Recently in VoIP Category

According to an announcement from TelTel, provider of peer-to-peer Internet telephony, they are adding a selection of music and audio programming to the services offered to members of their network. At more than one million members, TelTel claims that its network is "the world's largest SIP-based Internet Telephony user community."

TelTel says it is now providing 13 channels of audio entertainment in two languages and will soon be adding more. The company's press release is available on TMCnet at:

TelTel Offers New Media Channels Via SIP-based Internet Telephony

TelTel's P2P service integrates instant messaging and voice calling using standards-based SIP technology.

In case you're curious what TelTel's user interface is like, here is a screen shot from their FAQ page showing their IM and dialpad functions:

AB -- 5/27/05

HTLT Technologies has announced an Add-On database for its Local Call Analyzer (LCA) Enterprise product. Called VoIP-It!, the new least-cost-routing add-on is meant to provide "a unified pricing database for determining switched access rates and costs for calls by NPA-NXX within or between all calling areas in the United States," according to HTLT's announcement from today. The complete release is at:

TMCnet received two announcements from Toshiba (i.e., Toshiba America Information Systems Inc., Digital Solutions Division or TAIS DSD) today about enhancements to their line of IP telephony products:

eStara Inc., a provider of customer communications solutions, announced a milestone today in its provision of services.

A report released today by The Radicati Group says that new mainstream Internet telephony applications are about to change the way consumers (not just enthusiasts) make phone calls. (Nothing surprising there, I guess, but it's interesting to see Radicati commenting on this -- they do publish some great content about messaging trends.)

The report, called "Focus: Internet Telephony Goes Mainstream," is in the May 2005 issue of Radicati's monthly newsletter, "The Messaging Techology Report." (Note: An executive summary is available here.)

Radicati says adoption of Internet telephony was slow until recently, but the research firm believes that the technology is about to hit the mainstream thanks to its incorporation into instant messaging applications by AOL, MSN and Yahoo!, and the efforts of independent service providers like Skype and Teleo. Radicati's 12-page report reviews and compares these five services.

The report says that, while none of these services is as simple or ubiquitous as traditional telephony, they can replace landline or mobile for "certain applications." And "as the Internet becomes increasingly integrated into the daily lives of individuals," PC-based calling will "become more convenient and less costly" than PSTN calling.

In its reviews, Radicati's report says that out of the three IM applications (AOL, MSN and Yahoo!) reviewed only AOL's IM offers calling to the PSTN. However, my colleague Tom Keating here at TMCnet reported in his blog last week that the new Yahoo! Messenger beta does in fact allow PC-to-PSTN calling (see "Yahoo Messenger Truly Has VoIP?"), although apparently this capability is not easy to find.

AB -- 5/23/05

Most of us were already pretty sure that the FCC was planning to address the issue of VoIP and E911 in a meeting on May 19, but I think this is the first official announcement about that:

FCC to Hold Open Commission Meeting Thursday, May 19, 2005

The meeting is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. on Thursday, May 19, 2005. The commission's announcement says that the purpose of the meeting is to:

"... consider a First Report and Order and Notice of Proposed Rulemaking concerning E911 requirements for IP-enabled services."

AB -- 5/13/05

Television station WESH in Florida is reporting that a mother is blaming Vonage for the death of her 3 1/2-month-old daughter in March. Cheryl Waller says that her daughter Julia stopped breathing and that she was not able to reach emergency services when she dialed 911 through Vonage.

On the Web site Waller has set up calling for better regulation of VoIP providers, she relates her experience with Vonage and what happened on March 24, 2005, when she tried to reach emergency services:

"I successfully set 911 services up through Vonage ... found my three-month-old daughter not breathing. I dialed 911 several times and reached a recording that stated “hang up and dial 911” every time I dialed. I was unable to reach emergency services of any kind. I was forced to cease CPR long enough to locate a neighbor to dial 911 from a different phone. By the time emergency personnel arrived on the scene, they were unable to help my daughter and she was pronounced dead at 6:51 pm."

On the Web site, Waller calls for federal legislation she calls "Julia's Act," which would:

An announcement arrived this morning from a new IP telephony and communications company, Traxi Technologies, started by former Winstar executive Lou Person. I should say that, although the company rep describes this as a new company, their release does quote Person as saying that Traxi has "already finished many successful implementations and has successfully improved the business performance for law firms, real estate companies, hedge funds, e-commerce companies and large national banks."

The release outlines a series of five new products and services offered by the company: VoIP Integration, Volcrum (a proprietary middleware product), IT Architecture, Help Desk & Monitoring, and Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity.

Traxis describes IT as its "founding competency," and they are positioning their expertise as a provider in the down-and-dirty work of integrating VoIP into enterprise systems such as CRM, call centers and back office.

Traxi's news release from today provides details and is available on TMCnet at:

Traxi Technologies LLC Introduces New Products and Services

Traxi's PR rep provided some additional information about the company and some recent projects in the form of a two mini-case studies, which I will quote below:

+ VoIP implementation for National City Bank in Cleveland

In implementing the phone system, Traxi used ShoreTel phones and its own proprietary product, Volcrum -- a middleware product that ties enterprise phone systems into enterprise applications. Volcrum 's design allows it to integrate with almost any application, such as ACT!, FilemakerPro, and SalesLogix. Volcrum allows companies to easily track all inbound and outbound calls and can improve employee productivity and customer satisfaction. The Bank receives about 300 calls a day, and they use Volcrum for better record keeping.

+ Call Center, IT Architecture and VoIP implementation for small business Diva Pup

Diva Pup was a small but rapidly growing business. They were quickly outgrowing their existing IT infrastructure and their phone system just couldn't handle the ever increasing load. They installed a new, intelligent ShoreTel VoIP system and set up a call center. The call center was set up with features that most large organizations use (like agents, queues, messages between queue steps, etc.). In addition, they deployed a Microsoft windows network that had two key aspects to it. The network has layered security to protect business confidential data. Traxi Technologies also supported the network's front end with a website that had e-commerce capabilities. Currently, Diva Pup's entire new IT network and phone system are monitored by Traxi Technologies on a monthly basis.

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AB -- 5/9/05