dubbed "VxWorks killer" and we're sure this won't amuse the folks at Wind River Systems of Alameda, California -creators of Vxworks- a single bit.

This proves hardware manufacturers that they are better not annoying the linux crowd because programmers will often get things their way - or move on to other hardware that is more open.

Despite this interesting hack, it should be noted that users who want to install a full -not lite- version of dd-wrt or any of the half a dozen linux based alternatives to Linksys' original linux firmware -- like OpenWRT, HyperWRT and ewrt among others - including the one from commercial vendor Sveasoft, are better purchasing the WRT54G"L" which Linksys released to please the crying linux crowd. As for pricing, one WRT54G can currently be had for around $50, while the linux-friendly "GL" sells for around $65.

The code hackers among you might want to know that the dd-wrt project sparked from the official GPL source code of Sveasoft Alchemy, later mixed with work from OpenWRT. It has tweaked radius support and according to the site allows "the use of an external filesystem device" via Samba networking. At only 1.7MB, the 'micro edition' of dd-wrt has a reduced footprint, allowing it to fit on devices with less RAM and Flash memory.

The programmer -and apparently linux die-hard- "db90h" who authored this cool hack is actually named Jeremy Collake in real life, according to OSDir.com, and detailed instructions on how to install the "Vxworks killer" are available at the dd-wrt wiki.µ

Source: Inquirer.net 

Posted by Dal at 10:16 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

SMC Networks has announced the availability of a PC-independent VoIP device - SMCWSKP100 Skype Wi-Fi phone - that uses the popular Skype software for making free or low-cost calling options. It is compatible with most standard 802.11b/g access points and provides constant connectivity without slowing down network connections while running in a pure 802.11g wireless environment.

In a shared wireless and data network, the SMCWSKP100 Skype Wi-Fi phone maintains good quality by prioritizing voice over data packets. With the embedded Skype software, it incorporates most Skype features such as voice mail, as well as Skype-in or Skype-out services, which allow users to make low-cost calls to other phone networks.

As long as users have a valid Skype account, they can access both PSTN and Skype networks. Within any free wireless environment, Skype account holders can use the compact SMCWSKP100 device to make calls in different scenarios.

Source: SMC Networks

Posted by Dal at 10:11 AM | Direct Link Posted to Skype

For the first time, service providers can leapfrog legacy copper and economically roll-out a fiber-grade wireless infrastructure without trenching fiber.

ClearMesh Metro Grid technology extends the reach of metro Ethernet networks, where lateral expansion of fiber would require significant up-front investment and months for deployment. Metro Grid complements existing WiFi and WiMAX service deployments by infusing additional bandwidth in high density metro areas, expanding the customer base for wireless networks.

For wireless Internet service providers, the ClearMesh Metro Grid provides the ability to economically serve the dense metro SMB market with high-bandwidth business-grade services beyond those offered by WiFi or WiMAX solutions. Operating in the license-free band, the ClearMesh solution enables wireless service providers to overcome the crowded RF spectrum and deliver high-quality services in dense metro areas.

Now, Metro Ethernet service providers can cost-effectively deliver business-class Ethernet services in a matter of days and at a fraction of the cost of trenching fiber. This extends the fiber service providers' market by enabling them to reach a large number of medium-sized businesses and "light-up" underutilized core fiber.

"Small and medium sized businesses increasingly rely on broadband connectivity for Internet-based, mission-critical applications," said Suresh Nihalani, President and CEO of ClearMesh Networks. "We provide a truly scalable access network solution, enabling service providers to deliver the necessary bandwidth to support high-margin service bundles including VoIP, network backup, video conferencing, multimedia and security, at an affordable price."

Service providers can immediately begin to market fiber-grade Ethernet services and extend the physical reach of the Metro Grid as more customers sign up - a true pay-as-you-grow solution.

The Metro Grid solution is immediately available and is comprised of two products, the ClearMesh 300 (CM 300) node and the ClearMesh Management System (CMS).

A Metro Grid deployment consists of ClearMesh 300 nodes which can be pole or roof-mounted. This integrated networking platform combines high-capacity Ethernet switching and low-cost wireless optical transport with business-grade Ethernet service delivery interfaces. Using secure optical transmission, the CM 300 can distribute up to 300 Mbps of wire-speed, ultra-low latency, and full-duplex service capacity. This allows service providers to deliver enough capacity to concurrently serve thousands of VoIP calls, video streams and Internet sessions.

The ClearMesh Management System (CMS) gives service providers carrier-class tools for mesh-wide installation, diagnostics, service analysis and provisioning to support fast and efficient service deployment across the Metro Grid.

About ClearMesh Networks

ClearMesh is the only worldwide producer of next-generation, wireless optical mesh networking equipment, enabling service providers to target broader metropolitan business markets. The Metro Grid allows service providers to build reliable and cost-effective fiber-grade access networks. With ClearMesh, service providers have the ability to leapfrog legacy copper to deliver 5-100 Mbps per customer with a license-free and interference-free wireless mesh solution. For more information, please visit www.clearmesh.com.

Source: BusinessWire 

Posted by Dal at 10:15 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

The move will pit the Apple-branded video conferencing and instant message software against existing VoIP solutions from the likes of Skype, Google and Microsoft.

Skype, which began as a small software startup in 2003, is largely accredited with popularizing free Internet telephony through its self-titled software application. The Luxembourg-based company was recently acquired by eBay. It boasts a userbase of over 100 million and offers its software in 27 different languages.

Recently other industry heavyweights have looked to get in on the VoIP craze. Just this month, Microsoft added VoIP features to Windows Live Messenger, which will be available to users of its forthcoming Vista operating system. Meanwhile, Google wedged its foot in the door last year with public beta release of Google Talk, a similar software-based service.

If reports pan out, VoIP functionality won't be the only feature of Apple's Leopard to rival similar offerings from both Google and Microsoft. Earlier this month, sources reported that Apple also appears ripe to introduce a geographic mapping solution with Leopard, similar to Microsoft's Virtual Earth and Google's Maps.

The Apple software, which is simply dubbed "Maps," is also rumored to employ GPS functionally. In the future, the Cupertino, Calif.-based company may leverage the technology to help track stolen Macs or iPods, people familiar with the software have said.

A team of Apple executives is scheduled to formally unveil Leopard during the second week of August at the company's annual World Wide Developers Conference. Although Apple has so far referred to the operating system as "Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard," there's a strong possibility that name will change, sources have said.

Source: AppleInsider 

Posted by Dal at 10:12 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

Brian Ward said Citron’s speech at Convergence 2.0 failed to address any of the issues facing Vonage these days (growing criticism about its marketing spending, class-action lawsuits, discounts for subscribers who threaten to leave, etc.). With Vonage under siege, this is a time when you’d expect a marketing-wizard such as Citron to creatively and enthusiastically come to the company’s defense. After all, he co-founded Vonage because he believed VoIP would be a disruptive technology.

What happened to that chutzpah? Now that Vonage is public, itseems like Citron believes he has to behave. But if all you’re going to do is give tepid keynotes with no meat, why bother talking at all because you end up doing more harm than good?

Posted by Dal at 12:53 PM | Direct Link Posted to Vonage

RemoteControlEyes is designed to be used in conjunction with popular IM and VOIP video conversation programs such as AOL, MSN, Yahoo and Sykpe. RemoteControlEyes enables the webcam owner to offer their friends the ability to remotely control the pan tilt functions of the webcam. Many pan tilt webcams automatic feature face tracking and local control of the pan tilt function.

RemoteControlEyes adds to this with remote control functionality. Remote Control pan tilt helps to make video conversation more natural experience and its great fun to use. Using RemoteControlEyes with Skype or Instant Messengers is simple. The Remote ControlEye program generates a unique URL which you cut and paste into the chat feature of the VoIP or IM with an invitation to pan tilt control and an access password.

The remote user opens the control page in a web browser window and takes control. You can set up four preset positions. Access to the control page is password protected so you can be sure of just allowing your friends pan tilt control privileges.

Source: ClickPress 

Posted by Dal at 12:49 PM | Direct Link Posted to Skype

Brekeke Software, Inc., an emerging leader in voice and data communications technology, today announced successful completion of interoperability testing of OnDO PBX with Kapanga Softphone. Kapanga Softphone is a product of Ecotronics Ventures LLC, an Internet and Electronics Engineering services company based in the Washington DC Metro area.

"Brekeke has a great set of software products that enable both small businesses and system integrators to deploy IP-based solutions easily and at a very low cost," said Martin Cadirola, President/VP Business Development at Ecotronics Ventures. "Ecotronics relationship with Brekeke opens up a great range of opportunities for deploying media over IP solutions (voice, video, fax) since Brekeke's customers will be able send and receive voice, video calls and transmit and receive faxes using just one SIP client: Kapanga Softphone."

Kapanga is a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) based software phone capable of voice, fax, and video-over-IP communications. As a SIP phone, Kapanga can be used on VoIP networks to interact with traditional Public Switching Telecommunication Networks (PSTNs) and future IP-based telecommunication devices. In addition, Kapanga Softphone offers features such Voice and video-over-IP recording, fax auto-answering, real-time Quality of Service monitoring and much more.

OnDO PBX, an award-winning IP-PBX system, is easily managed through a web-based administrative interface and includes Conference Call, Automatic Route Selection (ARS), Call Forwarding, Call Monitoring, Call Recording and much more. Brekeke's products provide multi-platform support on Microsoft Windows 2000/XP, Red Hat Linux, and Solaris™ and are highly compatible with most SIP phones, gateways, and service providers.

About Ecotronics

Ecotronics Ventures LLC is an internet software and Engineering services company based in the Washington DC Metro area, providing innovative technology products and services in the IP communications, Internet and Engineering fields for commercial and governmental organizations. In 2005, Ecotronics launched Kapanga Softphone, the first SIP software phone client that integrates T.38 fax in addition to voice and video call capabilities. As a fully featured SIP client, Kapanga Softphone is designed from the ground up to work with current and future VoIP systems and infrastructure. Kapanga Softphone has also been tested by engineers and softphone users across many VoIP hardware and service providers in North America, Europe, and Asia.

Kapanga Softphone is available for free download for personal or academic use from http://www.kapanga.net.

Posted by Dal at 09:27 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

The new cordless phones have dual functionality so consumers can make free Voice over Internet Protocal (VoIP) calls, as well as ordinary landline calls.

The Skype VOIP321 and Windows LM VOIP433 phones, launching in the U.S. in July and September 2006, operate on Digitally Enhanced Cordless Telephone (DECT) technology. The new DECT technology enhances the sound and security available in a cordless phone. Consumers will experience crystal clear sound and reduced noise interference with the new DECT technology.

The VOIP321 was developed to combine the key benefits of Skype with the Philips’ home cordless technology. Skype’s rich features include free worldwide calls, conferencing with other Skype users, Skype Instant Messaging and file transfer. Users can make and receive calls on both Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) and VoIP networks from a single handset. The new VOIP321 allows consumers to view who is online anywhere in the home by simply looking at the cordless phone display. The handset allows specific polyphonic ring tones to distinguish Skype and landline calls.

Designed for Microsoft, the VOIP433 Dual Phone enables consumers to easily call and connect to anyone listed on their Windows LM contact list with the simple click of a button. Consumers will have three calling choices: free PC-to-PC calling through Windows LM allowing users to place and receive voice calls; MCI Web Calling offering Windows LM users a low-cost PC-to-phone outbound calling option; and traditional landline phone service.

The VOIP433’s color screen takes the consumer experience to the next level by allowing users to see their friends’ online presence, displaying dynamic Windows LM icons, and delivering notification options on the cordless handset, even when users are away from their PC.

Source: Philips 

Posted by Dal at 09:24 AM | Direct Link Posted to Skype

 

The new products, centered on an innovative optically-connected "virtual base station" approach, give service providers extreme flexibility in rolling out a cost-optimized Mobile WiMAX service network.

"2006 represents a milestone year for the commercialization of Mobile WiMAX, and ADAPTIX's strategy and new products are designed to assist both mobile and fixed carriers with the transition from voice-centric to multimedia-centric services," said ADAPTIX's Vice President of Marketing and Product Management Byron Young. "Our new BX-3000 Micro Base Station family represents the next wave of IP-based OFDMA base stations that will cost a fraction of what large, macro platforms will, while offering substantially better per-sector and per-user performance over 3G."

"The traditional macro cell configuration typically does not offer the kind of per-user throughput or flexibility of a micro or pico cell approach," said Iain Gillott, founder and president of iGR, a market consultancy focused on the wireless and mobile industry. "As more and more people around the world use wireless and mobile services, demands on traditional network architectures are increasing, and it is clear that fresh approaches are required."

Based on ADAPTIX's own core OFDMA technology, the new BX-3000 base station line and SX series of mobile terminals are built with a highly programmable Software Defined Radio architecture, allowing easy software upgrades to new features such as multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) as well as new services based on OFDMA beyond Mobile WiMAX. Next Generation PHS, 3GPP's Long Term Evolution (LTE), and the IEEE's 802.22 are all emerging standards considering OFDMA as their base physical layer standard.

While many companies are only now working on their first generation OFDMA products, ADAPTIX has constructed its third generation mobile OFDMA engine for the BX-3000 family, while also supporting the new robust IEEE 802.16e-2005 standard with its very first release. Its fully programmable, hardware- accelerated design makes it possible for the BX-3000 to achieve peak performance while supporting standards-based QoS for new services like Voice over IP and Mobile IPTV. Advanced functionality such as Gigabit Ethernet backhaul, dynamic IP routing with mobility, and Smart Antenna technologies such as MIMO are also supported. Finally, the BX-3000 supports high-speed optical interfaces between its ultra-compact baseband unit and up to three outdoor RF units, enabling a wide range of installation options while maximizing RF performance.

Complementing the BX-3000 is ADAPTIX's new SX series of Mobile Terminals. Smaller and lighter than a typical travel hard drive, the SX-300 Compact Mobile Terminal is ideal for fixed, portable and true mobile uses. The SX-500 High-Performance Mobile Terminal, designed for fixed, portable or vehicular use, features a dual antenna array and can support peak throughput of more than 10 Mbps.

"ADAPTIX was one of the earliest innovators of OFDMA technology with two prior pre-WiMAX mobile systems already in deployment," said Young. "Our third generation family provides the right combination of spectral efficiency, superior performance and cost efficiency that carriers require in order to take Mobile WiMAX and other emerging OFDMA services to the next step - mass deployment."

About ADAPTIX

To meet the growing demand for high-bandwidth, integrated mobile voice, video and data applications, ADAPTIX delivers software-defined, hardware- enabled infrastructure platforms for wireless and wireline service providers around the world. ADAPTIX's standards-based, OFDMA/WiMAX solution gives service providers the highest level of spectral and resource flexibility as well as the efficiency to deploy rich media applications quickly and cost effectively. ADAPTIX, one of the earliest developers of OFDMA technology, is headquartered in Dallas, Texas, with additional offices in Seattle, Washington, and Shanghai, China.

Posted by Dal at 09:21 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

By integrating Tropos solutions into ScanSource Securitys product offering, resellers are able to easily convert their wired security solutions to wireless.

By enabling hardwired solutions to become wireless, Tropos products help resellers provide more efficient, larger security solutions that can be installed in expansive environments, including campuses and prisons, where end-users might need multiple wireless network systems. Whats more, with Tropos, resellers can transmit video surveillance over a wireless network, an ever-increasing security need.

Posted by Dal at 09:18 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

The Lucent Compact Switch is a carrier-class solution with fault-tolerant hardware and software that delivers exceptional uptime for all voice and data services and with redundancy that extends to every part of the system including inputs and outputs, switching fabric, and system processing. The switch can support from as few as 1,000 subscribers to more than 100,000 subscribers.

The Lucent Compact Switch will enable Westelcom to deliver tandem switching and advanced next-generation Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services customers in upstate New York. Lucent’s VoIP solution will enable Westelcom to migrate toward a facilities-based platform, reducing operating costs and creating additional revenue opportunities.

Dynavar will provide the network engineering, integration and deployment services for the installation. Lucent Worldwide Services will provide maintenance. "To satisfy customer demand and maintain our competitive edge, we needed a solution that would allow us to offer our customers advanced new services in a timely manner, with no risk of sacrificing quality," said Jim Forcier, president of Westelcom. "Lucent’s solution, with support from Dynavar, offered the most feature-rich and reliable next-generation compact solution available on the market."

"Westelcom’s deployment of the Lucent-Dynavar solution will allow them to deliver a more cost-effective and better managed service to their customers," said Sean MacNeill, president and chief operating officer of Dynavar Corporation. "With the Lucent Compact Switch, Westelcom has a smooth migration path to a facilities-based platform."

"By partnering with Dynavar, we were able to offer companies such as Westelcom a compelling end-to-end solution that resolved their needs in a cost-effective manner, as well as met the needs of their customers," said Gerry Cafaro, vice president of sales for Lucent Technologies. "The Lucent Compact Switch offers Westelcom the flexibility they need to succeed in today’s competitive market, and also allows for the addition of new advanced services as they become available in the future."

The Lucent switch also can serve as a building block for carriers that choose to migrate to an IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) network to offer blended lifestyle services.Service providers can deploy the Lucent Compact Switch for end-office (Class 5) and tandem (Class 4) applications to replace an existing switch or as an addition to the network. In addition to providing VoIP, Internet off-load and gateway mobile switching center features, the compact switch also offers CALEA and E911 capabilities.

Source: WebWire 

Posted by Dal at 09:13 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

Posted by Dal at 04:32 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Consumers buying the routers, which usually cost about $60, will need to let others use their Internet connections and in return will be able to connect for free to other wireless hot spots that are part of the network, said Juergen Urbanski, Madrid-based FON's U.S. general manager.

FON, which in February raised $21.7 million from Google, eBay's Skype Technologies, Index Ventures and Sequoia Capital, is aiming to build a global network of wireless fidelity, or Wi-Fi, links to promote Internet access. The company also wants to give consumers a way of making money by renting connections to others.

"We want Wi-Fi to become much more ubiquitous," Urbanski, who is based in San Francisco, said in a Friday interview. "That's good news for the different Web-based companies. It's good for the router makers."

The routers are made by Linksys Inc., acquired by Cisco Systems Inc. in 2003, and Buffalo Technology Inc., and FON is making 1 million available for sale at the subsidized price, Urbanski said. Wireless routers plug into home Internet connections and broadcast a signal that can be picked up by laptop computers.

Users who already have certain makes of wireless routers can also install software from FON to join the network.

The company aims to have 50,000 wireless hot spots by September and 150,000 by the end of the year, Urbanski said.

Posted by Dal at 10:10 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

Posted by Dal at 10:05 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

Microsoft's vision for unified communications breaks down today's silos of e-mail, instant messaging, voice over Internet protocol (VoIP), telephony and conferencing, allowing people to communicate and collaborate more effectively with colleagues, customers and partners.

Polycom will develop and market integrated business-class UC SIP voice end-points beyond its previously announced integration. The new products will include integrated desktop devices that leverage the presence awareness, instant messaging, and new telephony and VoIP capabilities of Microsoft's unified communications platform. The solutions will bring the richness of the PC together with the familiarity and voice capabilities of the desktop telephone enabling users to easily find and communicate with customers, partners and co-workers within a more secure environment.

"Industry-leading companies such as Polycom will play a significant role in the development of real-time collaboration solutions using our unified communications platform," said Zig Serafin, general manager of the Unified Communications Group at Microsoft Corp. "Polycom is a recognized brand in enterprise communications and will bring high-quality voice and video products that are integrated for a Microsoft unified communications environment. Through our cooperative efforts, we will enable businesses to make better decisions faster by connecting people, information and business processes in a seamless fashion."

Today's announcement expands Polycom's commitment to Microsoft environments with new SIP desktop voice devices that will leverage the instant messaging, presence, and new integrated telephony and VoIP capabilities of Microsoft unified communications platform, including wideband voice communications (14 kHz). These devices will also support auto provisioning, management and configuration of Microsoft's UC platform, enabling use in a dynamic and mobile work environment.

Polycom's commitment builds on its strategic relationship with Microsoft, which has delivered multiple phases of integration including federation of its market-leading Polycom VSX(TM) video systems, SoundStation® and SoundPoint® IP phones, and V2IU(TM) network address and firewall traversal solution with Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005 and Microsoft Office Communicator 2005. An industry first, this integration enables presence and buddy lists on Polycom VSX video systems and SoundStation and SoundPoint phones to simplify rich media calling for end-users, making it as easy to connect a call from your phone or video system as it is using Office Communicator 2005 on your PC.

"To support today's announced Microsoft unified communication vision, we are developing integrated desktop devices that bring Polycom voice quality, ease of use and performance to customers in Microsoft environments," said Sunil Bhalla, senior vice president and general manager of voice communications at Polycom. "Through our expanded integration with Microsoft, we are able to offer solutions that bring the advantage of real-time presence information, name-based dialing and the simplicity of using directories and buddy lists to the forefront of the telephony experience."

Polycom reserves the right to modify future product plans at any time. Products and/or related specifications referenced in this press release are not guaranteed, and will be delivered on a when and if available basis.

Posted by Dal at 09:51 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

Secure VoIP peering enables VoIP wholesalers, VoIP clearinghouses, IP transport providers and network co-location providers to increase customer loyalty and generate new revenues from peer to peer VoIP traffic.

Secure VoIP peering for Entice includes two new features which eliminate interconnect fraud risk and settlement disputes. First, digitally signed tokens included with each call setup ensure secure peer to peer access control. Second, real time collection of encrypted call detail records from both source and destination peers eliminate interconnect settlement billing disputes.

