VoIP Blog - Tehrani.com

November 5, 2007

Fonality has made quite a splash in the open source communications market and the most recent news coming out of the California company is an acquisition of Insightful Solutions Pty Ltd, one of the world’s largest SugarCRM development houses.

 

I had an opportunity to have a podcast interview with Fonality CEO Chris Lyman about the acquisition, the future of telephony, CRM, unified communications and the market in general.

 

As part of the transaction, Fonality will also begin selling Insightful’s SugarCRM managed service offering called FonalityCRM. The solution is integrated with PBXtra and trixbox Pro and provides click-to-call dialing, agent screen pops, telephone campaign management for outbound sales teams, and a host of other features. It is hosted at one of the six Fonality data centers and available immediately to PBXtra and trixbox Pro customers worldwide. The underlying FonalityCRM managed service platform was developed by Insightful to provide a complete on-demand offering that is updated, maintained, backed-up and available 24x7.

 

As you may expect, Fonality will leverage Insightful’s knowledge and experience when supporting SugarCRM deployments, as well as support of its other solutions.

This acquisition is infinitely logical and also provides a tipping point in the open-source market. Prior to this time, you might have considered open-source solutions to be entry-level in nature. Now, with the capabilities discussed in this podcast, you can see that an open-source communications solution actually eclipses many other proprietary solutions generally available.

November 5, 2007

The day’s communications news doesn’t stop it seems and it is worth sharing some nuggets since my last report on the Open Handset Alliance where we discussed Google’s mobile strategy. But as we focus on mobility it is worth pointing out most companies don’t focus enough on mobile security.

 

In fact according to a CompTIA survey of 1,070 organizations, 60 percent said handheld device security issues relating to data access and transfer have increased over the past 12 months. Also, 55 percent of the respondents said that security issues with WiFi networks are on the rise.

 

The study also surprisingly uncovered that of the almost 80 percent of the organizations allowing their mobile employees to access data remotely, only 32 percent of them have implemented security awareness training for employees, with only 10 percent having plans to offer such training in the next year.

 

But when you consider mobility, consider IMS and whether in fact we need IP multimedia subsystem technology at all to provide QOS to mobile networks and devices. Fred Goldstein from Ionary Consulting thinks not.

 

In even more mobile news, it seems our phones are all going to be video-enabled soon. Infonetics tells us that by 2010 mobile video phones will be a $125 billion market (unfortunately at the rate the US dollar is dropping this could be about 100 euros by 2010. :( ) In case you are wondering, in 2006 the market for these video devices was a relatively small $58 million.

 

Continuing with our mobile trend it is worth noting RIM has a new SMB focused Blackberry server edition which is easier to install and serves up to 30 wireless users. This is a great move for the company as it allows smaller companies to set up their own BES at a better price point and with an easier install.

 

In all, it seems the day was ruled by wireless news with the biggest being Google’s Open Handset Alliance and lots of other interesting nuggets as well. If a Monday is so busy what will the rest of the week look like? Be sure t keep coming back to Tehrani.com and TMCnet to find out. :)

 

PS: Don’t forget about TMCnet Mobile and MyTMCnet.

November 5, 2007

Another week and other massive avalanche of news in the communications space. The first item worth sharing is regarding Google shaking up the foundation of the mobile phone market. The funny thing is, editors and bloggers have been looking to find the Google phone for months and instead of it being somewhere, it will be everywhere.

 

If you missed it the company has launched an Open Handset Alliance which aims to open things up in the cellular communications space. Specifically the alliance is a total of over 30 companies working together to produce low-cost phones whose development is supported by advertising. The question is whether this is possible when you don’t own the network. Time will tell.

 

If you think the mobility space has lots of news, have you seen what is happening in Unified Communications? Just today in fact HP and Ericsson announced they would collaborate and Ericsson would integrate its UCS software with the HP BladeSystem platform in order to allow enterprises to have more seamless voice/data deployments. The move will also make business communications applications accessible anywhere, anytime and on any device (even iPhones I wonder? ;) ). HP will document these offerings for reseller and customer setup and configuration as a BladeSystem Solution Block.

 

In a philanthropic move T-Mobile has joined the one laptop per child program meaning the company will offer one year of complimentary HotSpot access to people who donate an XO laptop to a child in a developing country. Nice move.

