September 28, 2005
Hosted VoIP and enterprise-level service
Increasingly, companies are finding out that the services provided by their vendors are not enterprise-strength. There are around 400 VoIP service providers in the US but very few provide facilities to handle the call volumes of a company and services such as IP PBX support, broadband VoIP, etc.
Companies such as Qwest are taking into consideration the customer’s requirements and in October 2004, Qwest introduced IP Centrex Prime, which is an IP Centrex service for companies that have their offices distributed over several locations. Qwest also provides another service known as OneFlex, which enables small and medium businesses use VoIP phones for conference calls and managing functions on their own.
Similarly, the PremierSERV Hosted IP Communication Service provided by SBC Communications is aimed at enabling SMBs to customize the features as per their needs, this includes find me/follow me capabilities. Users can access calls over IP networks and PSTN. SMBs are obtaining their VoIP services from CLECs and regional providers.
The disadvantage with hosted VoIP providers is that they are dependent on the telephone loops and if these are down then the VoIP service is affected. The number of VoIP providers has increased due the low entry barriers in this trade. The level of service offered by the providers is affected by the quality of the instruments provided by the vendors.
According to Infonetics Research Inc., the growth in demand for voice application servers, soft switches, etc indicates that the providers are purchasing the type of equipment that will help them to provide better service. Covad provides services such as virtual PBX, call logs, visual voice mails, etc; SBC provides services such as hosted IP communication, unified messaging, plug and play, etc; Qwest provides services such as caller ID, call waiting, online dashboard, etc.
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