To enable secure VoIP peering, the Entice Session Border Controller communicates with the NexSRS settlement server using the OSP peering protocol – an operations and billing support (OSS/BSS) protocol standard defined by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI). The OSP peering protocol, designed for secure clearing and settlement of peer to peer applications such as VoIP and video, is supported by a growing variety of VoIP platforms, such as Cisco, Veraz, Asterisk, SIP Express Router and OpenSER.

"We are pleased to certify that the TransNexus OSS/ BSS software platform is fully compatible with the Entice Session Border Controller. Our partnership with Emergent offers TransNexus customers new alternatives for VoIP protocol inter-working and interoperability," said Jim Dalton CEO of TransNexus.

Posted by Dal at 11:11 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

The notification (Ref# 2155455200) is a response to alleged infringement of Naztech products. Wireless Xcessories Group has been notified and a response is pending.

The complaint alleges that the Wireless Xcessories Group, Inc. website contains online products that have copied every aspect of Naztech products, including the identical designs causing confusion to consumers and irreparable damage.

Naztech Wireless Technologies’ legal department commented “We are accustomed to eventual copying of our merchandise overseas after a certain period of time with its own uniqueness to avoid infringement, however this case is unique.

We have never dealt with a customer creating an identical design and merely changing the logo. This is noticeably unfair business practice in addition to probable infringement. We have taken the preliminary steps to put an end to this activity and are hopeful that the response will be favorable”.

Naztech is a pioneer in the wireless accessory market and has been in similar situations before. All previous attempts of comparable unfair business with other companies were terminated upon notifying the companies and Naztech is optimistic that Wireless Xcessories Group will abide by the appeal.

The wireless industry has had to deal with infringement since its existence. Earlier this year, network equipment giant Ericsson filed a lawsuit against mobile phone maker Samsung alleging patent infringement.

Posted by Dal at 11:08 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

The strategic relationship formed between Microsoft and Plantronics will enable the two companies to jointly develop new innovative unified communications devices that provide professionals with superior voice and data integration enabling unified communications across the enterprise.

"Plantronics and Microsoft teamed together because we share a vision for creating the next generation of unified communications solutions that will make office communications integrated, intuitive and real-time," said Chuck Yort, vice president of Business Solutions at Plantronics. "This initiative is consistent with Plantronics' long-range strategic view to make voice solutions more deeply embedded and valuable across the entire enterprise workflow and communication process."

"Microsoft's vision for unified communications enables people to find and collaborate with co-workers right from the applications they use most to more effectively get business done," said Eric Swift, senior director of product management for the Unified Communications Group at Microsoft Corp. "Plantronics is playing a significant role in the development of voice and VoIP peripheral solutions using Office Communicator 2007 and our unified communications platform. Through our cooperative efforts and the integration of the Plantronics Voyager 510-USB Bluetooth headset system with Communicator 2007, Plantronics is adding significant value to PC-based enterprise communications and enabling businesses to better connect people, information and business processes."

The Plantronics Voyager 510-USB marks the first step towards this joint vision, supporting instant VoIP connectivity and extending the reach of the network via a wireless Bluetooth headset. The Voyager 510-USB will support the enhanced instant messaging (IM) capabilities of Microsoft Office Communicator 2007 by enabling professionals to instantly place hands-free VoIP calls through a PC.

Office Communicator 2007 on the PC brings voice capabilities to enhanced IM and presence awareness, integrated telephony, VoIP, and real-time elements of conferencing and unified communications.

An extension of Plantronics' VoIP product portfolio, the Plantronics Voyager 510-USB features the award-winning Voyager 510 headset and includes a plug-and-play Bluetooth USB adapter that simplifies setup and use. Plantronics' exclusive multipoint technology allows users to switch between multiple Bluetooth enabled devices, including softphones and mobile phones, with the touch of a button. The Voyager 510-USB also includes Plantronics' PerSonoCall(R) software which enables users to wirelessly answer/end PC telephony calls while roaming in the office. By "cutting the cord" between the PC and headset, professionals will have the freedom to roam within their offices, talk between conference rooms or at the printer, and be completely hands free to multi-task and collaborate more effectively. PerSonoCall will be fully integrated with the new Communicator 2007 and include wireless call control in the near future.

Posted by Dal at 11:04 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

It is believed that Telstra has acquired around 30 Touchbase staff.

In a recent interview with CRN, Magnus Maynard, managing director, Touchbase said the integrator refused to agree to stipulations imposed by Avaya which restricted its service capabilities.

In a statement to CRN, Telstra said it has bought Touchbase Australia’s Avaya assets. According to Telstra, Touchbase will continue to trade with other vendor products.

“Telstra will continue to provide customer service to Touchbase's Avaya customers - many of whom are already existing Telstra customers for other ICT services. This acquisition would allow Telstra to deepen their relationship with existing and new customers,” stated Telstra.

“We will also be selling Touchbase’s Avaya products.”

The acquisition of the Touchbase's Avaya customer base and associated staff is part of Telstra’s strategy in the IP telephony space.

With this acquisition, Telstra will be able to provide a broad range of IP Telephony solutions to enterprise and government customers in Australia.

Telstra now has relationships with vendor partners including, Avaya, Cisco, NEC, Ericsson, Nortel and Mitel.

Posted by Dal at 10:58 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

The box, which is about the size of a large suitcase, goes by two names—the Mobile Communications Kit and the NetHope Relief Kit. Cisco doesn't sell the James Bond-like kit directly. The kit connects to a satellite service to deliver local and long-distance voice and data and standard wired access for buildings and wireless access up to 20 miles.

However, the NRK is made up of common off-the-shelf equipment.Cisco's effort was designed to solve connectivity issues for relief agencies. The problem: Mobile radios are ineffective, and high-frequency radio transmissions are at the mercy of interference and jamming. In addition, bandwidth toll rates can blow budgets when large files such as X-rays are transferred.

Bob Browning, manager of tactical operations support at Cisco, in San Jose, Calif., likened the kits to blocks that can be used to build ad hoc networks. The kit was largely started as a test within the company to see how many products it could cram into a small space.

The kit made its debut in Iraq in 2003 to support the NetHope relief agency, a membership organization comprising the CIOs and chief technology officers of 17 global nongovernmental organizations working in international development.Cisco created six kits in 2004 to be used during the Indian Ocean tsunami that hit Indonesia and Thailand. The kits were also used during Hurricane Katrina in September 2005.

"It's designed to be rugged and available as long as you need it," Browning said, adding that NRKs are most useful in the first 24 to 48 hours of a disaster but can remain in place until infrastructure comes back online.The box can operate under multiple AC and DC power standards and includes Ethernet uplink ports, switches for LAN connectivity, antennas for wireless access and associated cables. The box also includes two exhaust fans.

Browning estimates that the kits take anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes to set up, with the bulk of that time needed to tune satellite reception. Browning notes that the NRK is a work in progress, but the possibilities are promising. Six NRKs coupled with Cisco's Mobile Command Vehicle, an RV equipped with networking technology, have managed to generate a mesh network covering 350 square miles. The command center provided the satellite broadband connection, and the NRKs relayed the wireless signals. "These are like Lego blocks," Browning said. "There are infinite possibilities."

Source: TheChannelInsider

Posted by Dal at 10:51 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

Posted by Dal at 06:14 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Help

 

The Bluetooth 2 Class 1 Skype phone has a remote control for shifting from Skype phone to Skype function, and vice versa.

The unit has an answer/dial phone call function. It supports handsfree, headset and serial port profiles. It supports 100m operating range in open space, 4hr talk time and 120hr standby time.

The Bluetooth Skype phone is powered by a Li-ion rechargeable battery and supports USB charging.

Posted by Dal at 06:12 PM | Direct Link Posted to Skype

Key New Features :

   * full rewriting on the web interface, new PHP Framework OO class
(code more structured & centralized)
   * CallBack : Web callback from customer interface, ANI callback, DID callback
   * Gettext Multi Language support for the customer interface (Spanish, English, French, Chinese, Italian, Romanian, Turkish, Urdu)
   * SOAP-Webservice : Create Card, Remove card, Update... See WSDL : A2Billing_UI/api/SOAP/soap-card-server.php?wsdl
   * Ratecard Simulator on Customer interface
   * CallerID Update on Customer interface
   * Based on Adodb, dbms layer
   * Features to export to XML
   * Update of the Web Dialer WebPhone Jiax
   * Add the VAT on the customer invoice
   * Better support for ARA
   * lot of bugs fixed
   * and more...

WIKI -> http://wiki.asterisk2billing.org/
FORUM -> http://forum.asterisk2billing.org/
DEMO -> http://demo.asterisk2billing.org/


As usual I am waiting for your good feedback and recommendation!

Enjoy your Sunday,
/Areski

Posted by Dal at 06:07 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Software

Posted by Dal at 01:07 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

"The first model will come during the first half of '07," Chung said, adding the handset will be made available worldwide.

WiMAX is a wireless technology that offers the promise of high-speed connections over a greater area than is possible with Wi-Fi. Fixed-wireless and mobile versions of the technology are being developed, with the fixed-wireless version seen as a replacement for wired broadband connections, such as cable and DSL.

Samsung's mobile WiMax technology is capable of downlink speeds up to 10.2Mbps while travelling at 120 kilometers per hour (75 miles per hour). By the third quarter of 2007, the company expects to push downlink speeds higher, to a maximum of nearly 40Mbps, Chung said.

At CommunicAsia, Samsung demonstrated a mobile WiMax network. The demonstration included a notebook equipped with a PCMCIA WiMAX card and several WiMax-equipped PDAs capable of surfing the Internet, downloading videos, and sharing files with other users.

These technologies are already making their way into the outside world. Samsung is now working with operators in several countries to test mobile WiMAX networks, including South Korea, where local operators will launch commercial services based on the technology at the end of this month, Chung said.

Posted by Dal at 01:05 PM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

Posted by Dal at 12:58 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

Sanjay Singh, head, SMB Business, Avaya GlobalConnect, told Business Standard that the company planned to launch a new “IP solution, which will enable conferencing among 20 users without using EPABX.

There will be a software sitting on the IP phones, which will perform functions that an EPABX does.” Avaya's flagship product 'IP Office' targets SMEs in India. It is a 128-party conferencing solution and can be customised according to customers' requirements.

IP Office was launched globally in 2002 and in India in November 2005. "So far, we have sold 60,000 systems globally and 80 systems in India," he said. However, the company expected a 20-25 per cent share of the IP telephony market for SMEs in India in the next one year. The IP telephony market in India is expected to reach Rs 950 crore in the next three years from the current Rs 300 crore.

The market for SMEs is expected to reach Rs 450 crore in the next three years from about Rs 150 crore by growing 35 per cent annually compounded. Other than marketing its own software products, Avaya also sells products of firms like LG, Polycom, Cyberoam and Plantronics to SMEs. Avaya GlobalConnect's revenue in India at present stands at around Rs 500 crore.

Posted by Dal at 06:51 PM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

 
A former AT&T technician told Salon that wiretapping, sniffing equipment was installed at numerous AT&T facilities. The brains of the entire operation are at an AT&T Network Operations Center in Bridgeton, Mo., inside a well-protected, 20-by-40 foot room. The room is protected by a "mantrap" -- highly secure protection.

The Bridgeton facility is said to be able to collect data via any AT&T router in the U.S. via the sniffers.

And if a former AT&T technician is to be believed, they can sniff and capture virtually any piece of information, whether it be browsing information, VoIP, email or more.

"The network sniffer with the right software can capture anything," he told Salon. "You can get people's e-mail, VoIP phone calls — even passwords and credit card transactions — as long as you have the right software to decrypt that."

Is all this snooping needed for national security? We'll never know, because the NSA and AT&T still refused to divulge details.

Posted by Dal at 06:48 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Politics

Posted by Dal at 03:41 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Software

It's a pleasant dream, but the reality is that while you can escape the tyranny of long distance charges, it will still cost something. You have to pay for bandwidth and equipment, and invest some time and skill in running your Asterisk server. And the telcos are understandably unhappy at the idea of losing all that revenue, even as we still use their wires. I can't predict how they will ultimately react to the upheaval caused by VoIP and Asterisk, but something is going to change sooner or later.

Whatever the future brings, for now you can enjoy saving money and having greater flexibility by peering with other Asterisk servers. Suppose you have far-flung branch offices, or vendors or other business partners that you need to talk to a lot. You can set up your own private network of Asterisk servers and bypass the telcos entirely. In typical Asterisk fashion there are a number of ways to do this. We will look at two: using DUNDi, the Distributed Universal Number Discovery protocol, and using a central directory service like Free World Dialup. Today we'll learn how to use Free World Dialup. DUNDi is distributed protocol that eliminates the need for a central provider; we'll learn how to implement it next week.

Source: LinuxWorld 

Posted by Dal at 09:41 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Help

The Inter-Tel 7000 will be a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)-based IP PBX that can support as many as 2,000 IP phones, as well as analog handsets, via a built-in gateway. The phone system includes built-in multimedia messaging applications based on SIP that could improve user productivity with features such as unified-messaging options and integrated instant messaging and presence technology, according to Inter-Tel.

The Inter-Tel 7000 includes two appliances: a call-processing server, which has SIP-based call control and features; and a media server, which includes presence IM and unified voice mail and e-mail applications. One media server feature lets users set an out-of-office reply in Outlook that will be flagged as such in the IM and voice mail systems.

If a user is on the phone, his status will reflect this as well. For smaller deployments (fewer than 100 users), a single-server appliance can be loaded with the call-processing and media-server software.

Posted by Dal at 09:37 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

CommPartners, an IP-based network operator and telephony services and solutions provider, today announced the launch of its new IPTrunking service for business customers migrating to VoIP services with existing IP PBX, legacy PBX and Key System equipment. The company also announced two new simplified pricing plans for its wholesale hosted VoIP solutions for business customers.

"The new product launch and simplified pricing plans are in direct response to the selling needs of our wholesale Partners focused on delivering a comprehensive suite of IP telephony solutions to their business customers whether the end user is interested in a complete hosted service offering or want a slower migration to VoIP," said Michael McGhee, VP Sales and Business Development.

"CommPartners IPTrunking service is an important product offering for business customers seeking to transition to IP telephony and realize the productivity and cost benefits of VoIP services, but who have existing PBX or key system equipment that they want to continue to utilize," said McGhee. "The new service enables the most efficient use of broadband connections for both data and telephony services, and facilitates a 'cap and grow' strategy maximizing ROI in a company's adoption of VoIP."

CommPartners also has introduced a new, simplified pricing plan for business users offering three distinct service sets delivering the most popular Enterprise feature packages. The new services include an Enterprise IP Dialtone service, and Enterprise Standard and Enterprise Premium service sets with bundles of robust telephony and productivity enhancing features.

A second CommPartners pricing alternative -- IPSelect -- enables the sale of IP telephony services with a pricing model that may be more familiar to larger business customers. Services purchased under the IPSelect™ pricing program are based on the number of "lines" and full-featured extensions selected by the business. "We think this program offers a compelling value proposition to larger enterprises with more employees requiring hosted IP telephony services," said McGhee.

All of the feature packages are available with options for unlimited domestic long distance or measured usage as well as term-agreement discounts.

CommPartners IPTrunking and hosted VoIP services can also be purchased in conjunction with the company's IPDirect service, which provides dedicated T-1 access from the customer premise to the CommPartners core network. IPDirect™ is for those commercial customers who need the quality and reliability of private line access eliminating service quality issues faced when using the public internet for VoIP services.

Source: CommPartners 

Posted by Dal at 03:57 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

Cistera Networks, the leading provider of advanced IP phone application platforms and engines in the Enterprise VoIP Telephony environment, today announced two new products, the Cistera ConvergenceServer 7500 and Cistera CallCenterEnterprise v1.7.

The CisteraConvergenceServer (CCS) 7500 is designed for Enterprise VoIP installations with large numbers of users and monitoring requirements. Depending on the configuration, it can support up to 100,000 directory users or 600 simultaneous recorders. The CCS 7500 supports four Intel Xeon Processors and up to a maximum of 36GB of memory. It runs the Cistera v1.6 platform and will support the CallCenterEnterprise v1.7.

The Cistera CallCenterEnterprise v1.7 will offer Call Center administrators and supervisors additional features including remote monitoring, screen capture, Integrated IM client with improved presence support, coaching, desktop remote control and others. CCEv1.7 also includes all of the popular functionality from Cistera CallCenterRecord™ Enhanced such as quality reporting, remote web monitoring and QA sampling. The CCS integrates seamlessly with Cisco's IP Contact Center Express and Enterprise.

The new products will increase both the scalability and performance capability of the Cistera Platform. "In response to increasing demand from our large customers we have again enhanced our ability to deliver to Enterprise Call Center customers as well as our Fortune 1000 customers. This new server increases the number of simultaneous recorders 300% on a single platform as well as delivering a six fold increase in the number of routers and gateways it supports compared to the popular CCS 2500 platform," said Chief Technology Officer Greg Royal. "A tremendous amount of work has gone into increasing the performance of the core integration components including the CTI integration, fault and performance management subsystems and our Enterprise Java subsystems," Royal continued.

Both products will be available in the third calendar quarter of 2006.

The Cistera ConvergenceServer, with its robust suite of application engines, offers customers IPT applications that are easy to integrate and install. The CCS adds critical competency and features such as text and audio broadcasting, messaging, recording and content streaming within Cisco and Nortel Converged Communications environments.

Posted by Dal at 11:26 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

SkyPilot Networks, the leading provider of carrier-class broadband wireless mesh networks, announced that Foster City, California, has selected MetroFi, the leader in designing, building and operating citywide Wi-Fi networks, to build out a wireless network powered by SkyPilot equipment in this San Mateo County city.

Free wireless Internet coverage will be available to the city's 30,000 residents as well as visitors. The 3 square mile citywide mixed-use network will also provide Foster City's public works and field personnel as well as fire safety officials with expanded access to wireless services in an effort to facilitate more responsive communication through a cost-effective network.

"We are very excited about the prospect of having Wi-Fi services available in Foster City," said Steve Toler, the City's Administrative Services Director. "MetroFi's network will provide our residents and businesses with a fantastic opportunity for internet connectivity in public spaces. We look forward to working with MetroFi and seeing Wi-Fi services thrive in our community."

Once commercially available, anyone with a Wi-Fi enabled computer or personal digital assistant (PDA) will have the ability to gain access to 1 Mbps Internet. Providing the wireless Internet connection is SkyPilot's SkyExtender DualBand, a high-capacity mesh backhaul device with an integrated Wi-Fi access point mounted on street lights throughout the city.

Support for free Internet access at speeds up to 1 Mbps, delivered throughout the area by MetroFi, will come through advertising from local and national advertisers. Customers accessing the network will see a banner or text advertisement in the browser's frame. For $20 a month, users can subscribe to a premium service without advertising.

SkyPilot, the leading provider of carrier-class broadband wireless mesh networks, and MetroFi have collaborated on eight municipal municipalities' Wi-Fi networks.

"MetroFi continues to showcase a unique ability to fulfill the wireless needs of municipalities and their communities," said Brian Jenkins, vice president of product management at SkyPilot Networks. "By leveraging SkyPilot's wireless solution, which seamlessly integrates mesh backhaul and Wi-Fi access, MetroFi can easily build out cost-effective, large-scale wireless coverage that supports public access, public safety, and public works - at no cost to the municipality -- and supports a viable business model through a blend of advertising and paid subscribers."

Source: SkyPilot 

Posted by Dal at 11:16 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

Posted by Dal at 11:08 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

With over 100 million users Skype is the world’s fastest-growing Internet communication offering, allowing people everywhere to make unlimited voice and video communication for free between the users of Skype software. Skype is available in 27 languages and is used in almost every country around the world.

Skype generates revenue through its premium offerings such as making and receiving calls to and from landline and mobile phones, voicemail, call forwarding, as well as instant messaging, SMS messages and file sending features. Skype also has relationships with a growing network of hardware and software providers.

FEECO International, Inc has been supplying companies globally for 55 years with equipment such as Rotary Dryers / Coolers, Pin Mixers, Disc Pelletizers, Material Handling Equipment, Process Systems, Rotary Calciners, Rotary Coolers / Dryers, Rotary Kilns and more.  FEECO is also proudly celebrating it 55th anniversary in 2006.

About FEECO International

At FEECO, we specialize in turning problems into opportunities. Our mission is: "To provide innovative solutions that meet our customer needs by supplying high quality products and services at a competitive price." We also specialize in meeting your needs on time and within budget. Since 1951, we have been designing, manufacturing, marketing and installing equipment and systems throughout the world.

Source: FEECO 

Posted by Dal at 10:57 AM | Direct Link Posted to Skype

This package is free as in GPL. (the suite is not an asterisk configuration tool) This package is geared towards Asterisk installations with SIP,IAX or Zap phones and Zaptel, IAX or SIP trunks.

For this revision, we have fixed some serious security issues, several bugs and have added many new features like customizable call time settings, an internal DNC list, automated lead recycling and FTC safe-harbor compliance just to name a few.

We have also tested the suite on Asterisk versions through 1.2.9.1 All client web-apps and administration pages are available in English, Spanish, Greek and German, with rough translations of French, Brazillian Portuguese, Italian and Portuguese for the client web-apps only.