 

Rounding out the day’s news is the report that VoIP provide JahJah will be working with Ordian to play audio ads preceding VoIP calls. One wonder is JahJah will be able to generate significant profit with this shift in strategy. I think it a great idea to try and I wonder how users will respond. Certainly there is precedent with some of the free directory assistance providers. Hopefully this will be a positive move for both companies and moreover be a positive way to boost the profitability of VoIP services.

November 5, 2007

Can Google pull it Off -- is the question worth asking when realizing the search leader is looking to open up the mobile phone industry. The cellular market is legendary in its ability to lock in customers. In the US the phones are subsidized and locked. In Europe the phones are unlocked but when you go from country to country your rates skyrocket.

 

In the US the situation is even more interesting as carriers typically cripple devices making them less useful. The goal generally is to drive more network minutes. For example, try sending a photo via bluetooth on a Verizon Wireless phone.

 

So when Google announced it is working with 34 handset makers, wireless carriers and technology companies to create low-cost mobile phones based on open standards, you have to wonder who they are working with and who would want to work with them.

 

After all, the wireless carriers control everything in this business – why would they want to open anything up? Amol Sharma hints at this in his Wall Street Journal article when he mentions Verizon Wireless and AT&T are missing from this alliance.

 

But still, many others in the industry are working with the company behind the world’s largest search engine and the reason is likely because Google has so much pull. Betting against this company has got to be scary.

 

But then again, Verizon told Steve Jobs to jump in a lake when given the opportunity to carry the iPhone, I would imagine they aren’t too concerned to hurt Google’s feelings as well.

 

So how will this initiative be paid for you ask? Advertising of course. Google will subsidize much of the development costs through ads delivered through mobile devices.

 

Then again, I am sure Verizon, AT&T and others aren’t too keen on sharing this ad revenue with the search juggernaut. I am sure they aren’t fans of open standards either. The question is how much pull will this device have with consumers. Will it be very useful? Will everyone want to have one? If so, the mobile carriers may be in quite a pickle. It will worth watching how this proceeds very closely.

November 5, 2007

CNBC reports Wind River is rumored to be supplying the OS for the upcoming Google phone. On a separate note, some analysts have said the new mobile gadget will be unveiled today.

 

One would imagine Google would chose a Wind River embedded operating system based on Linux as it is open and Google is all about being open.

November 5, 2007

What’s new in the world of IP communications? Well, as it turns out, quite a bit. For example, Allworx has just released version 6.8 of its software which includes follow-me functionality as well as allowing specific callers to be forced into voicemail. The latest update also has the ability to do some fancy things with messages which you can read about here.

 

Radisys who just had a blow out quarter recently introduced a new media processing blade. Going from the embedded space to the desktop, Skype and Logitech are collaborating on high quality video.

 

Other interesting items worth sharing: Toshiba has some new IP communications products, Nuvio is using session managers from Covergence, Snom and Digium have announced a partnership, Sonus has version 2 of its IMX Multimedia Applications Platform out, Aculab has a new IP gateway and finally, IBM found a way to turn silicon waste into the raw materials needed for other things such as solar cells.

 

There is more news that I can conceivably write about and keep your attention so for the solid news junkies make sure to bookmark this page for all the latest original TMCnet content. Oh and I almost forgot – be sure to add TMCnet to your Google toolbar so the latest TMCnet news is always a mouse click away.

November 5, 2007

In the IMS space perhaps one of the most controversial concepts I hear is IMS in a box. You see, some vendors tell me the whole concept of IMS in a box is counter to the concept of why the IP multimedia subsystem framework was developed.

 

My two cents? I like the concept from a marketing perspective and in the real world we all know IMS scales so the term “box” shouldn’t be a deterrent. So I was happy to hear that HP has teamed with Tekelec and BEA Systems to provide such an “IMS in a Box” system which combines applications and third-party software vendors with HP’s OpenCall Home Subscriber Server, BEA Systems’ WebLogic Session Initiation Protocol Server and Tekelec’s TekCore Session Manager.

 

As you may have guessed by now these components interoperate seamlessly to create a complete IMS solution and this is why I like it. In other words an actual working multi-vendor solution is always better than a single-vendor locked-in approach. And it is always better than a disparate bunch of products which may or may not work together.

 

For more information, check what TMCnet’s Mae Kowalke has to say on the matter and be sure to frequent TMCnet’s IMS Channel and IMS Magazine.