Today, I spoke with Fonality's CEO Chris Lyman and Amon Prasad, Director of Information Technology for BLADE Network Technologies. BLADE Network Technologies is a former subsidiary of Nortel and get this - they selected Fonality’s Asterisk-based PBXtra over a comparable system from Nortel. Even though Nortel offered their former subsidiary a discounted price, it was still much more than PBXtra. Chris and Amon explained to me that Fonality was able to offer PBXtra at less than 50 percent of the cost of a proposed Nortel system and that included junking the existing Nortel phonesets with all new VoIP phonesets. Ecstatic over this "win" besting a well-known PBX manufacturer, Fonality stated, "BLADE is one example of how Fonality is now regularly beating out incumbents including, Cisco, Nortel and Alcatel in the small to medium business (SMB) market. PBXtra is now deployed in more than 2,000 SMBs with over 45,000 users in 37 countries."
Amon told me that one of the main reasons BLADE chose PBXtra was that it scaled better and was easier to manage than a Nortel system. He also mentioned that Nortel's digital and IP hybrid solution has hard system limitations, which require a significant system overhaul to increase capacity beyond 90 seats.
"Fonality's PBXtra is extremely attractive to me since it allows me to worry less about my phone system, so I can focus more time on my regular job. In Fonality’s support model, everything is easily included so if there is new software, I get it for free. Nortel was trying to charge me around $5,000 a year just for service and support, but high quality service and support comes free from Fonality." said Amon Prasad, director of information technology at BLADE.
"We were excited to find out that we can now have employees work from an IP phone at home or a softphone on their laptop while keeping their same four digit extension," said Prasad. “Fonality makes this process so much easier because we can give remote workers a handset at their home or remote office and they can plug it into their DSL/cable line and be connected. It’s just that simple."
"Signing BLADE is just another proof-point that the SMB market is ready for another option. They are sick and tired of overpaying for a phone system that has a limited feature set." said Chris Lyman, CEO of Fonality.
"Sick and tired is right! For the cost of one Nortel system, I could get two Fonality systems and still have change left over!" said Amon Prasad, director of information technology at BLADE.
The tradional PBX manufacturers (Nortel, Avaya, Alcatel, etc.) as well as Cisco will have to come down in price to compete with a plethora of low-cost, feature-rich, IP-PBX phone systems on the market. Even low-cost handsets based on the SIP standard will help drive prices down. Unless there is a compelling case for an "expensive" handset, built-in video/webcam for instance, or a presence-aware OCS 2007 phone such as the Polycom CX700, the traditional PBX manufacturers will no longer be able to charge exorbitant prices - and that is great news for the enterprise looking to deploy VoIP.
android apple asterisk at&t blackberry cell phone cisco dell digium e911 facebook fcc google google talk gps im ip-pbx ipad iphone ipod itexpo ITEXPO lync microsoft mobile phone open source outage phone review sip skype sony unified communications verizon video video conferencing voip vonage wireless xbox 360
- Apple (280)
- Bittorrent (2)
- Call Center and CRM (48)
- Computer Hardware (183)
- Computer Software (71)
- Gadgets (650)
- Google (225)
- Home Entertainment (263)
- Internet (173)
- Linux (111)
- Microsoft (376)
- MovableType (48)
- News (187)
- Personal and Humor (118)
- Politics (9)
- Reviews (246)
- Security (2)
- Social Networking (42)
- Sports/Outdoor Technology (9)
- Tablets (32)
- Technology and Science (355)
- Unified Communications (471)
- VoIP (2285)
- Wireless (584)
- p2p (20)
- March 2014
- February 2014
- January 2014
- December 2013
- November 2013
- October 2013
- September 2013
- August 2013
- July 2013
- June 2013
- May 2013
- April 2013
- March 2013
- February 2013
- January 2013
- December 2012
- November 2012
- October 2012
- September 2012
- August 2012
- July 2012
- June 2012
- May 2012
- April 2012
- March 2012
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
- December 2010
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
- August 2010
- July 2010
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- August 2008
- July 2008
- June 2008
- May 2008
- April 2008
- March 2008
- February 2008
- January 2008
- December 2007
- November 2007
- October 2007
- September 2007
- August 2007
- July 2007
- June 2007
- May 2007
- April 2007
- March 2007
- February 2007
- January 2007
- December 2006
- November 2006
- October 2006
- September 2006
- August 2006
- July 2006
- June 2006
- May 2006
- April 2006
- March 2006
- February 2006
- January 2006
- December 2005
- November 2005
- October 2005
- September 2005
- August 2005
- July 2005
- June 2005
- May 2005
- April 2005
- March 2005
- February 2005
- January 2005
- December 2004
- November 2004
- October 2004
- September 2004
- August 2004
- July 2004
- June 2004
- May 2004
- April 2004
- March 2004
Featured Videos