Check out the project blog for more information: http://astguiclient.blogspot.com 

Click Here to: Download 

Thanks,
MATT---

Posted by Dal at 10:28 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Software

The FCC ordered Internet telephone services like Vonage Holdings Corp. to contribute part of their revenue into the Universal Service Fund, which subsidizes phone service to rural and low-income areas as well as communications services and Internet access for schools, hospitals and libraries.

The agency also increased the amount wireless telephone providers would have to pay into the fund. The move may lead to higher bills for wireless and Internet telephone customers because the companies typically pass the fees on to customers.

Companies offering long-distance and international telephone services as well as high-speed Internet service via digital subscriber lines (DSL) must currently contribute 10.9 percent of that revenue into the $7.3 billion fund.

However, DSL providers will no longer have to contribute to the program after August, so the FCC had to act to avoid a potential shortfall of hundreds of millions of dollars.

Consumers' DSL bills could go down if the savings were passed through to them.

Posted by Dal at 10:41 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Politics

Auspice Corporation, the leading broadband service assurance solutions provider, and Empirix Inc., which helps organizations adopt complex communications solutions with confidence, announced today that they have entered into a strategic partnership to pursue joint marketing, interoperability testing and development opportunities.

The new collaboration has been designed to integrate Empirix's Hammer XMS carrier-class VoIP monitoring and analysis solution with Auspice's OpsLogic service assurance solution.

Harnessing the power of each company's market-proven technologies, service providers can proactively identify the root cause of VoIP quality impairments within their networks before subscribers are impacted. Further, they can use the combined system to investigate problems down to the individual subscriber level.

"A survey Empirix conducted earlier in the year found that one third of VoIP service providers rely on subscriber complaints to identify service problems," said Phil Odence, Vice President of Business Development for Empirix. "By integrating Empirix's VoIP quality of service metrics and analysis with Auspice's real-time HFC plant monitoring and assurance, our MSO customers can proactively detect potential problems and realize great operational efficiencies. For example, alarm information for service performance thresholds will be integrated with correlated HFC infrastructure outage information to provide a single view of the health of VoIP services, enabling speedy problem resolution."

"Our partnership will provide broadband service providers with the ability to better anticipate and manage potential VoIP service quality issues," noted Bob Miele, Director of Business Development for Auspice. "Proactive real-time monitoring of network infrastructure, in conjunction with access to per-call and aggregate VoIP service quality metrics, means a service provider can analyze and automate actions to minimize or eliminate service degradation prior to any negative impact to end subscribers."

Posted by Dal at 10:37 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

Suddenlink (formerly Cebridge Connections) is preparing to expand its telephony services with the acquisition of cable systems from Cox Communications (closed on May 5) and Charter Communications (expected to close in July). Together, those acquisitions will more than triple Suddenlink's size.

The new network will provide VoIP-based telephony services to Suddenlink's national customer base from California to North Carolina, and will include conversion of approximately 30,000 telephony subscribers acquired from Cox.

"With Suddenlink's pending integration of several networks, it is critical that our new VoIP network integrate seamlessly with equipment from multiple vendors," said Terry Cordova, senior vice president, Engineering, Suddenlink. "Nortel's services and expertise, the proven interoperability of its VoIP solution and its IMS roadmap give us confidence that they can uniquely help our company launch and maintain a new VoIP service."

"Nortel has earned a reputation as a leader in simplifying the deployment of VoIP services for our cable customers," said Tom Buttermore, vice president and general manager, Global Cable Solutions, Nortel. "Our track record for producing quality products and contributing high-caliber expertise has made Nortel a primary choice for companies like Suddenlink looking to introduce advanced telephony to both residential and business markets."

Nortel will act as the prime integrator and lead architect for the VoIP network, bringing together solutions from multiple vendors. In addition to these network design and integration services, Nortel will provide on-site resources to manage the network for one year, and network maintenance including technical support, repair and software services. The deployment is expected to begin later this year and be completed by the end of 2007. Suddenlink will be using PacketCable-qualified Nortel Communication Server 2000-Compacts (CS 2000-Compact) as the exclusive softswitch on their Suddenlink backbone.

The CS 2000-Compact uses industry standard SIP protocol for cost effective interconnect to the public phone network and Nortel will also provide Suddenlink with IP Unity's PacketCable based Mereon(x) 6000 Media Server and Mereon Unified Messaging application, delivering voice mail features for its business and residential subscriber services. IP Unity is a messaging market leader in the cable operator segment.

Nortel ranked number one globally in carrier IP telephony for Q1 2006 and full year 2005, according to recent reports from Synergy Research Group and Dell'Oro Group. Nortel's cable solutions have been selected by leading operators around the world and span video and video on-demand transport, voice and multimedia communications, high-speed data services, managed network services for business customers, and next generation access.

Nortel's Global Services include a full range of integrated services for design, deployment, management and maintenance of end-to-end multi-vendor network solutions, including seamless migration to next generation technologies.

Posted by Dal at 10:34 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

Since implementing AltiGen's VoIP technology, Silver State Helicopters has realized significant business benefits including enhanced unified communications between office sites, a feature-rich in-house call center, and cost savings through self-management.

In the last few years, Silver State Helicopters has grown from one flight school with 20 students to 22 flight schools with over 1,700 enrolled students. The Company's existing legacy phone system was ill prepared to handle the rapid expansion of a fast growing company that demanded a robust telecommunications solution. Its aggressive growth plans punctuated the urgent need to link multiple sites together and to bring its outsourced call center operation 100% in-house.

The inherent flexibility of AltiGen's phone systems gives customers like Silver State the ability to fine-tune each system to the customer's precise specifications without exorbitant costs. For example, Silver State is now able to provide call center staff with information about the customer such as the exact geographical market from where the call has originated as well as to what advertisement the caller has responded and populates the staff member's screen with various offers and up selling opportunities geared for that specific area.

"AltiGen's solutions have allowed us to take control of the sales process by bringing our call center and other phone operations completely in-house," said Steve King, IT Manager of Silver State Helicopters. "It has greatly increased the rate of actual signups from initial calls by better preparing our call center staff with information that can help convert each customer call to into a sale, thus giving us more bang for the buck from our advertising. The system's IP capabilities include a unified dialing plan to implement four-digit dialing between offices and a single phone number with which to reach Silver State Helicopters' mobile workforce, thereby increasing our employees' productivity."

Installed by Capture Technologies, Inc., a leading AltiGen Communications reseller, the entire call center deployment took less than three days. The call center installation was highly successful and Silver State Helicopters immediately rolled out AltiGen's IP phone system to the rest of the Company, stretching across all major departments and across multiple office locations. In addition, Silver State Helicopters has begun to roll out smaller branch office AltiGen systems in its local flight school offices, replacing its antiquated PBX solutions. AltiGen will now be the system of choice in new local offices as Silver State Helicopters continues to expand across the country.

Mr. King continued, "One of the deciding factors in choosing AltiGen over other competitive offerings is that after the installation, there was very little ongoing IT support necessary. Call center managers can independently handle recording of prompts, changing screens and changing auto attendant features, among other unique features. AltiGen's call center offers a highly intuitive phone system with built-in commands that puts the call center staff in control and allows our IT staff to focus on other areas."

"Silver State Helicopters is a fantastic example of how AltiGen is providing growing organizations advanced communications solutions via VoIP technology designed to meet demands for mobility, simplified management, robust call center features, and increased productivity," said AltiGen CEO, Gilbert Hu.

Source: AltiGen 

Posted by Dal at 10:29 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Today's news is that Vonage is being sued by Verizon for patent infringement. Verizon claims Vonage infringes on seven different VoIP patents.

That's in addition to a previous patent infringement suit related to VoIP filed last year by a subsidiary of Sprint-Nextel Corp.

And that's not counting all the lawsuits filed in wake of the disastrous IPO over irregularities about how the IPO was handled.

The stock fell another 11.67% yesterday. It was at $8.48, less than half of the $17 price it fetched at the IPO.

Don't feel sorry for those who bought it at $17; this offering smelled from the beginning. In fact, the company prospectus itself admitted that Vonage may never make a profit.

The stock may be a shade under $8.50, but there's plenty of room for it to head down -- and it will. It has nothing to offer that big telcos and small upstarts can't offer -- and they'll ultimately offer VoIP calls for free (some are already).

If calls can be made for free, why should anyone subscribe to Vonage?

The only thing of value the company has at this point is a subscriber list. But considering that the list is composed primarily of people who's main interest is in getting as cheap a phone subscription rate as possible, what's the value in the list? There's nothing to upsell them.

So don't be surprised when Vonage continues to tank. That's the only way it's heading.

Source: Networking Pipeline 

Posted by Dal at 10:28 AM | Direct Link Posted to Vonage

Training will be offered in a variety of formats, ranging from one-day seminars to three-day "boot camps" that teach all of the steps an engineer would need for municipal mesh design, installation, operation and deployment. Each class will be taught by a wireless expert, using hands-on equipment and tools from leading network providers. Training programs will be designed for IT professionals working with municipalities, as well as systems integrators and resellers involved in WiFi deployments.

Municipal WiFi networks, particularly those built around mesh networking technology, represent one of the fastest growing markets in the high-tech industry. More than 245 cities, towns and counties in the U.S. have announced plans to deploy or have already deployed networks, according to the latest data from MuniWireless.com.

"This is a market that is growing rapidly and getting a lot of publicity," said Esme Vos, founder of MuniWireless. "There is a lot of pressure on municipalities to make sure their deployments are successful, and that requires capable, knowledgeable and skilled technical professionals who are up-to-date on the latest technology. Our goal at MuniWireless is to do everything we can to support the municipal broadband ecosystem, and we are pleased to work with DoceoTech to expand our reach into technical training."

MuniWireless LLC is the leading provider of information and content for the municipal broadband market. Its products include the MuniWireless.com Web site; MuniWireless Magazine; a series of conferences and executive roundtables; Web seminars; newsletters, and research.

DoceoTech is a leading technology consultancy that develops and delivers technical skills training courseware and consulting services based on existing and emerging wireless communications protocols and standards. DoceoTech's mission is to provide its clients with the technical understanding and strategic insight necessary to develop and market competitive products and services employing leading edge wireless communications technology.

"As municipal WiFI- and WIMAX-based networks are being deployed, public- and private-sector organizations are increasingly trying to ensure that these products are well-built and well-managed," said John Swart, President of DoceoTech. "Therefore, the need for standards- and practical-based courses to educate the increasing population of engineers needed to deploy these networks is growing by leaps and bounds."

The first training programs from the MuniWireless-DoceoTech partnership will be offered in September, 2006. The companies will announce a complete schedule for the next six months during the summer. More information will be available at each company's Web site starting in July. The partnership was announced at the MuniWireless Silicon Valley '06 Conference at the Santa Clara Marriott in Santa Clara, Calif., the largest and most comprehensive event ever conducted for the municipal wireless community.

Posted by Dal at 10:25 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

“As more consumers move to VoIP to complement or replace their existing landline and mobile phones, we believe the Internet Area Code provides an easy way for consumers to move comfortably between traditional phone and mobile networks and the VoIP network,” said Roger Karam, President of Fusion’s VoIP division. The Company has chosen “10” as the Internet Area Code, allowing Fusion to recognize calls placed between efonica subscribers.

Fusion’s network delivers these calls at a high quality over the worldwide Internet for free. Fusion’s eNumber concept allows efonica subscribers to register their existing telephone numbers – any landline or mobile number – as their efonica telephone numbers, or ‘eNumbers’. Fusion’s patent-pending system verifies the phone number registered belongs to the subscriber, and then uses this phone number as the subscriber’s eNumber.

By way of example, if an efonica subscriber creates an eNumber by registering their phone number of 1-212-555-5555, all other efonica users can call the subscriber for free through the Internet, by simply dialing the Internet Area Code “10”, followed by 1-212-555-5555. This innovative system works from any efonica-registered computer or compatible hardware device connected to the Internet. If the subscriber dials the same number without the Internet Area Code, the call is sent through the traditional landline or mobile network for a small fee. “We believe our approach to delivering VoIP services is a revolutionary advance in the industry and deserves patent protection.

It allows subscribers to call each other from their regular telephones (without the need for a PC), use their existing telephone numbers, and by dialing the Internet Area Code, reach any efonica subscriber worldwide for free” said Matthew Rosen, President & CEO of Fusion. “We believe that maintaining and supporting consumers’ normal calling habits will lead to broader worldwide acceptance of our efonica VoIP service and provide our subscribers with an easy and seamless transition to experiencing the many benefits of VoIP.”

Source: efonica 

Posted by Dal at 11:20 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Posted by Dal at 11:16 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

Then, yesterday, there was the piece by Andy Kessler, suggesting we go after the telco-owned networks to force the telcos to generate some real competition. Evslin has now come back and written another long post about the situation, in part responding to Kessler's piece while also filling it in with some ideas from an event he attended. He comes up with a two part solution to the competition issue and net neutrality. First, instead of talking about net neutrality, he suggests focusing the debate on America's Antiterrorist Network. The idea being that, if we actually had better, faster, more reliable broadband networks we'd actually be able to do a much better job protecting the country (economic boosts would just be a side benefit). Of course, in some ways this seems on the same level of propaganda as the two main players in the debate over net neutrality keep rolling out.
 

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 11:12 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Politics

ultys Technologies today announced the release of version 3.0 of the software for their MX30 and MX250 IP PBXs. With many thousands of these systems deployed globally, Zultys is maintaining its leadership position in providing new and innovative VoIP solutions for businesses and enterprises. 

The software provides features unavailable on competing products and ensures that the users of Zultys IP telephony systems have the best productivity tools available.

"This release is the culmination of a major software development effort that has been in process for over a year," said Iain Milnes, president of Zultys. "There has been extensive testing done for the past six months at over 80 trial sites around the globe. The feedback has been extremely positive and puts us way ahead of those companies struggling to shore up their telephony offerings."

Some of the major features introduced are:

--  instant message (IM) bridge between the Zultys PBX and public IM
    services such as AOL, ICQ, Yahoo!, and MSN
--  advanced automated attendant (AA), or basic IVR
--  integration with Microsoft Exchange for unified messaging
--  support for fractional PCM (T1 or E1) on the MX30 system
    

"Our customers are extremely happy to have this IM to the outside feature," said Charles Green, Business Development Manager, Government Accounts, at MidAtlantic Broadband, a broadband services provider with headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland. "Before release 3 from Zultys we had to block all of the ports on our customers' firewalls so that no one could use external IM. With version 3 on the MX250, they will now have the security they want and the control the law requires, while at the same time getting the benefits of archiving the text. It's great!"

The advanced AA allows the MX system to interact with a caller to collect information that can be used to access a database for further interaction or to determine how the call should be routed. The information from a database can be spoken back to the caller, attached as data and forwarded simultaneously with the call to an agent, or can be used to route the call. Multiple interactions are permitted, all controlled by scripts running on the MX system and an external HTTP server. This feature is highly customizable to support multiple vertical markets such as banking, real estate, pharmacy, and automotive.

"We implemented our first advanced AA solution for a financial services firm about three months ago," said Mike Fredrickson, Vice President of Sales for KineticWorks. "The Zultys solution is powerful and really flexible. It allowed us to easily address the customer's needs, and since then, we've been applying this same model to customers in other industries. It's hard to believe how many applications are out there that we can fit with Zultys."

The integration with Microsoft Exchange synchronizes operations between the MX system and the Exchange server when accessing voice mail and fax messages. For example, when a user deletes the message on one system it is automatically deleted on the other.

This software upgrade is available at no charge to those customers with a current software subscription. Although some new features are licensed, existing customers benefit from upgrading to this version by having:

--  better archiving (more items to be archived and a tool to query and
    view the archived elements)
--  better fax (customized cover pages)
--  better inbound call center (route by multiple DIDs to support multiple
    campaigns, full time call recording, enhanced statistics)
--  better language support (multiple languages supported simultaneously
    in the automated attendants and voice mails; over 25 languages now
    supported)
--  better support for emergency call handling (allows emergency services
    personnel to call back the specific device that placed an emergency call)
--  better E1 CAS support (MF R2 certified for Mexico and Brazil)
--  better diagnostics and system monitors (allowing the administrator to
    find network faults faster and review usage patterns easier)
--  better global support for Internet telephony service providers (ITSPs)
    (numerous configurable options allow the MX systems to interoperate with a
    greater number of ITSPs worldwide)
    

Other customers and channel partners around the world had these further comments about the version 3 software:

"The fractional E1 is a fantastic addition to the MX30 product," said Jules Rumsey, managing director of Australian VAR, Telarus. "This now allows us to deliver customers with smaller offices over double the capacity previously available with the MX30 when using traditional access services. This further enhances the value offered by such a compact, feature rich platform."

"We are pleased that we have the ability to record all calls on our call centre," said Suresh Ramaswami, Chief Operating Officer at Quscient Business Services, a Business Process Outsourcing company with a large call center located in Chennai, India. "This makes it much easier for us to provide better training for our agents. Ultimately, it means we are providing our customers with better service."

DLA Telecomunicaciones Digitales, S.A. de C.V., a Zultys reseller located in Mexico City, is very pleased with the support for MF R2. "This will allow us to sell to larger corporations all over the country," explained Dario Jimenez Aguilar, DLA President. "It also lets us service multinational corporations, many of which may have offices in the US as well as in Mexico."

Pricing and Availability:

Release 3.0 is available at no charge for Zultys customers with an existing software subscription. Customers without a subscription can upgrade for a fee. Some features are licensed separately. The software will be available for general release on 10 July 2006 through certified Zultys resellers around the world. Further details are available at: http://www.zultys.com/version3

Posted by Dal at 10:48 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

Posted by Dal at 10:27 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

Unwired customers can already 'roam' between the company's networks in Sydney and Melbourne, while in the second half of 2006, Unwired and AUSTAR broadband customers will be able to roam across all three.

"We believe this will be a world first -- no other carrier in the world is yet able to offer roaming across another company's pre-WiMAX wireless broadband network. It shows that Australia is leading the way with the deployment of this global standard, and with the spectrum settings in Australia so conducive to WiMAX deployment, both companies see wireless as a viable alternative to the more traditional ADSL and cable broadband services," said Navini CEO Roger Dorf.

Unwired's and AUSTAR's networks combined currently cover more than 4 million Australians. However, the two companies own spectrum licences covering 90 per cent of the population, or 18 million Australians, following spectrum auctions in 2000 where the Australian Government licensed spectrum in the WiMAX designated 2.3 and 3.5GHz bands.

"Australia is in the unique position of having very large amounts of capacity in these two WiMAX designated bands with no restraints on the type of technology that can be deployed. In many ways we are the envy of carriers in other countries. Unwired, for example, has 190MHz in Sydney and 200MHz in Melbourne across the 2.3 and 3.5GHz ranges," said Unwired CEO, David Spence.

Unwired, which launched its Sydney network in August 2004 and then Melbourne in April 2006, currently has more than 50,000 customers. AUSTAR's launch into Wagga Wagga was the first step in its plans to cover 750,000 homes in 25 regional markets by the end of 2007.

John Porter, CEO of Austar, said, "Wireless broadband technology is perfectly suited for the regional and rural areas of Australia. Firstly, the purchase and installation process is faster, simpler and cheaper than other solutions such as ADSL. And perhaps most importantly, non-line-of-sight (NLOS) capability means that we can provide coverage despite the challenges of topography and the limited footprint of wireline networks."

"Navini is excited and proud to be working with leading companies like Unwired Australia and AUSTAR," Said Roger Dorf, president and CEO, Navini Networks. "Providing the ability to roam across the cities and regions is critical to the successful delivery of personal broadband and only Navini, with our Smart WiMAX(TM) solution, has been able to offer this in commercial deployments."

Navini has the most pre-802.16e mobile WiMAX experience in the world, including providing solutions in over 30 countries, which has led to numerous pre-standard deployments.

Posted by Dal at 10:26 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

Seagrove, LLC, which specializes in financing small-to-middle market companies, lead the Series B investment. BandTel will use the funds to further expand its sales and marketing team, invest in marketing and business development initiatives and support the company's working capital needs.

"BandTel has built significant value in the company, and we are excited to be part of its path to success," stated Rick Edwards, CEO of Seagrove and BandTel board member. "The VoIP market has exploded in the past couple years, and BandTel has proven that it's one to watch in that market. With BandTel's market potential, unique service offering and solid business model, we hope to augment its success by providing the financial tools to continue its growth and achievements."

"This round of funding is a testament to the vitality of the VoIP market and BandTel's ability to succeed in that market," said Chris Dunk, president and CEO of BandTel. "Large-scale, global organizations demand high quality, cost-effective telephony systems, and BandTel's worldwide presence, seamless integration and unmatched voice quality enables these users to significantly reduce telecom costs while increasing productivity."

BandTel's VoIP termination to the PSTN solutions provide users with a fault-tolerant, scalable VoIP architecture, which allows for continuous service and investment protection on legacy devices. Its SIP Softswitch technology allows users to receive service from one of two BandTel switching centers at any given time. The company's unique ability to connect call systems via a trunk-to-trunk transfer combined with the ability to cost-effectively terminate calls to and from any location in the world instantly unites global businesses with multiple users in various locations.

"BandTel is building a reputation for providing superior VoIP termination services and solutions, and XO Communications is pleased to be one of its underlying communications infrastructure providers," said Ernie Ortega, president of carrier sales at XO Communications.

For more information on BandTel and its service offerings, please visit the company's web site at www.bandtel.com

Posted by Dal at 02:30 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

LiteScape Technologies, Inc. a leading software developer that enhances the value of IP telephony, and 4What Interactive, a leading multimedia based communication firm that specializes in the creation of innovative marketing and training solutions, today announced that they have signed an agreement to develop and deliver 4What's PC-based VoIPTrainer products via Cisco IP phones using LiteScape's collaborative communications solutions.

