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Greg Galitzine

August 2004

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Charter To Offer VoIP Services

August 30, 2004

Add cable player Charter Communications' name to the growing list of VoIP service providers.

Charter Communications Inc. is the latest cable operator to announce Internet telephone service, entering the market by way of agreements with Sprint, Level 3,and Accenture.

Currently the nation's third-largest broadband service provider, Charter plans to have more than a million telephone customers by year's end.

Level 3 and Sprint were tapped to provide long-distance and local telephone service; Accenture will provide telephony provisioning services.

"These agreements enable Charter to significantly increase telephony deployments in each of our Divisions during 2005," said Tom Cullen, Charter Executive Vice President of Advanced Services and Business Development.


It's a new world people. Every day brings more proof.

iPlay3 Hits Into Triple Play

August 20, 2004

Triple Play. It’s on everybody’s lips these days. I had the chance to speak with some good folks at iPlay3 this afternoon, and I thought I’d share some of what they’re up to.

iPlay3 is a consortium made up of NetCentrex, Envivio, and Highdeal — each a successful vendor in their own area of expertise. Together they offer an integrated triple play solution featuring voice over IP, video over IP, and a pricing/rating solution that leverages any type of broadband IP infrastructure including Fiber to the Home (FTTH), DSL, Cable, and Wireless.

GIPS' VoiceEngine Enables Quality Skype Experience

August 18, 2004

Global IP Sound (GIPS), issued a press release today announcing that Skype, the peer-to-peer Internet calling service, is leveraging GIPS VoiceEngine to offer its customers improved voice processing and quality.

“Skype is proving that Voice over IP quality can be better than the public switched telephone network. With over 19 million downloads since the launch of the beta version, this application has clearly launched the market for Voice over IP and set the quality bar,” said Gary Hermansen, President and CEO of GIPS. “We are very pleased with the market response in respect to the voice quality that Skype delivers.”

GIPS VoiceEngine handles voice-related tasks for VoIP soft clients in both personal computer (PC) and personal digital assistant (PDA) environments.

Lingo Goes Worldwide

August 16, 2004

Lingo , the U.S. Internet broadband phone service introduced by Primus Telecommunications, Inc., in June, announced today that they will offer customers the opportunity to select international telephone numbers from cities in 12 international countries for their broadband phone service.

When a U.S. Lingo customer selects a number from an available country for their service, their family, friends, and business associates in that country can call the Lingo customer on that number at the price of an in-country local call.

Freedom Calling

August 13, 2004

A soldier currently deployed in the Sunni triangle north of Baghdad in Iraq was able to watch his wife graduate nursing school in Norfolk, Nebraska using technology supplied by VidiTel.

In cooperation with Freedom Calls Foundation and Connecting Point of Norfolk, Sgt. Gabriel Synovec, Alpha Company 185th CSB, was able to watch his wife, Kim, graduate from Nursing School at Northeast College in Norfolk, Nebraska on August 6th. After the ceremony, Sgt. Synovec was also able to see and talk to Kim, his parents, and other relatives.

Freedom Calls recognized the fact that most front line soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, faced with extended tours of duty, are not able to speak with members of their families for months at a time.

VoIP Inc.'s Residential VoIP Service

August 12, 2004

“VoIP applications will be the value-add that consumers are seeking to justify their investment in broadband. We expect that broadband Internet access and our VoIP applications will fuel each other's growth, so we're in for an exciting time in the next few years as consumer and business telephony services shift towards this new method of delivery for familiar services."

So said John Todd, CTO of VoIP Inc., regarding the company’s announcement hailing the roll-out of residential VoIP phone service, called eGlobalphone, to consumers throughout Florida.

The company has plans to expand its service footprint to Texas, Ohio, Washington, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, Minnesota, and Missouri next week. The service will be expanded to other areas in the nation over the coming months.

Customer Service Kudos for AT&T

August 12, 2004

If you’ve been following several recent conversations on TMCnet.com you aware that Rich Tehrani had some issues with Vonage and switched to AT&T’s CallVantage service, citing — among other things — AT&T’s superior service.

In an August 10 blog entry, Tom Keating praised AT&T for their timing and for their marketing savvy in making the decision to leave the consumer long-distance business and begin offering VoIP service in earnest.

Well, I guess my colleagues are on to something.

In a press release issued yesterday, AT&T announced the results of a recent Yankee Group survey which found that AT&T achieved the number-one ranking by the Yankee Group in its Service Provider Scorecard.

Covad To Offer Business VoIP

August 11, 2004

The tip of the iceberg is just breaking the surface.

With announcements from the likes of Verizon, AT&T, SBC, et al still generating ripples of buzz, Covad Communications splashed into the party with yesterday’s news that they will begin offering business-class VoIP services in 42 markets around the nation. And the constant stream of carriers announcing VoIP service offerings is not going to slow down any time soon.

Covad acquired VoIP services provider GoBeam back in March and what we’re seeing today is clearly a result of that investment.

NeuStar Launches Clearinghouse Solution

August 9, 2004

NeuStar, Inc., a provider of trusted information exchange services for the communications industry, today announced its clearinghouse solution for policy-based IP services enablement, routing management, and real-time network control. The IP Clearinghouse provides network intelligence required to link islands of VoIP and other IP- based services among service providers' networks and those of their customers. It is designed to save costs by providing real-time information needed to accurately route and manage end-to-end IP connectivity, by enabling direct peering for calls, messages, or sessions.

Building on NeuStar's existing Convergent Clearinghouse platform, this new suite is geared to assist service providers to quickly launch services while reducing capital and operating expenditures.

VoIP Developer Conference: Day 2 Keynotes

August 4, 2004

Day 2. This morning’s keynote presenters, Martin Steinmann and Anna Dorcey addressed the assembled crowd of conferees and discussed the topics of Open Source and the developer’s role in society.

Starting things off, Martin Steinmann, a member of the Board of Directors of SIPFoundry, spoke to the audience on the subject of SIP and Open Source, and the opportunity created by these two major factors as they drive change and growth in telecom.

Linux and Open Source have evolved from a cult-like philosophy or religion in the early 1990’s to enjoy status today as a successful alternative to Windows and other aspirants.

VoIP Developer Conference Off to a Great Start

August 3, 2004

The VoIP Developer Conference got off to a fantastic start this morning, with keynotes from Chris Wood of AT&T’s CallVantage service and Michael Stanford of Intel.

Speaking to a full house, Chris Wood, director of AT&T’s CallVantage service laid out the basic groundwork for the conference by pointing out that VoIP introduces some substantial changes to carrier product development, for example driving the need for networks to evolve from multiple, closed proprietary legacy services to integrated standards-based open IP architecture.

Wood went on to describe his view of the building blocks for growth – the very things that the VoIP development community will need to focus on to drive the adoption of this technology. Open, scalable, reliable development tools, access to key markets, simplified devices… these are just some of the things companies need to think about to be successful in this space.

Sunshine? In California?

August 2, 2004

Something miraculous happens when I travel to the West Coast. All the travel companies advertising sunny California probably shudder when they hear that I'm heading out this way. I bear clouds. I bring rain when I travel to San Diego.

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