"We look forward to working with LiteScape so that we can offer our VoIPTrainer product directly on IP phones as a natural extension of what we do," said Jim Cossetta, president of 4What Interactive. "It will make our innovative, hands-on instructional solutions even easier to access. We have already witnessed strong interest in LiteScape's products from prospective beta customers with employees that have more convenient access to IP phones and would benefit from the direct connection between training and actual usage."

Combining video, audio, animation and interactivity, VoIPTrainer is a proven solution for IP phone sales and end-user training and support. LiteScape has agreed to develop solutions that enable the delivery of this training directly on the IP phone. For example, financial customers, such as banks, may only have a couple of PCs per branch but will have an IP phone for every teller. Using the VoIPTrainer solution in conjunction with LiteScape's applications will allow for training to be performed quickly and at the convenience of the users. Working on the actual device to be used provides familiarity and speeds up the comprehension factor.

"VoIPTrainer is an innovative and effective teaching tool," said LiteScape's Rod Hamlin, executive vice president of sales and marketing. "Being able to provide training for Cisco phones on the actual phones that are in practice is a logical assumption. This partnership with 4What Interactive will bring together best of breed VoIP applications to help companies more comprehensively take advantage of their IP infrastructures from basic training through everyday implementation."

It is anticipated that 4What and LiteScape may develop training modules of VoIPTrainer which include lessons on LiteScape's collaborative communication solutions. LiteScape's OnCast Directory gives users the ability to search and dial across multiple sites and view Presence availability before making a call. Collaboration is simplified with a one-click feature to initiate or join a conference call. OnCast Directory can also be used to broadcast to individuals or groups for multi-media training to increase productivity or to send emergency alerts; creating a safer work environment.

LiteScape offers full solutions for the retail, government, financial, healthcare, and education verticals, which are delivered quickly with proven ROI. These solutions enable secure, real-time collaboration comprised of voice, data, and image streams that can be coordinated and simultaneously delivered to various IP devices.

Source: MarketWire 

Posted by Dal at 02:27 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

Posted by Dal at 02:26 PM | Direct Link Posted to Vonage

At the moment, the U.S. government seems to be leaning toward the "just another way to deliver telephony" perspective. As I pointed out last week, the FCC is looking to apply Universal Service Fund taxes to VoIP. The courts have similarly decided recently that VoIP is covered under the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) - meaning that providers such as Vonage and Skype need to provide wiretapping hooks like those from AT&T, BellSouth and Verizon. And the U.S. House of Representatives just passed the "Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement (COPE) Act of 2006" (H.R. 5252), stipulating that VoIP providers must ensure that 911 and E-911 services are provided to VoIP subscribers.

Overseas, however, the situation is decidedly more mixed. Although VoIP remains officially banned in China, word on the street is that the Chinese are planning to rethink their strategy, possibly as early as this year. (No word on whether the Chinese equivalent of CALEA will apply.) And while Russia just moved to regulate VoIP, the Philippine and Indian governments have taken steps to loosen VoIP regulations.

But the folks who are furthest ahead are the Europeans. Earlier this month, the heads of some 30 of the largest formerly state-owned telcos asked the EU Information Commissioner to level the playing field by - get this - lifting the regulatory burden imposed on incumbents, rather than introducing more regulation for new players. What a novel concept: Deregulate all of telecom, not just VoIP!

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 02:22 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Politics

This Trango product was previously released in the United States on April 27, 2006 and has proven to be an easily scalable and more cost-effective solution for point-to-multipoint wireless broadband networks.

Trango will also be launching two other highly anticipated products at the conference; the HD Mesh-2 and the international version of the Atlas Series 5055 tri-band radio, operating in the 5.3, 5.4, and 5.8 GHz frequency bands. The features and benefits of these new products will be discussed at the Trango Press Event to be held on June 21st from 4:30pm - 5:45pm in Press Room G at the Expo.

Trango will also be providing the Solutions Presentation on June 22nd in room V3B, which will outline the Trango portfolio of products and applications, as well as provide basic configuration training. Attendees will gain an understanding of IP video and data wireless applications and will receive an introduction to backbone MESH and self-healing networks. There will be two sessions available to those who wish to attend; one from 1:30pm - 3:00pm and the other from 3:30pm - 5:00pm.

Trango invites the international wireless integrators and service providers to visit the Trango booth (#414-14) in the U.S. Pavilion in Hall 4 at the Singapore Expo.

Posted by Dal at 02:20 PM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

The Alcatel PIMphony Attendant console application enables SMEs distributed over several sites to centralize reception at a single site. This application simplifies the management of incoming calls and call transfers for all the sites. Using a graphical interface, it provides instant knowledge of the status of all the terminals of the installation - analog or digital phones, IP, DECT or PC - wherever they are located. The operator is therefore in a position immediately to suggest an alternative solution when the person required is absent, diverted to another phone or engaged. This application enables daily management tasks such as activation or changing of call forwarding of a phone, updating the directories of each of the sites, and locking or unlocking of a phone to be performed. Combined with inter-site voice/data links on IP, companies can achieve substantial economies by centralizing reception functions at a single site and reducing the cost of inter-site communications, while providing a complete and transparent service for all callers.

The Alcatel OmniPCX Office offers capabilities and facilities for multi-site SMEs desiring to reduce their costs without sacrificing the level of service offered to customers and users. The Office Management Console ensures more efficient centralized and secure systems management at each of the sites through a secure Internet connection. This new facility will enable installers to respond more rapidly to their customers' requests by avoiding sending an engineer to the site.

Source: Alcatel 

Posted by Dal at 02:17 PM | Direct Link Posted to SIP

 
This is especially true for organisations’ telecommunications. Some analysts estimate that 80% of commercial transactions are conducted via the telephone yet this is often one of the last considerations, or even overlooked, in a Business Continuity plan.

As a Hemel Hempstead based company, Telephonetics are all too aware, following the Buncefield Fire, of the disruption an unforeseen event can cause. However, the company emphasises that less dramatic events can affect your telephony services including evacuations due to fire alarms and builders chopping through cables. According to the CMI survey 24% of organisations suffered from loss of Telecoms links during the last year.

Telephonetics suggests that the following considerations should be made:

•    How do switchboard calls get handled in an evacuation when staff are unavailable to take the calls? Is a voicemail box sufficient when the duration of the event and the importance of the call is unknown.

•    How long can your business last without taking a single phone call? According to the Henley Management Institute, 60% of companies that experienced a loss of normal telecoms for a period of 10 days ceased trading within a year.

•    How do staff who have been evacuated and therefore have no access to a company phone directory, contact other staff?

•    How are DDI and switchboard calls handled when my primary carrier transfers the entire DDI range to one number at an alternative site? Who will be there to redirect calls from that number, to individuals or departments?

Telephonetics has developed a Business Continuity Solution that in the event of an evacuation or disaster can be invoked remotely to ensure all DDI, Switchboard and Employee to Employee calls are handled effectively. The solution will enable staff to continuing working from an alternative site and stay in touch with other staff and clients thereby minimising disruption and loss of business to the organisation.

Bill Burgar, MD, Telephonetics explained, “Following our own local experiences, we felt that most Business Continuity Plans failed to cover telephony services adequately. Many organisations post Buncefield found that although their telephony equipment was intact, they were not allowed to re-enter their buildings and therefore their businesses could not function effectively. We are providing a solution that can be simply activated remotely to ensure organisations can effectively continue operations with minimal disruption to their customers, suppliers and staff.”

Source: PR Web
 

Posted by Dal at 10:17 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Help

allTower, Inc., the leading provider of Always-On, hosted communications and collaboration solutions for businesses, today introduced the new CallTower Hospitality Suite, the hotel industry's first and only complete, hosted suite of voice and data services and applications that is exclusively designed for, and delivered to, hotels and hospitality organizations. 

The new CallTower Hospitality Suite allows hoteliers to create a differentiated experience that delivers advanced business communications to travelers -- with minimal investment -- resulting in increased revenue and occupancy.

As part of today's Hospitality Suite announcement, CallTower also announced a partnership with Percipia, Inc. to provide hotels and hospitality organizations with a comprehensive suite of applications for Cisco's color touch screen-based IP phones.

The new CallTower Hospitality Suite provides hoteliers an advanced set of hosted voice, data and application capabilities that eliminates the maintenance costs of managing on-premise telephony, internet service, and guest services systems. Hotel and hospitality groups can now seamlessly add hosted, in-room voice, data and Internet services and marketing offers, without having to purchase and manage an on-premise PBX.

Hospitality Market Seeks Differentiator

Today, hotel systems and their related devices are typically disjointed islands, each requiring different interfaces and cabling. Most hotels are experiencing challenges in how they efficiently manage the growing IT infrastructure demands of email, voicemail, fax and other customer support services, as well as the capital expense to deliver these new technology solutions.

Historically, phone systems were a reliable revenue generator for hotels. With the advent of cell phones and handheld wireless devices, hotel PBX systems became merely a necessary expense. Now, however, a hotel's phone system can be a powerful differentiator, can attract clients and produce revenue in ways that traditional phone systems simply cannot do.

The CallTower Hospitality Suite is vital to the hospitality industry because it can lower costs, provide superior guest services, and as a result, transform the hotel telephony back into a revenue-generator.

Guest Service Improvement and Revenue Opportunities

Guests will find the CallTower-enabled hotel and its services easier and more convenient to use. From their room phone, they can set or change wake-up calls or do-not-disturb notices. They can view dining options or local attractions, and then dial them with one touch. Using the simple Cisco color phone interface, guests can schedule hotel services, such as a tee time or a spa appointment, with no waiting and at any hour. CallTower includes capabilities that can genuinely improve the guest experience, encourage returnees, and drive hotel revenue.

Also, the innovative telephone color touch display gives hotels an opportunity to market highly visible advertising space and messages for hotel services and/or local and national advertisers. When a hotel has a cancellation at the spa or the golf course, the owner/manager can quickly and easily promote the open time slot to targeted guests.

One-Wire Ease and Flexibility for Commercial Property Owners/Managers

The CallTower Hospitality Suite of voice/data services is built into a hotel's infrastructure, and provides one-wire, fixed-price delivery of all voice/data applications and services to travelers. The services are delivered via a single coax wire to each room, so hotels do not have to have multiple cables or service providers laying cable in their buildings for separate telephone and data services.

CallTower's Hospitality Suite is built on Cisco's ® CallManager technology, and allows hotel owners/managers to connect, with one common infrastructure, phones, high speed Internet, energy management, the room mini-bar, operations, reservations, marketing and services. Guest room phones can display local and home weather, stock quotes, local dining options, a local directory, currency rates, airport schedules, daily room service menus, and the ability to view the list of members of a group at the hotel, then directly dial them, all at the touch of the guest's fingertips.

The new CallTower Hospitality Suite includes: Internet, telephony, voice, email and fax messaging, calling plans, network administration, single-wire connectivity, call center functions, Microsoft Exchange integration, presence management, disaster-proof access to all data and voicemail, and 24/7 customer support. These new CallTower services allow hotels to realize:

--  Conversion of the telephone from a cost center to a profit center
--  Improved customer satisfaction and guest services
--  No maintenance
--  Reduced capital expense -- fixed monthly fee
--  Lower number of vendors, accounting time and effort
--  Increased occupancy
--  Disaster Recovery in Voice & Data
--  Completely converged network infrastructure which can actually save
    money
--  Single cable plant
--  Obsolescence-proof hardware and services
--  New services for guests and the staff's ability to recognize guests
--  A strategic competitive advantage for the hotel
    

Pricing and Availability

The new CallTower Hospitality Suite is available now. Hotel owners and operations who purchase CallTower's secure, hosted, communications and collaborations solutions can be up and running in just 45 days.

Posted by Dal at 10:09 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

The compatibility with Motorola’s MEA technology will transform the Sony cameras into routers in the network. The solution is ideal for cities and government agencies looking to improve situational awareness and incident response via cost-effective wireless video monitoring. The mesh-enabled cameras can be configured to operate over licensed 4.9 GHz public safety or unlicensed 2.4 GHz frequencies.

"Integrating Motorola’s mesh technology with Sony’s IPELA IP SNC-series cameras, allow for easy deployment of wireless video monitoring anywhere," said Rick Asahina, division manager, Business & Communication, Product Marketing Division, Broadcast & Professional Pacific Asia. “These new generation cameras expand the capacity and flexibility of remote monitoring, and wireless networks can be leveraged to lower infrastructure costs.”

Sony’s IP-based technology, combined with Motorola’s mesh networking technology, work synergistically to enable the IPELA network cameras to provide real-time video feeds to both fixed and mobile security personnel - even while travelling at highway speeds.

Mesh Networks’ Multi-Hopping® technology turns every mesh-enabled camera into a router/repeater. The more users there are, the stronger the network becomes. It also allows ad-hoc peer-to-peer networks to form among users and cameras, anytime, anywhere. In addition, through MOTOMESH and MEA-enabled wireless PC modem cards, these network cameras will draw less power than those cameras requiring external modems and access points, helping cities to reduce deployment costs by more than 50 percent.

"The collaboration with Sony to introduce mesh-enabled IP cameras further supports Motorola’s city-wide wireless initiatives," said James Wong, senior business development manager for Motorola’s Mesh Networks.” By leveraging wireless video support and mesh routing functionality in a single system, participating communities can continue to easily grow networks that meet the needs of all constituents - public safety, public works and public access."

Motorola will be showcasing this new offering at the CommunicAsia 2006 from June 20 – 23, 2006, in Singapore at Singapore Expo, Hall 4.

Sony Broadcast and Professional Asia

Sony manufactures audio, video, communications and information technology products for the global consumer and professional markets. In the B2B markets, Sony is well equipped to support you with total business solutions incorporating a wide range of applications dedicated to Education, Retail, Healthcare, Corporate Communications, Digital Photography and Security. The IPELA line of Internet protocol (IP)-based communications products ranges from IP monitoring and recording devices to IP-ready videoconferencing systems.

Source: WebWire 

Posted by Dal at 10:04 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

Signate, a leading provider of VoIP telephone solutions based on industry standard hardware and open source software, today announced the availability of Cepstral's Text-to-Speech (TTS) engine and voices integrated into its SigProvider and SigCarrier solutions for telephone service providers. 

SigProvider and SigCarrier enable providers to offer state-of-the-art telephone services to individual consumers, small businesses, and large enterprises. The addition of Signate's Cepstral TTS Option means provider customers can offer rich interactive voice response dialogs to telephone customers, such as real-time weather updates, theater ticket ordering and account balance inquiries.

The Cepstral TTS Option will begin shipping during the second quarter of 2006. Pricing begins at $4,000 for 24 simultaneous voice streams.

"The combination of Signate's service provider telephony solutions and Signate's Cepstral TTS Option means our provider customers can offer small and medium sized enterprises the same types of interactive voice response solutions used by the largest companies in the world to communicate with their customers," said William Boehlke, Signate's CEO.

"The integration of Cepstral Text-to-Speech into Signate's VoIP and telephony offerings allows natural, flexible, dynamic voice content," said Kevin Lenzo, CEO of Cepstral. "Customers will see an immediate benefit from these robust, scalable systems that can deliver information and services exactly where and when is needed, with all the power and ease that Signate offers."

About Cepstral's Swift Text-To-Speech (TTS) Engine

Cepstral Swift Text-To-Speech Version 4.0 is a scalable, multilingual cross-platform voice rendering engine. Voices perform with low latency and minimum resource load on handhelds, desktops, and large automated telephony or VoIP installations. Supported languages include U.S. and U.K. English, German, Canadian French, Americas Spanish, and Italian.

Posted by Dal at 12:35 PM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

Speaking at the event Rob Lith, CEO of Connection Telecom, a company specialising in Asterisk VoIP solutions and distributor of Digium products, said the company had doubled its revenue in the last financial year and projects similar growth for the next reporting period.

Lith said Connection Telecom is currently supplying support and products to more than 180 clients, most of which are Linux integrators.

"We are seeing small and medium companies, not only making a living out of Asterisk, but making tidy profits. Looking at the market and the recent acquisitions we can see that OSS services is an attractive business to be in," he said.

FOSS is also making headway in the academic space and the University of the Western Cape's Derek Keats spoke about the successes of the African Virtual Open Initiatives and Resources (AVOIR) project.

AVOIR is a collaboration project between various universities to create a core of free software developers who are able, through software development activities, to create educational and business opportunities that contribute to development on the continent, said Keats.

Keats said the initiative has grown to include 16 universities and although the project is only 18 months old, the interest has gone far beyond what was expected.

Click Here to Continue Reading
 

Posted by Dal at 12:30 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

The growth will be accelerated by increased broadband penetration, and consumers becoming increasingly comfortable with VoIP and other new communications technologies, the report contends.

Trends driving VoIP adoption will be mobility, simplicity, and a need for on-demand telephony, the report says. Simple setup requirements will make consumers more comfortable with the technology, and the ability to access IP telephony not just at home, but while traveling will be a driver as well.

IDC sees significant market potential for service providers able to tap into the burgeoning demand. "For those that are able to tweak their service offering to fit the ever changing tastes of the mass market, the potential growth opportunity is huge," Will Stofega, research manager for IDC's VoIP Services program, said in a statement.

Source: CRN 

Posted by Dal at 12:24 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

We will have an open brain storming session during which users and developers can pitch ideas for new features, functions or APIs.  If you have any ideas you would love share with the development community at large, please bring them forward!

Thanks,

Steve

AstriCon 2006: http://www.astricon.net/
 

Posted by Dal at 11:11 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Development

Proxim Wireless Corporation, a global provider of broadband wireless equipment and wholly-owned subsidiary of Terabeam, Inc., today announced that OmniGlobe Networks, Inc., a global Internet Service Provider (ISP), has selected Proxim's Tsunami MP.11 WiMAX products to provide high-speed, cost-effective Internet access to residents of the Republic of Cyprus. 

Tsunami MP.11 was recently awarded a Frost & Sullivan 2006 Product Innovation Award for "truly innovative WiMAX solutions," and provides the capabilities of fixed and mobile WiMAX in license-free frequency bands worldwide.

OmniGlobe Networks, Inc. (www.omniglobenet.com) specializes in providing broadband communications capabilities to communities worldwide that cannot be served via traditional wireline access. The company brings connectivity into a community via a satellite gateway to the Internet, and distributes access to homes and businesses using Proxim's WiMAX products. Such is the case in the cities of Nicosia (the capital, population 206,000) and Kyrenia (population 38,000) in Cyprus. Traditionally, in this island nation, the waiting time for installation of a telephone line can be as high as five years. Thanks to OmniGlobe and Proxim, residents of Kyrenia and Nicosia have access to sophisticated and cost-effective communications such as Internet access and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), with a waiting time of as little as two days.

OmniGlobe selected Proxim's Tsunami MP.11 products after surveying 10 equipment vendors; the decision was based on a combination of performance, features, and price. The MP.11 includes WiMAX features such as a scheduled media access controller, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), and advanced Quality of Service (QoS) to optimize delivery of voice, video, and data traffic. In addition, the availability of indoor customer premise equipment (CPE) optimizes the economics and in many cases, ease of installation. Upon deploying the network, OmniGlobe has achieved connectivity between MP.11 base stations and subscriber units at ranges of up to 25 kilometers (15.6 miles), further validating the selection.

"OmniGlobe excels at bringing state-of-the art communications services to impossible locations, places which have no mechanism with which to connect to the rest of the world," said Dr. Jason Neale, Chief Executive Officer of OmniGlobe Networks. "WiMAX offers the most pervasive solution for last-mile connectivity in these locations, and Proxim offers the most robust and cost-effective WiMAX product portfolio that we have seen on the market."

"Proxim's focus in WiMAX products has been to lower the barriers to entry to network deployment, thus allowing a wide range of service providers to take advantage of this technology," said Amit Malhotra, Vice President of Marketing, Proxim Wireless. "OmniGlobe's success has demonstrated that WiMAX is available today to support a service provider's requirements including multi-service infrastructure, a choice of frequency bands, reasonable cost, and ease of installation."

Posted by Dal at 11:06 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

With VOICE.SKY™ hosted services, service providers can capitalize on the Company’s carrier-grade infrastructure to generate revenue through new voice services. From Vonage-like phone services to pre-paid calling card, VOICE.SKY™ provides services for immediate revenue generation. VOICE.SKY’s suite of applications includes:

VSKY Calling Card
The calling card market is growing at 25 percent per year. With VSKY Prepaid you too can penetrate this market and offer your own blend of calling card products.

VSKY Dial-Around
With VSKY Dial-Around customers can register their home, office or cellular numbers to make domestic and international calls. VSKY Dial-Around is only available in the United States and Canada.

VSKY Softphone
With VSKY Softphone customers can use their PC/laptop to make calls to both land-line and wireless phones.

VSKY IP Phone
With VSKY Phone customers can use an IP Phone or IP adapter and their traditional phone to make and receive calls to both land-line and wireless phones.

VSKY M-Center
With VSKY M-Center customers can enjoy the benefits of unified messaging.

VSKY Solutions
With VOICE.SKY’s solutions service providers can offer applications in a variety of settings including: IP Callshop, College Calling Services (calling cards/dorm phones), Enterprise Calling Services (employee calling plans), Tollfree Services, SOHO Services, International Telephone Numbers, and Collect Call Services.

VOICE.SKY’s flexible platform allows Service Providers, Institutions and Enterprises to offer a wide variety of feature rich applications to serve various markets and customers while at the same time preserving the service provider’s corporate identity through VOICE.SKY’s private label offering, and greater control of their revenue model by allowing clients to establish their own retail rates or use their own routes. In addition, a dedicated Research & Development team allows VOICE.SKY customers to enjoy ongoing product, service and feature releases, at no additional cost, allowing service providers to continue to deliver value to their customers. To learn more contact VOICE.SKY today.
 

For more information, visit www.voicesky.com

Posted by Dal at 11:00 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

 
Such a move, said the release, could stall Internet innovation, introduce new cyber security concerns, and expose unsuspecting Americans to law enforcement surveillance. Co-authored by Vint Cerf of Google, Whitfield Diffie of Sun Microsystems and others, the study points out that the architecture of the Internet, which is substantially different from the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), makes determining the location of communication endpoints exceedingly difficult.

Posted by Dal at 10:54 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Politics

 

Occupying less than a half square inch of space, the ZigBit is less than half the size of other modules available in the market today. Small as it is, the ZigBit module features best-in-class sensitivity, long range and low power consumption. The ZigBit module comes with the comprehensive software package, including a networking stack to enable ZigBee applications.

As the IEEE802.15.4/ZigBee market grows, OEMs fuel demand for IEEE802.15.4/ZigBee modules and single chips. Developers are faced with a choice in wireless connectivity implementation: either add a module to the system, or integrate a single chip to the board circuitry.

The module approach offers numerous advantages. The module already contains the complex RF design with the necessary passive components included, freeing the OEM from the time-consuming development. The manufacturer can instead focus on its core business without the need of having an RF expertise. The single chips offer lower cost and occupy less physical space than modules, allowing more flexibility in product design. With its ultra compact size of only 1.88cm x 1.35cm (0.74" x 0.53"), the ZigBit bridges this gap.

The ZigBit is based on the innovative 802.15.4 hardware platform being developed by Atmel. The Atmel 802.15.4 hardware platform concept allows a superior sensitivity. Combined with an outstanding Tx power without external amplifiers, it accounts for the longer range, due to outperforming link budget. The low power consumption is an important factor for battery-operated devices. Thanks to the Atmel hardware platform's inherent low power consumption and a low part count, the ZigBit module is exceptionally power efficient.

"When developing the ZigBit module, we faced a challenge of finding the right performing hardware platform that would combine the high sensitivity and long range on one hand, and low power and ample memory on the other, while being compact, robust and reliable," said Mr. Vasiliy Suvorov, Managing Director & CTO of Meshnetics. "Only Atmel's hardware platform was able to meet these tough criteria. Partnering with Atmel enabled us to bring together our expertise in software and reference design with the best-of-breed hardware."

Software is a key in turning a module into an efficient 802.15.4/ZigBee solution. MeshNetics provides a networking stack software called eZeeNet that is based on IEEE802.15.4 MAC layer and is ZigBee network capable. The eZeeNet stack allows the module-based wireless sensor devices to form self-healing, self-organizing mesh networks that are widely used in industrial monitoring, HVAC control, automatic meter reading, and more. The power-management feature, included in eZeeNet stack, is crucial in extending the battery life of wireless devices.

"Combining Atmel's superior 802.15.4 IC hardware platform and MeshNetics excellence in software & design is the right answer to address the diversified market needs in the most suitable manner" said Mr. Thomas Lerm, Wireless Strategic Marketing Director of ATMEL Germany GmbH "We are convinced that this concept allows the customer the fast adaptation of 802.15.4/ZigBee functionality in a seamless fashion including required professional system support & maintenance."

MeshNetics plans on introducing its Evaluation Kits in July of 2006. The ZigBit module general availability is scheduled for early Fall 2006. The ZigBit module will have three antenna options, i.e. integrated chip antenna, antenna connector, and balanced RF output for use with the PCB antenna. The Evaluation Kit will contain interface boards, accessories, and software package, including network configuration tools and a sample data acquisition application. For more information on ZigBit modules please contact MeshNetics at zigbit@meshnetics.com, or visit www.meshnetics.com. For more information on Atmel 802.15.4 hardware platform please visit www.atmel.com/products.

ZigBee: Wireless Control That Simply Works

The ZigBee Alliance is an association of companies working together to enable reliable, cost effective, low-power, wirelessly networked, monitoring and control products based on an open global standard. The ZigBee Alliance membership comprises technology providers and original equipment manufacturers worldwide. Membership is open to all.

Additional information can be found at www.zigbee.org.

Posted by Dal at 10:51 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

Claim 1, the first of forty-four (44) allowed claims, of the patent entitled "Communications Service Provider Network," reads:

1. A telephony private branch exchange routing arrangement adapted to route IP telephony data, the routing arrangement comprising:

a call-control application having an object-oriented programming (OOP) telephony interface and programmed, using OOP and the OOP telephony interface, to control the routing of calls;

a device-control application adapted to provide telephony communication signals for the routed calls and to interface between the call- control application and a plurality of telephony devices; and

a configuration manager adapted to provide configuration information for the call-control application and the device-control application.

"We are pleased and proud to have been awarded this patent for the technology incorporated in our Packet8 Virtual Office and similar hosted IP-PBX services," said Bryan R. Martin, 8x8 chairman and CEO. "More and more businesses are making the switch from traditional PBX phone systems to hosted business VoIP services. Technological achievements, such as those in this invention, that provide scalable, cost-effective, user-friendly control over communications networks, are vital to the successful deployment of hosted VoIP business phone services."

Since its establishment in 1987, 8x8 has been awarded sixty-one (61) United States patents covering a variety of voice and video communications technologies.

Source: Yahoo Press 

Posted by Dal at 10:14 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

Reason for Acquisition

When eBay bought Skype in October last year for $2.6 billion, analysts said that the main rationale for the acquisition was the possibility of eBay adding a click-to-call feature to its online marketplace. This feature would allow eBay customers to get in touch with sellers directly via Internet telephony , instant messaging, or video conferences. In a report on eBay's purchase of Skype, published last September, Forrester Research analyst Maribel Lopez was critical of the deal. "While real-time communications (provided by Skype) could benefit auctions, it is not essential to eBay's business," Lopez wrote. "Also, consumers are fickle and there is no guarantee that Skype users will stay. Skype will be severely challenged by Google, MSN, and Yahoo as they combine content with communications like voice and e-mail," she wrote. "Buried in eBay, Skype feature innovation will languish."

Online Synergies

In contrast to the comments by Lopez, Gartner analyst Avivah Litan was optimistic about the possibility of Skype embedded in eBay's auction services. "At long last, we should begin to see the real synergies of Skype and eBay services come to fruition," said Litan. "The integration of Internet telephony with auction services makes the most sense when it comes to auctioning high-value items like cars and jewelry. People want to talk to someone live before making a high-value purchase."

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 10:11 AM | Direct Link Posted to Skype

As a result, Boston-based Strategy Analytics reported that municipal broadband will play "only a small role in the rapidly growing U.S. broadband market, with incumbent telecom and cable operators still attracting the vast majority of consumers."

"We expect a lot of consumers will supplement their cable or DSL service with municipal WiFi, however they are not going to rely on it exclusively," said James Penhune, director of the Strategy Analytics broadband media and communications service. "Philadelphia and other large cities have recently announced plans to offer inexpensive WiFi service which may be better than dial-up Internet access, but is slow compared to the DSL service that is only slightly more expensive and usually offers better quality."

Source: UPI 

Posted by Dal at 10:09 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

The new products include a WiMAX customer premise equipment (CPE) product and a WiMAX PCMCIA notebook card. Both of the products were designed to be compliant with the 802.16e standard, but while they have the broadband capabilities found in DSL networking products, they also have QoS features.

The MAX-200 Series WiMAX CPE is meant to be used like a DSL modem, except that it connects to a WiMAX broadband Internet connection, said Jake Saila, marketing communications manager at ZyXel.

"It's a bridge that brings WiMAX into your house, and then you would use an Ethernet router to share it in your house," Saila said. ZyXel designed the CPE product to be a simple plug-and-play router for home users. The flip side to the announcement is the MAX-100 Series WiMAX PCMCIA card for mobile laptop users. According to ZyXel, both products enable service providers to deliver last mile wireless broadband access to customers as an alternative to cable and DSL. The products will provide a completely new and enhanced broadband wireless experience. ZyXEL's comprehensive WiMAX product line comes in several models to operate at different frequency bands including 2.5GHz, 3.5GHz and 2.3GHz.

With the products, ZyXel is offering the option to service providers to provide broadband IP telephony and IP TV services to their customers without the necessity of additional hardware on the customer's site, said Hans Tan, product manager for WiMAX at ZyXel. The CPE product is outfitted with Ethernet and a VoIP port, he said.

"Both of these products are designed to be sold through service providers," he said.

According to the ZyXel, the MAX-200 is ideal for wireless ISPs because it enables them to offer services such as VoIP and IP TV, which rely on a high level of QoS. Advanced firewall with DoS protection built in to block attacks from hackers and the addition of Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) for wireless connection allows the MAX-200 series to offer an all-in-one solution for the end-user. There's also an SMA removable high-gain antenna for outdoor antenna installation and SNMP support enabling service providers to remotely manage the CPE.

The MAX-100 series PCMCIA card is designed for mobile users who have Windows XP/2000 laptops. It is also compliant with the IEEE802.16e-2005 WiMAX standard and has a 23dBm powerful RF design for a long range and high-speed connection. This allows the user to access the Internet on-the-go with much wider coverage.

The WiMAX products are currently available to service providers for testing. The official release of the products will take place in the third quarter of 2006.

Posted by Dal at 10:07 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

Most IP telephony management products are designed to determine and solve problems after the fact. The Qovia IP Telephony Manager now provides IT managers with the ability to easily view call quality from the gateway all the way down to the handset for each person as a call is in progress. IP telephony performance problems are correlated with the network environment for faster problem resolution, so that jitter, echo or drop-outs can be quickly and easily identified and fixed as problems occur.

Qovia IP Telephony Manager now includes gateway analysis so that IT managers can also track a call to the level of how voice data is being used on each individual channel as it leaves the internal network and joins up with the carrier. This information helps determine whether problems are internal or with the carrier and also supports planning for peak call volumes.

Furthermore, the enhanced, robust reporting in Qovia IP Telephony Manager can indicate trends and identify potential problems that IT managers can correct before end-users are affected.

"As IP telephony continues its rapid adoption in the enterprise, the demands on the IT managers charged with maintaining these phone systems increases significantly," said Qovia CEO, David Woodall. "Our customers are clamoring for real-time information about their voice traffic. Reports that are hours old don't help in finding and fixing problems. The Qovia IP Telephony Manager now provides clear, concise and easy-to-read information about the whole system, from the gateway right through to the individual handset, in real time. Combined with both active and passive testing, Qovia IP Telephony Manager is an ideal solution for full VoIP lifecycle management."

"As we were planning an IP telephony implementation, we required top-quality monitoring and management products. In fact, as we worked with our reseller Apptis, we made any implementation of a Cisco IP telephony system contingent upon including Qovia," said Garrick Sobesky, manager of networks for the Institute for Transfusion Medicine in Pittsburgh, Penn. "We have a limited IT staff, so we need constant visibility into what is going on. Qovia is the only management solution that can bring all the pieces of our IP telephony system together and give us detailed information about how things are functioning in real time."

Features of the new version include:

-- Gateway Analysis--Analytical screens enable IT managers to isolate issues at the channel-level within a gateway. As a result, IT managers can determine whether a problem is with the provider or within the network, and then isolate where, specifically, the problem resides. What's more, careful analysis gives IT managers the information they need to plan for peak data and voice traffic periods.

-- Improved Dashboards--Live and interactive charts visualize emerging problems and allow IT managers to drill in for root cause analysis. Call quality, network performance, and utilization data can be sliced by various perspectives including time and network segmentation.

-- Richer and Easier Alert Configuration--An improved alert console enables users to easily set alert parameters to match the specific needs of that particular system.

-- Call Quality Trend Reports--Prepackaged reports, unique to Qovia, have been added that show combined utilization and quality trends over day, week, or month intervals. IT managers can asses capacity and quality by network segment, gateway route group, specific gateway channels, and wide area network paths.

-- Enhanced IPT Application and Server Monitoring--Monitors the health, availability and performance of call servers, IPT applications and servers using agentless, remote data acquisition. Prepackaged and extensible modules are provided for call servers, voice messaging systems, contact center servers, and other applications, including MeetingPlace and Cisco Unified Contact Center.

-- Increased Sensor Capability--Qovia IP Telephony Manager now includes network sensors that can each handle as many as 1000 simultaneous calls, having the capacity to provide real-time information even at peak calling hours.

Product Availability

The enhanced version of the Qovia IP Telephony Manager is available immediately. For more information contact a Qovia sales representative at (301) 846-0020.

Posted by Dal at 10:06 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

These vulnerabilities could also serve as entry points for attackers to compromise other critical network systems. Specifically, the vulnerabilities affect:

-- Asterisk PBX (Private Branch Exchange), widely-used open source software for phone systems that supports an extensive range of VoIP equipment, protocols and features including voicemail, interactive voice response, call queuing, three-way calling, caller ID services and more.

-- IAXclient, an open source library that implements the IAX2 VoIP protocol used by several VoIP software phones. Core Security discovered two vulnerabilities that affect VoIP software phones which implement the IAX2 protocol using the IAXclient library.

"These vulnerabilities exemplify the need to address and act upon IP telephony and VoIP security threats in a serious, proactive and systematic manner," said Ivan Arce, CTO at Core Security Technologies. "It's a testament to the dedication and responsiveness of the developers involved with both of these widely used open source software products that security fixes were made available so quickly to their users."

Vulnerability Specifics:

Asterisk PBX truncated video frame vulnerability--The Asterisk-specific IAX2 protocol includes support for transmission of video between the IAX2 clients that implement this feature. A vulnerability found in the Asterisk's handling of IAX2 video frames could lead to the remote compromise of the system running the software PBX through execution of arbitrary code of the attacker's choosing with the privileges of the Asterisk daemon. The vulnerability affects Asterisk PBX software versions up to and including v1.2.8.

IAXclient truncated frames vulnerabilities--IAXclient is an open source library that implements the IAX2 VoIP protocol used by the Asterisk IP PBX and several VoIP software phones. Two vulnerabilities have been discovered in the library that may grant attackers remote execution of arbitrary code on systems using software packages that rely on the library to implement the IAX protocol support. Although these vulnerabilities were discovered and tested using in the IDE FISK software phone, other software packages that use the IAXclient library are also vulnerable.

The maintainers of the vulnerable software have updated their packages with fixed versions For more information on both vulnerabilities, the systems they affect and their corresponding security fixes please visit:

http://www.coresecurity.com/common/showdoc.php?idx=547&idxseccion=10

and

http://www.coresecurity.com/common/showdoc.php?idx=548&idxseccion=10 

About CoreLabs

CoreLabs, the research center of Core Security Technologies, is charged with anticipating the future needs and requirements for information security technologies. Research is conducted in several important areas of computer security including system vulnerabilities, cyber attack planning and simulation, source code auditing, and cryptography. Results from these efforts include problem formalization, identification of vulnerabilities, novel solutions and prototypes for new technologies.

Posted by Dal at 10:02 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

Editors Note:  I wish all is well with these Swedish residents.  I hate to hear about the possiblity of technology affecting humans in a negative way.

 The Wi-Maxing up of the small Swedish town of Göten went hobbly wrong when local residents around the base-station stated dropping like flies.

It seems that within hours of the WiMAX base-station being activated, local hospital emergency services received calls from residents with compaints ranging from sharp headaches and difficulty breathing, blurry vision, and, according to a report, two cases of heart arrhythmia.

The sufferers' symptoms are said to have subsided after they moved away from the base-station.

Coverage of the incident on Sweden's STV Debatt apparently caused questions to be raised about WiMAX, leading to calls that Swedish government to close down the nation's WiMAX networks.

The Swedes are particularly unconvinced of the safety of some electro-magnetic frequencies on humans, and there are plenty of vested interests piping up to pooh-pooh the Scandiavians' concerns.

Source: The Inquirer 

Posted by Dal at 09:56 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

For more info or to register: http://www.astricon.net

--
Steven Sokol
AstriCon 2006: http://www.astricon.net/

Posted by Dal at 10:22 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

Vistula was previously marketing and distributing the V-Cube product range under an exclusive world-wide distribution agreement with NetYantra. The purchase price for the V-Cube solution and associated IP rights was $8.8 million and 14 million shares of Vistula's common stock.

The V-Cube solution, which serves as Vistula's core Voice over IP technology offering, facilitates full contact communication services including Voice, Video, Conferencing, Call/Contact Center and full hosted IP/PBX functionality across IP networks and provides a centralized administration, provisioning and maintenance interface. V-Cube offers a flexible cost effective IP Communication solution with Personal Call Control for Telco's and ISP's to launch products to their customers.

Rupert Galliers-Pratt, Chairman of Vistula said "The acquisition of the V- Cube intellectual property means that Vistula is uniquely positioned as a market leader in owning and supplying proprietary hosted IP/PBX solutions. We are fortunate in having secured such an innovative and commercially effective product suite. V-Cube puts Vistula at the forefront of what is unquestionably destined to be the future of telecommunications, supplying systems that we expect will be adopted by small, medium and large businesses throughout the world."

"We have been delighted with the success that Vistula has achieved in such a short period of time and it was a logical step to bring V-Cube wholly into Vistula," commented Vinod Sankar, one of the founders of NetYantra. "My colleagues and I could not be more excited at the prospect of operating together within Vistula as we build on the success that has been achieved to date."

Source: Yahoo Business 

Posted by Dal at 10:19 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Fonality builds on the popularity of Asterisk by performing a complete and total re-write of the front end to be aimed at the SMB (non-tech-savvy) business market. Fonality leverages the power and flexibility of the Asterisk platform, while simultaneously making it easy to manage and use. TMC Labs was very impressed with the Fonality IP PBX and would not hesitate to recommend it for anyone looking for a turnkey Asterisk solution with powerful Web administration tools."

Among the enterprise-class features of PBXtra that the reviewers highlighted were its ease of use and Web-based configuration, sophisticated best route calling system, branch-office and telecommuter support, PBXtra Softphone, Outlook integration, real-time call queues, excellent voice mail, customer support and reporting.

Source: VoIP Magazine 

Posted by Dal at 10:16 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

The Nokia 770 Internet Tablet OS 2006 Edition uses Telepathy as the foundation of Voice Over IP and Instant Messaging functionality enabling users to communicate via text or voice with friends using Google Talk and Jabber servers across the world.

Nokia R&D Manager, Yannick Pellet, said: "When we began this project to bring VoIP and IM to the 770, we first looked around in the open source world to see if anyone out there was looking to solve the same issues that we were facing. After meeting with the people from Collabora and discussing their plans, it became clear that Collabora’s idea for an open source Instant messaging and VoIP framework were a good match for our requirements.”

“From this initial conception, Collabora Ltd. founded and fostered a community for the Open Source Telepathy project with our support and involvement. The framework solves all major issues of flexibility and scalability, providing a robust platform for third-party extendibility in the future."

"Nokia has emerged as a spearhead of Open Source development on embedded Linux. This project provided a unique opportunity to show how a solution to a client's specific problems could also be the basis of a vibrant Open Source community project," said Collabora Ltd. CEO Rob Taylor.

"Telepathy is a tribute to the speed and quality of development that can be attained when the corporate and open source world work hand in hand towards the same goals. Open Source development and spot-on design has allowed us to achieve a small development miracle, " continued Yannick Pellet.

"Many of the issues we have solved together with Nokia for the Telepathy framework are also issues faced on Linux desktop system. It is a unified solution that guarantees a long-lived solution on embedded," confirms Collabora Ltd. CTO Robert McQueen.

The results of this collaboration have been continuously fed to the Open Source community and merged into the Telepathy project under the GNU
LGPL license.

Source: SourceWire 

Posted by Dal at 10:11 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

When purchasing the Virtual Observer call center quality monitoring suite, customers have the option to record selective calls instead of recording all calls, which requires many more channel licenses, and a corresponding higher budget. CSI differentiates themselves from the rest of the industry by providing "big budget" features at "small budget" prices, thus establishing the middle ground between low-end recording devices that simply record calls and allow for playback and high end complete call center suites that can overwhelm buyers with features they will never even use.

VO provides tremendous value to the call recording process by adding powerful screen capture, enterprise data capture (CTI), agent evaluation and E-learning features. Using VO, call center managers have the capability to produce training media for burning onto cd, web playback, or automatic email distribution to agents who require specific help. Packaged training material can also be used to reduce the training cycle time for new agents.

Virtual Observer supports a large variety of VoIP and TDM/Legacy phone systems: Cisco, Avaya, 3COM, Siemens, Nortel, Mitel, as well as any SIP-enabled VoIP systems. CSI can implement Virtual Observer within a traditional TDM environment, on a hybrid TDM/VoIP system, or on a pure VoIP network.

VO’s strength has always been in delivering full-featured functionality at a significantly lower total cost of ownership (TCO). One of the reasons VO is able to achieve the lower TCO is by allowing customers to record a sampling of calls for quality purposes, rather than forcing them to log every call. Now these same cost savings can be applied for VoIP recording on Cisco, Avaya, 3com, Siemens and any SIP VoIP system.

As more and more companies choose to implement VoIP, for both cost savings and value-added functionality, they can now acquire a more affordable quality monitoring solution that will record a select number of calls needed to produce the quality assurance target goal for number off evaluations.

This also means that companies can now implement the full featured technology of an enterprise class quality monitoring system without worrying that they will be left behind when transitioning to VoIP.

In the recent call recording marketplace, you used to be able to only buy basic, feature-deprived VoIP recorders OR expensive, feature-crammed, high TCO products. Just as CSI approached the traditional analog/digital recording world, the marketplace is revolutionized by making available a complete Call Center Quality Monitoring and VoIP Recording suite, packed with features that companies will use, for a palatable price.

Another differentiating area that separates CSI involves annual maintenance agreements. With VO, annual support renewals are not complete system re-buys, but instead a nominal percentage of the original software cost. Superior customer service at an affordable price will yield a mutually satisfied long-term relationship.

Coordinated Systems, Inc. (CSI) delivers enterprise-ready, random sample VoIP call recording and 100% call logging with quality assurance functionality at an incredible value. Recording is achieved via traditional TDM recording, Voice over IP recording, or, in partially migrated environments, a blend of both. CSI specializes in providing solutions to mid-size and large customer service centers recording a sampling of agent calls in single or multiple locations, and later moving to 100% call capture. Virtual Observer can be up and running and creating better trained employees in rapid time.

Source: PR Web 

Posted by Dal at 10:08 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

The first of its kind on the market, the new reader enables convenient, fast, reliable, accurate and secure tracking of books, periodicals, DVDs, CDs, documents, and other media.

Through fast-read performance, the handheld RFID reader simultaneously interrogates multiple items (between 15 and 20 items per second). Data is transmitted via WiFi to the library's host PC or to a PDA, avoiding the hassles of cables and providing freedom of movement. Featuring a lightweight, ergonomic design, the reader can be conveniently carried with a shoulder or belt strap. A patented, flexible antenna allows easy access to items on upper and lower shelves without the need to bend or reach.

"Librarians have long expressed the need for a high-speed, ergonomic, remote access system to improve the accuracy and efficiency of the inventory management process," said Elie Simon, CEO of TAGSYS. "The unique design and functionality of this new reader meets all of these needs and could benefit other sectors responsible for managing high-volumes of documents and materials, such as government, law and national archives."

The reader will be unveiled at the French Association of Librarians Annual Congress, June 9-12, 2006 in Paris, France. Deployment is expected in Q3 2006.

Source: MoreRFID

 

Posted by Dal at 10:05 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

"Motorola recognizes the momentum a vibrant ecosystem will bring to advancing the widespread adoption of WiMax," Dan Coombes, senior vice president and chief technology officer of Motorola networks and enterprise, said in a news release. "Motorola would like to drive the ecosystem to widespread adoption and support for WiMax chipsets, and by driving an end-to-end architecture for personal broadband, Motorola is poised to deliver all the solutions necessary to help operators meet growing needs for greater bandwidth, simpler networks and true mobility."

The company has been working closely with chipmaker Intel to promote WiMax worldwide.

Source: UPI.com 

Posted by Dal at 03:03 PM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

Regulators at the New York Stock Exchange are investigating whether short sellers helped fuel the decline of Vonage Holdings Corp.'s share price since its initial public offering last month, according to a published report.

NYSE investigators have sent a letter to securities firms with questions focusing on how dealers may have facilitated short sales in the stock of the Internet phone carrier, according to a report Friday in The Wall Street Journal.

 Source: Inside Bay Area

Posted by Dal at 12:27 PM | Direct Link Posted to Vonage

In a world where network hardware is increasingly a commodity, where can Cisco turn for its profits in the future? If today's buyout of two private companies is any sign, Cisco is betting the farm on VoIP.

Cisco bought two companies today. Metros Corp. makes an application development environment and run-time platform for IP telephony. Audium essentially does the same thing for IP Contact Centers.

The cash is a drop in the bucket for Cisco, a mere $19.8 million for Metros and $28 million for Audium.

Technologies from the companies will be merged into Cisco's Unified Communications platform, launched in the spring of this year. The Unified Communications platform gives enterprises an integrated platform for voice, data and video traffic.

The companies themselves will become a part of Cisco's Voice Technology Group.

Just because Cisco didn't spend much cash for these acquisitions doesn't mean they're not important. Cisco recognizes better than anyone that the future of all communications, whether it's voice, data or video, is IP, and that it's coming far faster than most people realize.

Expect more buys like this in the future, and lots more VoIP and IP telephony and video announcements out of Cisco. For a while, hardware may be its bread and butter, but those days are limited, and the all-IP network is the company's future.

Source: CMP 

Posted by Dal at 12:25 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia upheld the FCC’s August 2004 ruling saying interconnected VoIP providers must allow wiretapping by May 14, 2007. Several groups, including the American Council on Education, Sun Microsystems and the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), had appealed the ruling, saying it could introduce security vulnerabilities into VoIP services and drive up costs for customers.

The FCC ruling requires VoIP providers that provide a substitute service for traditional telephone service to comply with a 1994 telephone wiretapping law called the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). The U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), in requesting the ruling, argued that their surveillance efforts are "compromised" without CALEA rules for VoIP.

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said in a statement he was pleased with the court’s decision. "Enabling law enforcement to ensure our safety and security is of paramount importance," he said. "[The decision] will ensure that law enforcement agencies’ ability to conduct lawful court-ordered electronic surveillance will keep pace with new communication technologies." But the CDT said the FCC ignored U.S. Congress’ efforts to keep regulations away from IP services. "This ruling threatens both civil liberties and technology innovation,"

CDT Policy Director Jim Dempsey said in an e-mail. "This decision threatens the privacy rights of innocent Americans as well as the ability of technology companies to innovate freely."

-Grant Gross, IDG News Service (Washington Bureau)

Posted by Dal at 12:17 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Politics

Posted by Dal at 12:07 PM | Direct Link Posted to SIP

In the Friday announcement, MobilePro noted that it had been declared the winner of an RFP for the project. The firm complained that after it went through a lengthy permitting process, the city made a "counter proposal requiring that the company establish a free high-speed wireless network supported almost exclusively by advertising revenue without the benefit of the city serving as an anchor tenant."

They also said they do not believe that an advertising-supported business is possible in a the broadband world, and they could be right. We've seen what happens to "free" ISPs in the past. Moreover, it's still a blow to the city and to global WiFi as a whole, because likely it puts the project back a few years at the least.

Source: Tech Spot 

Posted by Dal at 01:37 PM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

"Quite simply, we deployed the TelCove network based VoIP solution for all the classic reasons companies like Ennovative are driven towards VoIP," said Nikhil Tambe, Director of IT at Ennovative Commerce Solutions. "First of all, VoIP is simply more flexible than traditional analog business voice services. Our executive, sales, and software development teams quite often work from remote offices in the Jacksonville area, and TelCove's VoIP service follows them everywhere, no matter if they're at our Jacksonville headquarters location or at their home office.

Our remote workers can make and receive calls and directly access their voicemail by plugging their IP phone into virtually any broadband connection. Next, all of the built-in features provided by VoIP - such as easy audio conferencing, follow-me services, and consolidated email and voicemail - significantly enhance Ennovative's core productivity. And, finally, TelCove's VoIP service saves us money; we've eliminated all of our domestic long distance by deploying TelCove's Premium Enterprise VoIP service, which includes unlimited local and domestic long distance calling."

TelCove offers two types of VoIP services. With the TelCove Network VoIP Service (TNVS), customers such as Ennovative Commerce Solutions simply administer the VoIP phones in their enterprise. TelCove provides all of the VoIP services, call functions, and rich feature set remotely from the TelCove network. The TelCove Managed IP-PBX Service (MIPBX) provides environmental, transport, monitoring, and maintenance services to support IP-PBX applications for customers who choose to maintain their own dedicated IP-PBX system.

"Ennovative had an easy choice in deploying TelCove's Network VoIP Service," said Joe McCourt, Southeast Regional Vice President for TelCove. "As an existing TelCove customer, Ennovative simply swapped out their TelCove analog business lines with our TelCove VoIP solution. In doing so, they gained tremendous flexibility for their telephone services and many added features and functions, while maintaining their business relationship with TelCove, a trusted service provider. They also benefit from much simpler voice service administration and better reporting capabilities, while consolidating their voice and data networks and eliminating usage charges. As Ennovative's experience indicates, it's easy to see why so many new and existing TelCove customers are moving to VoIP.

Source: TelCove, Inc. 

Posted by Dal at 10:21 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

As part of PIKA AllOnHost, a set of API commands is provided to control the remote Skype clients. This message based API communicates with a client side application that in turn controls the Skype client directly.

On the client side, the PIKA Skype Gateway resides on the client machine and is responsible for transferring audio as well as call control information between the remote Skype client and application server. Using a proprietary audio transfer mechanism, the PIKA Skype Gateway is able to send and receive audio and call control information from a PIKA AllOnHost equipped application server.

"When PIKA looked at the challenge of connecting to Skype and similar Internet communications services, we recognized two main issues to overcome. The first was to get connected to the client, gaining access to both audio and call control. The second, and more difficult, is providing a solution that allows developers to switch, transfer, and media process this audio without adding noticeable delay. PIKA AllOnHost is the key differentiator of our solution from basic gateway approaches," said David Clarke, Business Development Manager at PIKA.

Source: ICMI 

Posted by Dal at 10:12 AM | Direct Link Posted to Skype

Speaking at a press conference in Germany yesterday, Don Peterson, chairman and CEO of Avaya, said that there would be continued rapid growth in the adoption of IP telephony. “The question individual users have is when and how to adopt it, not whether to go there,” he said.

Last year around 14pc of the market had converted its telephony systems to IP. By 2009 this will have reached 46pc. “By 2009, still less than half the market will be converted; it’s a huge opportunity as we see it,” added Peterson.

Avaya has implemented what it claims is one of the largest enterprise IP networks in the world for the FIFA World Cup, which takes place over the next month in Germany.

Historically, the market has been dominated by companies with a legacy in the telephony equipment business, such Siemens, Alcatel, Nortel and Lucent (which spun off this business to Avaya). Cisco, with a background in data networking, has since entered the fray but the latest competitors to arrive come from a software background, including Skype, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo. “Correctly, I believe, they are viewing the value of voice in delivering their service to the marketplace and they will challenge us in the enterprise communications business,” said Peterson.

Dave Johnson, president of Avaya International, pointed out that IP telephony was becoming more strategically important to many businesses instead of simply providing an opportunity to save money on telephone call charges. “Companies aren’t looking at this for cost any longer; they’re looking at it for business value and making the business more efficient,” he stated.

Avaya grew its revenues from US$4.069m to US$4.902m in its last fiscal year and has been steadily increasing the level of business it wins outside the US from current levels of 42pc. “We won’t be satisfied until we’re north of 50pc,” said Johnson.

The company has also expanded through acquisition. Among these was Spectel, an Irish company that specialised in developing audio and web conferencing applications.

Source: Silicon Republic 

Posted by Dal at 10:10 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Metreos brings to table a network-based application development environment and run-time platform for IP telephony, while Audium adds similar technology for IP Contact Centers.

Posted by Dal at 10:06 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

The FTC opened an informal investigation into Vonage's 911 and telemarketing compliance in January 2005, it said. Vonage shares have fallen more than 30 percent since its market debut last month at $17. It last traded down 29 cents at $11.70.

Source: Reuters 

Posted by Dal at 12:28 PM | Direct Link Posted to Vonage

Asterisk is an Open Source PBX (or PABX) integrating PSTN telephone lines and VoIP into a single solution, providing all of the functionality of a high end PBX; and best of all its free!

AsterFax builds on the services provided by Asterisk to provide a full fledged email based Fax Gateway.  With AsterFax you can send and receive faxes directly from your existing email client without installing any desktop software.

AsterFax can translate a normal email message into a fax message. You simply enter the destination phone number in the 'To' address, compose your email message and click send. Its that easy.

For more formal correspondence AsterFax also supports a growing number of file formats such as PDF, Tiff, Postscript, MS-Word and OpenOffice Writer.  You can either attach the file to your email message or for applications such as MS-Word and OpenOffice you can fax directly from the application by using the 'Send Email' option. The resulting email is sent as a fax message.

For incoming faxes AsterFax support routing of emails based on a Direct In Dial (DID) number. Which means that every person in an organization can have their own private fax number. AsterFax DID to email address mappings can be stored in a simple configuration file or be pulled from an LDAP repository or virtually any Database.

This release includes a number of install process improvements and minor bug fixes. The install process now creates all the working directories.

The compression scheme used in creating TIFF images has been changed to group 4 compression improving the ability to preview faxes using third party TIFF viewers.

The DefaultFaxHandler has been fixed to handle both inbound and outbound faxes.

Future releases will further improve the install process, provide an init script. We're also looking at providing the RPMs in a public yum repository.

You can download AsterFax from sourceforge at:
http://asterfax.sourceforge.net and click the 'Downloads' link on the right hand side.

Enjoy!
The AsterFax Team
http://www.asteriskit.com.au
 

Posted by Dal at 10:41 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Software

The new service lowers operational and call costs to the end-user, as well as providing dealers with the opportunity to offer further value-added services.  IPDirectConnect offers SMEs full PSTN connectivity via a broadband connection, and marks one of the first true IP transit services on the market. Offering a scaleable and flexible alternative to ISDN, IPDirectConnect opens the full potential of an IP-PBX, complementing a converged network with lower costs and simplified architecture. It also offers a number of features bundled into the service such as DDI number ranges and CLI presentation, which usually incur additional costs with ISDN.

With a simple ordering and provisioning process, Uniworld provide an IP ‘pipe’ between the end-user site and the Gamma network with the appropriate level of bandwidth required. End-users will be able to either port their existing BT telephone numbers to the service or have geographic numbers issued. Geoff Raynsford, Uniworld Channel Partner, said, “The industry needs a partner like Uniworld to push IP telephony through the market place and make it accessible for the SME market. We’re very confident that Uniworld will continue to deliver its promises.”

Uniworld recognises the challenges of the changing telephony market and has identified a need to offer its dealers leading services and extensive support. Kim Robinson, Managing Director of Uniworld Communications, commented: “IPDirectConnect marks the first of a full portfolio of IP services Uniworld will be launching during the next six months. Each new service enables our dealers to sell a proven and leading IP telephony solution that offers customers lower cost calls and value added services. This is an exciting time for the telecoms industry and Uniworld will continue to provide its channel partners with the highest level of service and innovative solutions.”

Source: IT Backbones 

Posted by Dal at 10:23 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Unlike traditional PA systems which use a hard-wired electronic amplifier, Pangean’s IP-based PA solution uses an existing corporate network and clients installed on users’ PC to rapidly disseminate corporate information to users via voice broadcast channels, with no need for additional hardware. The system can also integrate with other traditional PA systems and with one button click, a user can instantly speak to other users who are tuned in to that broadcast channel. The solution can also be used as a IP-based emergency broadcast system where emergency notifications need to be relayed to employees.

The new version of insta-RELAY! supports MySQL as well as Pangean’s Multicast Reflector, a solution that allows unicast-only networks to receive multicast communications. This would enable multicast packets to go across corporate WAN links even if multicast is not enabled over the corporate WAN.

“We view Pangean's solutions as the mission-critical VoIP solutions for the enterprise market and insta-RELAY 2.0 delivers on this concept of instant communications,” said Jack Galligan, VP of Sales and Marketing at Pangean Technologies. “With the new MySQL and Reflector support, this version of insta-RELAY will allow companies to leverage their converged networks to improve employee productivity and fundamental business communications processes.”

insta-RELAY! takes an IP approach to PA systems using SIP. The system supports instant, full-duplex, and multi-channel communications on a one-to-many and many-to-many basis. Any employee with access to the corporate network, including remote users (VPN), can receive the audio broadcast on their PC.

Source: eMediawire
 

Posted by Dal at 10:07 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

In previous years, ENTEL deployed Alvarion’s BreezeACCESS XL system to provide residential broadband data services of 30,000 customer links throughout the country.

“We are excited to be the first operator to offer WiMAX data and voice services in Chile,” said Richard Büchi, CEO of ENTEL Chile. “We have already deployed 22 base stations and our network will be completed by the end of the first half of 2006. We chose Alvarion after we tested various competitive systems and we are confident of the performance of our network that will allow us to offer various services specially to small and medium companies."

BreezeMAX is Alvarion’s WiMAX platform designed from the ground up according to the IEEE 802.16 standards and uses OFDM technology for advanced non-line-of-sight (NLOS) functionality. Its carrier-class design supports broadband speeds and quality of service (QoS) to enable carriers to offer triple play broadband services to thousands of subscribers in a single base station. Since its launch in mid-2004, BreezeMAX has been successfully deployed in over 150 installations in more than 30 countries around the world.

Click Here to Continue Reading

Posted by Dal at 10:03 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

The new services include IBM WebSphere IP Multimedia Subsystem Connector, IBM WebSphere Presence Server and IBM WebSphere Telecom Web Services Server. IBM is also enhancing its Eclipse-based Rational Unified Service Creation Environment with a new Rational Unified Process plug-in for IMS and associated converged HTTP/SIP application development tools to help enable the creation of converged services.
 
Also released today is IBM's Intel-based system, System x3650T, designed to be optimized for the telecommunications environment. Supporting telecommunications applications such as VoIP, IMS, IPTV, telecom network infrastructure and gateways, System x3650T may also be deployed for virtually any application.
 
"IBM’s goal with software, systems and services is to help our telecom clients provide the latest and best new services to their customers," says Tim Greisinger, director of communications sector for IBM Software Group. "With IBM's experience in service oriented architecture and IP technology deployment we can extend our core expertise to help service providers cut time to market with innovative new products."

Source: Thwhir 

Posted by Dal at 02:56 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

Excerpt: And now there's a brand-new Asterisk@Home: TrixBox 1.0 with a brand-new Asterisk Management Portal: freePBX 2.1.1. So we've got a lot of new ground to cover. These new Asterisk products are designed to support the casual home or home office user's PBX needs as well as gigantic call centers processing millions of calls a month...

What freePBX brings to the table is an incredibly simple yet powerful, upgradeable web-based GUI to totally manage your PBX. And TrixBox adds all of the Asterisk bells and whistles you could ever ask for in an integrated PBX: full-featured database management, simple hooks to high-level application development tools such as PHP and Perl, an Apache web server, integrated voicemail and fax-to-email support, contact management, calling card billing, hardware auto-configuration for Digium and Cisco phone hardware, Microsoft networking support, an integrated text-to-speech system, and loads of free utility software applications for Asterisk compliments of Nerd Vittles.

Click Here for the Full Nerd 

Posted by Dal at 10:39 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Help

Many people today think it was the improvements in cell phone design that dropped rates and the cost of cellular phones to the point where today even most suburban teenagers carry cell phones when just 10 years ago many middle income adults considered them a luxury. The fact is though those who think it was the phones themselves that drove the market have it backwards. It was the wireless infrastructure that drove the market to its' current state not the devices using it.

To understand this better we need to look to New York City about 100 years ago before the modern subway was introduced there. At the time a few surface trains serviced the NYC area and many people opposed the massive investment in a subway system. You see in the early 1900s New York City was nothing like it is today, while one of the biggest cities in the US at the time that was not an enormous claim. Much of Manhattan was still vacant swampland along with many of the surrounding areas on Long Island, Brooklyn, etc. The early proponents of the system understood that if you built the infrastructure to allow people to travel swiftly throughout the city that with the ports and current businesses in the area the city would become a massive financial powerhouse. They were right, as the infrastructure came into being the city grew to what we today know as New York City with its massive impact on the global economy.

The cellular market took a similar path though it was less obvious because you don't see the cellular signals traveling though the air. Yet in the beginning cell coverage was spotty at best because there was not much of an infrastructure so even many who could afford one saw little value in having a cell phone. As the network improved because carriers started to erect cellular towers all over the nation people began to buy and use more cellular products. Then the economy of scale gained traction and as the volume of users increased the cost per phone and for service began a drop that has continued all the way up to our present day. Make no mistake though the infrastructure drove the market and caused all the associated reactions. Just as the subway was the fuel that grew NYC to 8 Million people who live and or work there, the cellular towers drove the market to an current estimated 779 Million Cell Phones that are sold each year.

Click Here to Continue Reading
 

Posted by Dal at 10:37 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

Making a call is easy, as caller only need the recipient’s email address. A public server, VoiceGate is provided by CE-Infosys to locate the IP address of the communication partner. Secure communication will be established directly between the 2 parties. Secure session keys used for the voice data encryption is negotiated between the endpoints of the communication and are destroyed every time a talk ends.

This solution provides protection against unauthorized interceptions, also known as ‘man-in-the-middle’ attack and eavesdropping. ClosedTalk provides a security mechanism to verify and confirm the privacy of the talk. By using ClosedTalk, the VoIP security risks and vulnerabilities are greatly reduced for both organizations and home users. ClosedTalk is now available for FREE download at CE-Infosys website.

About CE-Infosys

Founded in 1981 in Germany, CE-Infosys offers cryptography, security design, security management, and smart card applications with offices in Germany, Singapore and United Arab Emirates. Through a network of worldwide partners, the company serves international companies and governments, provides security components for OEM customers, and collaborates in co-operative developments and joint ventures in enterprise security systems.

Source: CE-Infosys

Posted by Dal at 10:32 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

MeshDriver software is designed to function as a virtual interface, binding existing networking interfaces and supporting plug-ins for controlling NIC specific functionality. Meshcom is implementing the upcoming 802.11s mesh standard in MeshDriver.

In addition to mandatory features dictated by 802.11s specifications, MeshDriver includes several optimized algorithms to push the performance of wireless networking. MeshDriver is compatible with all existing network protocols, applications and services. It can be integrated into all devices to create a future proof platform for next generation wireless mesh connectivity.

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 10:30 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

Continuing its innovation and leadership at the desktop, Mitel has extended its award-winning desktop portfolio to include the Mitel 5330 and 5340 IP Phones, the Mitel Wireless LAN Stand (WLAN) and the Mitel Gigabit Ethernet Stand (GigE).

“Mitel is committed to providing innovative IP phones, applications and capabilities at the desktop that provide exceptional ease-of-use and enhanced user value,” said Mitel’s vice-president of product development, Ron Wellard. “Mitel’s new additions to its desktop portfolio demonstrate our continued focus on the end-user experience by developing devices and standards-based applications that are easy to use, customizable to meet the unique communication requirements of diverse communities of users and can be seamlessly integrated into business processes.”

Designed with large graphic displays and wideband audio, Mitel’s new 5330 and 5340 IP phones come with 24 – 48 customizable, soft-labeling keys, respectively. Ideal for enterprise executives, managers or employees, the 5330 and 5340 IP Phones come equipped with wideband audio handsets (7 kHz) making them acoustically superior to many IP phones available today. The new Mitel phones are also designed for power conservation, operating at significantly reduced power consumption compared to many competitors’ phones.

Also available, the Mitel HTML Toolkit for the 5330 and 5340 IP Phones provides an easy-to-use way to create graphical phone applications using a standard web-authoring tool such as Microsoft Office FrontPage® 2003 and Macromedia Dreamweaver® 8. This application allows the phones to be easily integrated into key business processes. Additionally, Mitel has created templates designed specifically for particular vertical market sectors such as education, retail, finance and hospitality.

Both phones support Mitel's new GigE and WLAN stands as well as conference units and the Line Interface Module (LIM) that provides E-911 emergency dialing and survivability using the PSTN. They also support Mitel’s proprietary MiNet and SIP protocols, as well as teleworker, automatic call distribution (ACD) and Hot Desking. The 5330 and 5340 IP Phones and HTML Toolkit will be available in July 2006.

Intelligent Evolution - Mitel Maintains Investment Protection
Mitel’s Gigabit Ethernet Stand is a cost-effective solution that is designed specifically to meet the needs of customers with high bandwidth requirements. By building the GigE interface into the phone stand, users can GigE-enable legacy 5200- and 5300-series IP phones, rather than junk and replace. This enables enterprises to migrate its installed base over time, protect its investment and offer the user choice and flexibility in selecting an IP phone. The GigE Stand is currently available.

Mitel’s Wireless Phone Stand enables many of Mitel’s wired phones with 802.11 wireless connectivity. The WLAN Stand operates in two modes: client and access point. The client mode enables the phone to operate in a standard WLAN environment while the access point mode provides a wireless environment for multiple Mitel IP phones and wireless devices. The stand is ideal for customers with wiring constraints, wireless greenfield sites, temporary locations, and teleworkers with a wireless LAN at home, among other applications and benefits. The WLAN Stand will be available in July 2006.

Source: Telephony World 

Posted by Dal at 10:25 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

To make this happen, GTT exploited a combination of advanced telephony and multimedia technologies. The company also brought to bear documented experience and knowledge of SIP protocol and related standards. With the cooperation of video device maker Leadtek Research Inc. and their extensive experience in video signal handling and compression as well as hardware manufacturing, the final challenges were resolved.
 
"Video telephony is emerging as the next big thing in communications and the Internet,"
said Vladimir Smelyansky, CTO of GTT. "'Our solution is not strictly revolutionary, but is nevertheless an important VoIP milestone for 3 reasons. Firstly it truly works, unlike previous offerings, it is truly plug and play, and it is the first time that the previously disparate worlds of video telephony hardware and SIP software function come together in one solution."
 
"A key driving force to move videophones into the mainstream market is its simplicity of use," explained Hon Sit, VP of Business Development at Leadtek, "a user should just plug the videophone in and start making video calls, much like using a conventional telephone.  GlobalTouch and Leadtek worked hard together to make this a reality. We are excited about the results."
 
In keeping with GTT's R&D strategy, the company was able to successfully create user friendly video telephony technology that provides superior quality and can be delivered to end user with low price tag and acceptable cost for service provider at the same time.
 
There are currently two ways to conduct a video call on the GlobalTouch VoIP platform.
 GTT supports the Leadtek desktop video telephone. The standalone videophone is designed for video over IP. A winner in the CES Telephone category, the unit has a built- in 5" TFT LCD screen and CCD camera that can be rotated and tilted.
 
Callers also can use the GTT video Softphone that comes bundled with the company's VoIP service. This is integrated with MS Outlook contacts. By clicking on an Outlook contact in they can instantly initiate a video call with another similarly outfitted user, or with user that has a desktop video telephone. If a user on either end of the call does not have a multimedia device, the call reverts to a normal voice only call by default.
 
GTT recent initiated a limited field test. A wider release of the product is planned for late
Q2 to early Q3 of this year.
 
"The demands of globalization, cost reduction and productivity acceleration are exerting increasing pressure on enterprises large and small," said Gregory O. Welch, CEO of GTT, "video telephony is therefore becoming a really important application. For our customers, video over VoIP means a very attractive new feature and revenue streams."
 
"We feel that Video over VoIP is not just a cool feature, but a window into VoIP's future, where VoIP communications offers remote interactive communications from any location on any device," commented Cliff Rees, COO of GTT. "And by designing our VoIP platform with open standards to support a broader range of devices, we offer our ASP customers to offer their subscribers lots of value added, plug and play options like video telephony."

Source: Telephony World
 

Posted by Dal at 10:13 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Alvarion Ltd. on Tuesday announced the commercial availability of its BreezeMAX Si platform.  The WiMAX CPE, using the Intel PRO/Wireless 5116 broadband interface chip, is self-installable, taking the onus off the service provider to roll a truck to get a customer up and running. As such, self-install opens the door for large-scale deployments of WiMAX services everywhere, the company said.

The availability of the units comes after trials of the CPE with 10 different operators. The compact CPE from the BreezeMAX 3500 family offers improved indoor penetration and NLOS operation, enables simple end-user plug-and-play installation, and paves the way for nomadic and portable services, Alvarion said.

The product can be integrated into Alvarion's 150+ WiMAX network deployments to date. By eliminating professional installation, the Si enables carriers to broaden their distribution channels, and when combined with outdoor CPEs, optimizes their network planning by trading-off coverage, capacity and installation costs.

The Si CPE introduces a dual-mode software-defined radio functionality that enables operation in either FDD or TDD mode, thus providing flexibility in network design. Through a Web-based interface, the BreezeMAX Si achieves a connection in almost any environment using its integrated 9dBi antenna or with an external 12dBi window mount antenna. Supporting a single 10/100 Base-T interface for IP data, it can connect with Alvarion’s portfolio of indoor devices for Wi-Fi and voice services, and enable primary voice services with battery backup.

Alvarion Ltd. www.alvarion.com

Posted by Dal at 10:08 AM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

Global Crossing VoIP Integrity Service provides key performance reporting and indicators, including per-call Mean Opinion Score (MOS) metrics, in addition to the standard features of Global Crossing Network Integrity and Global Crossing Application Integrity Services. Global Crossing VoIP Integrity service empowers enterprise network managers to optimize VoIP network design and utilization through end-to-end, real-time performance monitoring, robust trouble shooting and one-second increment data gathering. "Converged IP networks require high levels of transparency, end-to-end monitoring and end-to-end management to achieve consistent reliability and quality for real-time applications," said Anthony Christie, Global Crossing's chief marketing officer.

"By gaining such a high degree of visibility into and control over their VoIP network performance, enterprise network managers can maximize the productivity of their organization and achieve lower total- cost-of-ownership efficiencies." VoIP Integrity performance reporting is a tool for enterprise network managers to proactively design and troubleshoot their entire network and or individual locations for optimal quality.

Reports provide information on VoIP call quality distribution for a selected site over a specified period of time, identify the top 20 sites with the highest number of VoIP call flows, and highlight the worst performing sites based on call quality for the selected time period. Network managers have real-time visibility into network and applications performance, enabling them to identify potential performance issues before they lead to service interruptions. "Global Crossing VoIP Integrity Service demonstrates Global Crossing's commitment to enhancing its position on the leading edge of VoIP services," stated Brian Washburn, principal analyst at Current Analysis.

"This latest Global Crossing VoIP capability enables enterprises to exercise greater monitoring capability and control over their voice network while realizing the efficiencies of IP technology." "VoIP Integrity Service is built with the Visual UpTime Select VoIP module from Fluke Networks. By adding the newly released VoIP module into their existing Application Performance Management portfolio, Global Crossing becomes the first carrier anywhere to offer such market-leading functionality," said Steve Hindman, vice president for carrier channels at Fluke Networks. "Global Crossing's APM customers will have the ability to view per-call MOS data for VoIP conversations on their MPLS network, and then to intelligently troubleshoot any problem calls."

Global Crossing's APM services enable enterprises to proactively manage the performance of any networked application, such as VoIP, video, customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP) or e-mail. APM services increase application and network availability, optimize the use of network bandwidth and reduce operating costs across traditional and converged IP-based infrastructures. Global Crossing Applications Performance Management Services are now available worldwide as part of Global Crossing's Managed Solutions portfolio.

Source: PR Newswire 

Posted by Dal at 01:41 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

 

Designed exclusively for AltiGen IP Phone Systems, the IP 705 is AltiGen's second telephone to offer advanced VoIP technology while still providing standard business features such as paging, multiple line appearances, and busy lamp fields. The IP 705 provides a subset of the of the flagship IP 710 VoIP telephone's features while offering the same level of voice quality at a reduced price.

"The IP 705 VoIP telephone strengthens our existing product lines with the introduction of a competitive mid-level VoIP telephone," said AltiGen CEO, Gilbert Hu. "The additional flexibility provided by multiple telephone options will enable our resellers to better tailor our products to customer's specific needs."

IP 705 VoIP telephone users will have convenient single button access to voicemail, call conferencing, call transferring, redial and call log lists. With a two-line liquid crystal display, the IP 705 is capable of displaying time, caller ID name or number, and do-not-disturb and call forwarding status. Five backlit, user-defined, programmable keys can be setup for any combination of available features like, but not limited to, speed-dialing, extension busy/ringing appearances, call appearances and line appearances. The IP 705 also supports third party hands free headsets using AltiGen's amplified industry standard RJ9 headset port.

"The available features on the IP 705 VoIP telephone set bring tremendous value to the table when competing head-to-head with other manufacturers' products in a similar price range," said John Babin, Vice President of Capture Technologies, an AltiGen authorized reseller. "The IP 705 provides our customers with more options while expanding Capture's opportunities for growth."

    Some of the phone's key features and benefits include:

    -- One button access for voice recording to your personal voicemail box or
       to a centralized server
    -- One button access to voicemail
    -- Five user-programmable keys for extension, call and line appearances,
       access to feature codes, and speed dialing
    -- Auto answer feature allows calls to be answered automatically to a
       defined voice device within a specific ring time. Great for call center
       service agents with headsets or office operators
    -- 2-port Ethernet Switch
    -- Optional Power over Ethernet (PoE) support

    Availability

The IP 705 will be available starting today, June 6, 2006 through all AltiGen  Authorized Resellers.

Source: PR News 

Posted by Dal at 01:28 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

Asterisk is an open source IP-PBX with interactive voice response (IVR), voicemail, caller ID and conference calling on its long list of PBX features.

The Asterisk open source project is backed by Digium whose founder Mark Spencer is the founder of the Asterisk project.

The business edition of Asterisk is a fully supported, tested and certified version of the open source edition of Asterisk. It also includes additional proprietary driver support that is not part of the open source edition.

Asterisk Business Edition B.1 is based on the 1.2.7 version of Asterisk open source. The 1.2.x branch of Asterisk first debuted last November. Among the key enhancements is a new firewall module called net-sec, which is based on a code contribution from Ranch Networks.

Net-sec dynamically opens and closes firewall ports as needed instead of having to keep ports open all the time. This allows a higher degree of security.

In the past, Asterisk users typically would either overlay their Asterisk deployment on top of an existing Linux distribution or would have to separately install a new Linux distribution in order to run Asterisk.

Asterisk Business Edition B.1 is intended to make deployment easier for potential users by including a customized version of Linux that is specifically designed for Asterisk.

The customer Linux distribution was developed with the help of rPath, which develops a custom build-your-own Linux distribution effort.

"It allows us to provide a very tailored and customized distro specifically made for Asterisk to our customers and that distro is fully supported both by Digium and backed up by rPath if there is any issues with it," Jim Webster, director of software technologies at Digium, told internetnews.com.

"It allows customers with just one CD to install Linux and Asterisk at the same time."

"It speeds up the installation process considerably; you don't have to go in and select the packages that you need that are required for Asterisk, " Webster added. "And you also don't wind up with a bunch of packages that you may not necessarily want on the system."

Speech recognition capabilities are also given a boost in the new Asterisk Business edition by way of the inclusion of the LumenVox Speech Engine and the Cepstral Text-to-Speech System.

Webster noted that, among Asterisk Business Edition's advantage over some of its proprietary competitors is tested interoperability, which comes by way of its open source deployment.

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 01:02 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

All users are urged to upgrade as soon as they can practically do so, or ensure that they don't expose IAX2 services to the public if it is not necessary.

The release files are available in the usual place (ftp.digium.com), as both tarballs and patch files relative to the last release. In addition, both the tarballs and the patch files have been signed using GPG keys of the release maintainers, so that you can ensure their authenticity.

Thank you for your support of Asterisk!
 

Posted by Dal at 06:03 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Development

 

Grandstream chose TI's TMS320C5501 DSP because of its high performance for advanced digital signal processing and affordable cost. The C5501 DSP allows Grandstream to offer superb voice clarity, enhanced security protection for device provisioning and private communications, and all the popular PBX phone features on its GXP2000 enterprise IP phone product, including transfer, forward, do not disturb, hold, mute, 3-way conference, intercom/paging, shared line presence, call park/pick up, speed dial, full duplex hands-free speakerphone, etc, at a much lower price level than competition. Optimized for communication devices, music effectors and portable medical devices, the TMS320C5501 fixed-point DSP is based on the TMS320C55x DSP generation CPU processor core. The C55x DSP architecture achieves high performance and low power through increased parallelism and total focus on reduction in power dissipation.

“We are very excited about working with TI and using their industry leading DSP that powers our innovative VoIP products. By leveraging the powerful processing capabilities, extended features and relatively low cost of TI's DSP, Grandstream is able to design and deliver advanced IP voice and video products with high quality, rich functions at unrivaled price points,” says David Li, CEO of Grandstream Networks, Inc.

Grandstream's GXP-2000

Grandstream's GXP-2000 is a next generation enterprise SIP phone that offers great features at a great price. GXP-2000 features dual 10/100M Ethernet ports that can be configured in switch or router mode, headset jack, adjustable large 130x64 graphic LCD (with support for multiple languages), four line indicators (each of which can be configured using independent SIP account), seven programmable speed dial keys with further expandability to support up to 112 additional programmable keys via add-on key expansion modules, various popular voice codecs including G.711, G.723.1, G.729A/B, GSM, G.726, and G.722 (wideband), multi-party conferencing, intercom, call forward, call transfer, BLF (Busy Lamp Field), shared line appearance and call pickup, full duplex speaker phone with acoustic echo cancellation, AES based SRTP and ZRTP for secure voice communications, XML, SIMPLE, and LDAP to allow easy integration with other applications. GXP-2000 comes with built-in Power-over-Ethernet (802.3af) and a universal power supply. With MSRP of only $119, GXP-2000 presents a tremendous value to corporate users.
 

Posted by Dal at 05:13 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Hardware

 

The Digium Asterisk Business Edition is the professional-grade version of Asterisk, the industry’s first open source PBX. The Ranch Networks security code is the first solution of its kind to be supported by the popular open source IP telephony platform.

Combining Asterisk Business Edition with Ranch Networks new RN series appliances provides unprecedented security and scalability to the open source telephony industry. Ranch Networks solves security concerns associated with VoIP implementations through both its MIDCOM integration with the Asterisk platform, and several of its Patent-Pending technologies. The MIDCOM integration provides for dynamic per-call firewall control, bandwidth management, NAT traversal, and RTP traffic bridging – all supporting encrypted signaling streams, while the Patent-Pending technologies separate voice, video, and data traffic into multiple, secure zones without having to reconfigure IP addresses.

“The Ranch Networks security code integrated into the new version of Asterisk Business Edition will provide enterprise users with a secure and scalable option for open source software,” said Alex Pavlovsky, president of Ranch Networks. “Digium has paved the way for mainstream businesses to take advantage of open source telephony with the new version of Asterisk Business Edition.”

“This new version of the Asterisk Business Edition provides enterprise users with a flexible, cost effective, and fully-supported telephony platform,” said Jim Webster, director of software technologies at Digium. “By adding Ranch Network's security appliance business professionals can also now enjoy security and scalability on-par with proprietary VoIP systems.”

To supplement Asterisk Business Edition, Ranch Networks offers the RN300, RN20, RN40 and RN41 to provide dynamic, protocol independent, per-call authenticated network access. These products supply unprecedented VoIP security, bandwidth management, VPN, accounting and switching capabilities to small to mid-size enterprises, service providers and carriers.

The RN300, RN20, RN40, and RN41 are available through leading Digium resellers worldwide ranging in price from $600 to $17,300. 

Posted by Dal at 05:06 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

This solution targets applications in several markets including public safety, logistics, asset management and healthcare. Customers in these markets need a reliable, scalable and ease of deployment wireless infrastructure to monitor sensory data and track asset location.

Helicomm's new platform consists of wireless mesh Access Points, low power Mobile Tags and an application management tool interface that enables customers to quickly integrate and deploy wireless sensory networks. This innovative system seamlessly integrates various types of sensors, such as temperature, pressure, smoke and gas. With its mesh networking capability, the system performs reliably even under complex and challenged environments.

"We are pleased to participate in Sensors Expo and show our wireless sensor monitoring and location tracking systems," said Helicomm president, Jack Sun. "The integration of a mesh sensory network with the wireless location tracking solution will provide niche value for markets in public safety, logistics, asset management and healthcare," he added.

Helicomm's location Access Point uses mesh technology and requires no wiring during installation. Thirty access points can cover a maximum four million square feet area. The management tool API seamlessly integrates third party graphic and database tools. This system is currently under customer trials in the target markets of public safety, logistics, asset management and healthcare. An overview of Helicomm's tracking system can be found in www.helicomm.com.

Source: Business Wire 

Posted by Dal at 05:03 PM | Direct Link Posted to WiFi / Wireless

Multi-Tech Systems, Inc., a leading data communications and telecommunications technology company based in suburban Minneapolis, is announcing new MultiVoIP voice and fax over IP gateways targeted towards businesses implementing SIP (Session Initiated Protocol) telephony.

The new MultiVoIP FX Voice/Fax over IP Gateways will be shown at this year's Globalcomm exposition in Chicago starting on June 5. The VoIP gateways are available in two-, four-, and eight-port models, include features selected specifically for implementing SIP telephony, and are cost-effectively priced while still offering business-class quality and performance. Shipping next quarter, the MultiVoIP two-port MVPFX-2 is priced at an MSRP of $US599, the four-port MVPFX-4 at $US999 and eight-port MVPFX-8 at $US1699. 

"In selecting the feature set for these new MultiVoIP models we targeted users deploying a SIP-centric network," states Chip Harleman, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Multi-Tech Systems, Inc. "The MultiVoIP FX gateways connect to analog ports on telephony gear using two, four or eight FXS or FXO interfaces, connect to an IP network using a 10/100BaseT interface, include an RS232 command port, are controlled via web browser and are flash upgradeable.

The new models support SIP for sending and receiving voice over an IP network, T.38 real-time fax relaying for VoIP equipment interoperability, Voice Activity Detection for silence compression, Comfort Noise Generation for a more natural speaking experience and utilize 5.3K bps voice compression for maximizing bandwidth.

These features packaged into our standard cabinetry make for a rugged and feature rich product specifically designed for SIP networks requiring cost-effective solutions." The Session Initiated Protocol (SIP) standard, primarily developed by the IETF SIP working group, allows for the interoperability of a large number of devices from various vendors with those devices being easily configured and automatically updated as necessary. The new MultiVoIP FX gateways enable the integration of existing telephony equipment (e.g. PBXs, telephones, fax machines, etc.) into SIP networks. SIP-based telephony networks offer stable interoperability with a wide range of features and flexibility.

The new Multi-Tech Systems MultiVoIP FX products fit well into such networks by being able to adapt existing telephony equipment to evolving user requirements. Multi-Tech Systems is an ISO 9001:2000 certified global manufacturer of award-winning telephony, Internet and device networking products that connect voice and data over IP networks, add connectivity to equipment using embedded technologies, and provide the latest in cellular wireless technologies.

With a 35-year history of inventing products known for their reliability and performance, Multi-Tech Systems still employs the same mission on which the company was founded: to provide solutions that solve real business problems. To reinforce this philosophy, Multi-Tech Systems prides itself on developing and fostering mutually beneficial long-term relationships with its worldwide network of technology partners, sales channels and customers. 

Posted by Dal at 04:45 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Hardware

As the Java EE-SIP application server component of the BEA WebLogic Communications Platform product family, this latest version of BEA WebLogic SIP Server is designed to deliver enhanced support for IMS, making it the telecom industry's first and only carrier-grade, converged application server platform with native support for IMS, Java EE, Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), and Event Driven Architecture (EDA), in a single application container.

"Network operators are looking to quickly implement a flexible, dynamic and agile IMS services layer architecture in order to accelerate the delivery of next-generation services," said Brian Partridge, senior analyst with The Yankee Group. "A converged Java EE-SIP container, like that found in BEA WebLogic SIP Server is a cost-effective and efficient approach. By leveraging the enhanced IMS, SOA and EDA support network operators can better respond to changing competitive market forces."

BEA WebLogic SIP Server 2.2 Provides Support for Key IMS Standards and SIP-based Event Notification

BEA WebLogic SIP Server 2.2 is designed to provide enhanced support for IMS. The product supports the key IMS application server standard interfaces specified by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). These standards include the SIP-based IMS Service Control (ISC) interface, and the Diameter-based Sh reference point that can help allow network operators seamlessly integrate BEA WebLogic SIP Server with their IMS core networks. BEA WebLogic SIP Server is also designed to provide a simplified and cost-effective foundation for an IMS services layer architecture, with support for multiple application protocols and interfaces, such as SIP, HTTP, Java EE, and Web Services. This foundation can help allow for more rapid service creation and delivery, while helping keep the cost of deploying these new services down.

Additionally, BEA WebLogic SIP Server 2.2 supports key Internet standards and protocols that can help enable telecom network operators to implement a SIP- and XML-based event-driven application architecture (EDA) at the IMS services layer. These new technologies include SIP-specific Event Notification and XML Configuration Access Protocol (XCAP), both of which are in the process of being specified and standardized by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Network operators deploying IMS networks can leverage a SIP-based event notification framework, and an XML-based data configuration platform designed to help implement new IMS service enablers much more rapidly and cost effectively.

All of these enhanced capabilities in BEA WebLogic SIP Server 2.2 are designed to offer telecom network operators simplicity and choice at the services layer of their next-generation network architectures. Instead of requiring operators to purchase, deploy and manage multiple application containers to build out services that require support for multiple application protocols, BEA WebLogic SIP Server 2.2 is designed to deliver a single application container platform that can support all of these industry-standard technologies. Simplicity can mean lower operational costs; choice means new service and revenue opportunities can be created using the variety of complementary technologies implemented.

"BEA WebLogic SIP Server 2.2 is designed to firmly position BEA as the leading converged Java EE-SIP-IMS application platform provider," said Mike McHugh, vice president and general manager, BEA WebLogic Communications Platform, BEA Systems. "We fully support the key 3GPP standards for IMS application servers in BEA WebLogic SIP Server 2.2. We are continuing to provide network operators with communication services infrastructure designed to deliver new sources of revenue, while also helping to protect investment by focusing on the implementation of widely adopted industry standards at the IMS services layer. No other vendor in the telecom or IT industries today offers such an integrated and complete solution."

Source: Yahoo PR 

Posted by Dal at 04:35 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

Meetings are held monthly on the second Saturday of each month, excluding July and December. The Agenda is posted online
http://www.voip-info.org/wiki/index.php?page=Twin+Cities+Asterisk+User+Group+Agenda


This months meeting will be held at a new location, Onvoy will be hosting in a much larger facility.

Onvoy is located at Hwy169 and I-394 in the west metro area.
Google Maps Link

Onvoy Corporate
300 S. Highway 169, Suite 700
Minneapolis, MN 55426

Please arrive on-time so that we can enter the building as a group.
11:30am - This Saturday

This month we'll be discussing call center solutions with Asterisk.

If you're having a problem with Asterisk, bring your questions to a meeting for free help. We love helping new users!

Come to a meeting to meet other asterisk users, see asterisk solutions, win a door prize, eat food, or for the good company, to look for work, if your looking for employees, to go out for a drive, to get out of your house, whatever, JUST COME TO THE MEETING!

New visitors can help themselves to FREE FXO Interface cards (So you can connect your phone line, and have a timing source for meetme and IAX protocols). Some members have been known to swap hardware at the meetings.  Have extra VoIP gear, looking for VoIP gear? There's plenty of hardware to see. Have you been to a meeting recently?

Please come and share your own ideas and learn from others. As always, free food.

We are always looking for help with meeting topics. If you feel like taking the lead, please do and simply let me know if you need anything.

Meeting starts at 11:30am and parking is available all around the building. Runs about 2 hours or less, and we'll order Pizza to the meeting for lunch.

Look forward to seeing you there.

VoIP Info "Info"

If you have a product or service you'd like to introduce to our members,
send a private message to ejo1(at)soundchoicecomm.com and we'll see if we
can't get you listed as next month's sponsor.

You can subscribe to our annoucement list at:
http://omni.sccvoip.com/~tcaug  Soon to be http://www.tcaug.net


SPONSORED THIS MONTH BY: SOUND CHOICE COMMUNICATIONS LLC "Keep in touch with the World"//  With Support from ONVOY "Be seen. Be heard. Be informed. Be connected"
 

Posted by Dal at 04:21 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk News

This new solution expands on the real-time audio and web conferencing and collaboration provided by its Mereon Application Server and Mereon Conferencing application. It will offer highly flexible and user-friendly features like service interoperability with all H.263 videoconferencing client systems, interoperability with 3G mobile phones and desktop IP phones, capacity for 8 video and 100 audio participants per conference, flexible templates and moderator controls.

With the advent of IP-centric video conferencing, the cost of this previously expensive application has dropped precipitously while the appeal and accessibility of real-time video meetings have grown by leaps and bounds. In addition, the participant-friendly, intuitive GUIs and participant controls of today's IP video conferencing service platforms have made it much simpler to add and personalize video conferencing for users, enterprises and carriers.

Nithya A. Ruff, vice president of product management and marketing for IP Unity, states, "We have leveraged the best of IP Unity's applications technology to make video conferencing easy to use, flexible, IMS ready and carrier grade. We fulfill customers' needs for personalized interactions in the enterprise and in the consumer space through video enabling interactions, in a cost-effective and a preference driven way."

Among the compelling features of the solution are

-- Ability to support multipoint conferencing up to eight simultaneous video participants and 100 audio participants per conference. System capacity will support many simultaneous conferences, and enables subscribers on desktop, IP phone and 3G mobile phone networks as well as all H.263 videoconferencing clients to participate.

-- High-resolution display of participant images and imported video streams via support for .3gp and MPEG4 video formats

-- Ability to display video conferencing signals flexibly on many different end-user devices, ensured by automatic transcoding, frame rate control and rate matching between video streams

-- Use of all applicable audio and web conferencing service features, including easy-to-use participant controls, extensive moderator controls, multiple skin options and in-conference operator assistance.

-- Moderator-controlled features such as in-conference paging, on-demand conference provisioning and whisper mode

-- Voice-activated switching

IP Unity will exhibit in booth 76063 at GLOBALCOMM in Chicago, Illinois June 5 - 8, 2006.

Source: Business Wire 

Posted by Dal at 12:54 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Software

Building upon years of joint deployments, Acme Packet and BroadSoft have formalized and strengthened their relationship as part of BroadSoft's Premier Access Solution program. Over 70 service providers around the world currently use Acme Packet Net-Net SBCs and BroadSoft BroadWorks.

Premier Access Solutions focuses on hosted service solution testing, including prioritized and pre-tested interoperability as new product releases are made available, joint development and feature integration, pre and post sales support along with development of integration guides and documentation of best practices. This integration work helps service providers quickly deploy revenue-generating services by mitigating access side operational and management challenges. Service providers will also benefit with rapid problem resolution.

"Acme Packet is a natural fit for our Premier Access Solution program based on the extensive feature set of the Net-Net SBC product family coupled with our joint experience working with service providers worldwide," said Scott Wharton, vice president of marketing for BroadSoft. "Our companies have the same goal to offer pre-integrated, readily deployable access solutions that allow carriers to rapidly deploy secure and premium hosted VoIP services."

"Acme Packet and BroadSoft share a strong and growing common customer base and market focus," said Seamus Hourihan, Acme Packet's vice president of marketing and product management. "Our strategic partnership helps overcome operational challenges and provides service providers with a premier VoIP solution so they can focus on building their revenue streams."

Source: Market Wire 

Posted by Dal at 07:54 AM | Direct Link Posted to PBX / iPBX

"Tropic has been in the reconfigurable OADM market for over four years and we are now seeing WSS components maturing to a point where it makes sense to productize them into systems-level solutions. This is very similar to what the industry experienced with blockers, in that the first generation was available in the late 1990's but the components didn't really mature until 2003 when we introduced our first ROADM product. We are seeing the same cycle recur now, as the WSS prototype devices from multiple vendors mature into fully qualified production devices. Critically important is that these devices have comparable capabilities and performance that creates a stable, multi-sourced competitive supply base that can support broad deployment, but will also enable the 40G network evolution without requiring any equipment swap-outs," said Ben Bacque, VP R&D at Tropic Networks. "We are also encouraged to see the component manufacturing processes maturing, allowing our suppliers to ship production volumes, and to continue to drive down their manufacturing costs."

In common with both the static OADM and blocker-based ROADMs, Tropic Networks has integrated its Wavelength Tracker all-optical management technology into the WSS solution. The launch of the WSS ROADM variant rounds out the portfolio for Tropic Networks and allows customers to mix and match solutions as required. For example, while WSS technology may be required at video distribution or other multi-degree hub sites, it may not be required at the drop sites and edge node locations. The Tropic solution delivers optical flexibility without imposing additional costs.

"As networks begin to incorporate WSS technology and become more dynamic and optically transparent in nature Wavelength Tracker forms an essential part of the solution. Without Wavelength Tracker the service provider cannot cost-effectively provision and manage the optical flexibility introduced by WSS devices without first going back to the electrical layer, which of course means they lose the advantages of using the all-optical WSS technology" said Rob Lane VP Sales and Marketing at Tropic. "Over the last two years of live network deployments Wavelength Tracker has proven itself as a vital piece of the network. Our customers also look for more than packaging of component technology and hence our solution provides a complete network toolkit for design, cost optimization and network operations."

Source: Market Wire 

Posted by Dal at 07:51 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

Thankfully technology can play an integral role in enabling businesses to offer a high level of customer service to their customers, specifically in supporting their call management.

Call management solutions focus on helping businesses better handle their incoming calls, including setting up customer greetings, queuing calls, and routing calls to mobile phones or other numbers so they can be answered more efficiently. Many invest heavily in the appropriate PBX (private branch exchange) hardware and software available to help improve this area of their businesses, and the benefits of well managed incoming calls means they reap the rewards of happy customers and connected business communications.

But many small businesses face a dilemma. When budgets are tight and money is needed to invest in a wide range of other areas, putting aside anything like a significant sum to cover the cost of a traditional PBX is extremely difficult. Recent research we conducted amongst our customers put the average cost of a standard call management solution, along with the cost of servicing and maintenance, at around £2k – quite a hefty investment! So what can small businesses do to get around this problem?

The primary solution is to look to the web for inspiration. As technology has evolved, so has the means of delivery for the functionality and flexibility of call management solutions. Specifically, suppliers in the market are now offering totally web-based solutions, which don’t need hardware or software to be installed, and thus can be harnessed at a fraction of the usual cost. An additional benefit is the ability to turn the solution off as quickly as it was turned on, which allows it to be used for ad-hoc projects and without the commitment of a long-term contract.

These call management solutions can be set up, changed and turned off in real-time, and so support any business in creating a flexible office environment; a must in today’s competitive and fast moving world. So many small businesses rely on working from home or while on the move, and solutions that support this way of working enable them to stay connected regardless of where they are. They match all of the functionality of traditional PBX solutions, but because of their self-administration over the web; can be easily and quickly changed according to the needs of the business.

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 07:38 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

The Citel Handset Gateway helps businesses migrate to a next-generation IP telephony platform, while maintaining much of their existing handset and wiring infrastructure. The solution now is compliance-tested by Avaya for compatibility with Avaya Communication Manager IP telephony software and the Avaya Converged Communication Server, an application that enables SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) services and extends the value of a company's investment in its network.

"Citel is proud to have obtained this important milestone with Avaya," said Mike Robinson, CEO of Citel. "Now, enterprises with multiple locations and PBX handsets from multiple vendors can connect seamlessly to Avaya's robust SIP-based IP platform, reduce total costs and minimize the disruption to their business as they migrate to a voice over IP network."

Citel is a member of the Avaya DeveloperConnection Program -- an initiative to develop, market and sell innovative third-party products that interoperate with Avaya technology and extend the value of a company's investment in its network. As a member of the program, Citel is eligible to submit products for compatibility testing by the Avaya Solution Interoperability and Test Lab in Lincroft, N.J. There a team of Avaya engineers develops a comprehensive test plan for each application to verify whether it is Avaya compliant. Doing so ensures businesses can confidently add best-in-breed capabilities to their network without having to replace their existing infrastructure -- speeding deployment of new applications and reducing both network complexity and implementation costs.

"By offering compliance testing to the many innovative companies like Citel who are members of our DeveloperConnection program, Avaya promotes fully interoperable solutions that help businesses unleash powerful new possibilities," said Eric Rossman, vice president, developer relations and technical alliances, Avaya. "They are able to use Intelligent Communications to connect employees and customers to information from wherever they are, over whatever device they have available -- getting more out of their multivendor network and delivering new value to their bottom line."

Source: Telephony World 

Posted by Dal at 07:33 AM | Direct Link Posted to SIP

CounterPath Products, Inc., a provider of Voice and Video over Internet Protocol (VoIP) applications and softphones, has launched X-Lite 3.0, its new free softphone.

X-Lite 3.0 is based on eyeBeam 1.5, CounterPath's carrier grade commercial SIP softphone, and offers such functionality as automatic configuration, high quality audio and video, presence and instant messaging, and a comprehensive address book.

The previous version of X-Lite was launched in April 2003, and has since been downloaded and used by companies “looking to test, build and deploy SIP-based products,” company officials say.

X-Lite 3.0 can be downloaded from CounterPath's Web site. Company officials say it lets users “experience the benefits of softphones for free, as part of CounterPath's drive to accelerate mainstream adoption of VoIP.”

"By providing X-Lite 3.0 free of charge, we are extending the benefits of softphones to as many people as possible, as part of our commitment to driving widespread VoIP adoption and to ongoing innovation in the SIP-based IP communications space," said Donovan Jones, President and COO at CounterPath.

Jones says many of the current users of X-Lite are using it in conjunction with PBX products such as Asterisk and with the resulting enhanced usability and performance. “We expect to see significant additional deployments of this complementary pairing,” he said.

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 07:26 AM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Software

The company raised its third round of funding from new investor Globespan Capital partners, and existing investors Highland Capital Partners and North Bridge Venture Partners. Formed in late 2003, the Maynard, Massachusetts-based company specializes in scaling, securing, and controlling VoIP and other real-time services like instant messaging based on a technology standard called the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP).

The latest investment brings the total funding in the company to $31 million. Covergence hopes to use the additional resources to develop new sales and marketing opportunities, expand its sales channel strategy, and extend its geographic footprint into international markets.

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 03:07 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

“Cisco has been focusing on bringing a lot more technology solutions for customers to address various areas like security, disaster recovery, mobility and infrastructure,” said Ashok, senior vice president, ITS, Cisco Systems, India & SAARC. According to the company sources, Cisco which has recently hived off India into a separate region, a status previously reserved for China.

“We are soon going to have more executive briefing centres, rapid fulfillment depots, stock depots and customer engagement centres in India,” B Ashok, country manager - ITS, Cisco Systems India told Business Standard on the sidelines of the Cisco ITS Summit 2006. The company is also ramping up its India operations in a big way. It is investing $50 million in setting up a new campus in Bangalore, which will be ready by June 2007.

This is in addition to the company’s global development centre in the city, which is one of the largest outside USA. The company is also going to increase its headcount in India from the present 1,400 to 3,000 in the next three years, according to company’s sources.

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 03:03 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

The feds are about to put their hands in your pocket again. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin is recommending that VoIP providers pay a 7% tax, and you can be sure that they'll pass that cost along to you.

CNet reports that Martin's proposal would require VoIP providers to pay the tax to the Universal Service Fund (USF), which subsidizes telecom services in rural and low-income regions, schools, and libraries.

Jim Kohlenberger, executive director of the VoIP industry's VON Coalition, told CNet that the proposal would have Internet phone companies pay 7 percent of their customers' monthly bills. That adds up to $1.75 for an average $25 bill. VoIP providers would most certainly pass those costs along to their customers.

Why the FCC proposal? There's a $350 million shortfall in the USF. Most galling of all is the reason for that shortfall: Last year the FCC declassified DSL as a "telecommunications service." So those who use DSL don't pay into the fund. Hence the shortfall.

Now, the FCC is considering taking it out of the hides of VoIP users.

There's a simple reason for this. Verizon and other big telcos give massive amounts of money to Congressmen, and wield big power in D.C. VoIP companies don't.

The FCC is slated to make a decision on this at its June 15 meeting. Stay tuned for more.

Source: Network Pipeline 

Posted by Dal at 12:25 PM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP Politics

The increases are mostly due to mounting shipments of WiMAX CPE units, indicating service providers with WiMAX networks are driving subscriber growth.

Swells in the WiMAX market are forecast to continue as WiMAX evolves from a fixed-only solution to both a fixed and mobile solution.

In 2007, we expect mobile WiMAX (802.16e) products to reach the market, generating a spike in growth in the overall WiMAX market," said Richard Webb, analyst at Infonetics Research. "After that, WiMAX will become an established technology offered by most major mobile network equipment vendors as a complementary technology to 3G, mesh, and WiFi networks. From late 2007, 802.16e PCs should be available, at which point 802.16e base stations will likely start outselling 802.16d products."

Source: Market Wire 

Posted by Dal at 12:19 PM | Direct Link Posted to WiMax

Sixty-one percent of cable customers who are receiving VoIP are satisfied with their service, versus 57 percent of those using handset-based VoIP providers like Vonage; just 48 percent of PC-based VoIP customers services like Skype expressed satisfaction. There are a couple of reasons for this difference, according to Boyd Peterson, senior vice president of consumer research at Yankee Group. "The customers with video, data, and voice service are much more valuable to that cable operator, so the cable operator is more interested in providing highly supported services," he says.

At the same time, a VoIP service like Vonage or Skype is "just an application, so the expectation for quality is lower for those service providers." And customers of those services know that the ability to get support will be lower. "It's like a cell phone. It's not quite as good as a land line, but the cost is so much better, it's worth it." "This is good news for U.S. cable providers offering new VoIP services, since the majority of customers prefer to receive multiple services form a single provider," says Marc Itzkowitz, director of product marketing and management at SupportSoft.

The combination of VoIP and broadband access is swaying customers away from specialized VoIP providers towards cable companies. Eighty percent of cable VoIP customers surveyed said that they also receive their broadband service from their cable provider. And cable providers are stepping up to support multiple services, Peterson says. "Cable companies aren't afraid to roll a truck, because they know that customers represent the accumulation of voice, video, and data or some combination."

Click Here to Continue Reading 

Posted by Dal at 10:14 AM | Direct Link Posted to VoIP News

This release contains many fixes for the Objective Systems H.323 channel driver. All users of this module are strongly encouraged to upgrade.  This version is available for download from ftp.digium.com as both a complete tarball as well as a patch against the previous version.

Thank you for for your support of Asterisk!

Posted by Dal at 04:19 PM | Direct Link Posted to Asterisk Development

Over the past two weeks, Vonage has equipped an additional 85 locally-run emergency call centers, in over 30 new counties, with E911 -- bringing the total number of calling centers with emergency 911 service to over 4700.

In June 2005, the FCC gave Vonage, and all Internet-based phone service companies, 120 days to create an E911 system from scratch, and provide all of its customers, wherever they are in the U.S., with E911 service. In that amount of time, Vonage worked closely with local 911 centers, also known as Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs), across the country to turn on E911 for as many customers as it could. Currently, Vonage continues to test and turn up new PSAPs which are VoIP-ready every day and will continue to do so until Vonage customers have access to E911.

"Today over 80 percent of our U.S. subscriber lines have full E911 capability," said Jeffrey A. Citron, Vonage's chairman and chief strategist. "Vonage will continue to work with the FCC, regulators, Congress and public safety until PSAPs across the nation are equipped with E911."

Since May 12, Vonage has added the following counties to its list of those with E911 capabilities -- bringing the total number of calling centers with emergency 911 service to over 4700.

Source: PR News 

Posted by Dal at 11:42 AM | Direct Link Posted to Vonage

The Gigabit Ethernet product has successfully completed customer trials at several leading service providers and is currently commercially available.

This native Ethernet solution with ultra-low latency is optimized for next generation backhaul networks and Metro Ethernet network applications including WiMAX, WiFi, Triple play with IP-DSLAMs and for IP cellular networks. FibeAir IP-Max answers operator needs for higher capacities required for providing enhanced IP-based services.

Ceragon’s software-based capabilities maximize Ethernet throughput capacity with jumbo packet support and dynamic bandwidth allocation between native Ethernet transmission and PDH ports delivering true wire-speed Ethernet. Traffic integrity is guaranteed with built-in Quality of Service (QoS) for different classes of service including VLAN priority (802.1p) and DiffServ/IP TOS values.

Operating in the frequency range of 6-38 GHz, the Gigabit Ethernet solution supports a variety of modulation schemes, including QPSK, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256 QAM, and configuration schemes, including hot swappable 1+0, 1+1, East