Sony

Sony finally goes Skype on PSP

Tom Burton — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 06:59:56 -0500

Sony is adding Skype to its PSP mobile game console in Japan later this month to broaden the appeal of its game console amid fierce competition with rival Nintendo. Sony will sell microphones for the PSP-2000 in the Japanese market from March 19 to enable users to make free or low-cost telephone calls. A concurrent firmware change will enable PSP users to chat for free to other Skype users and, for a charge, call landlines and mobile phones anywhere in the world.

Sony began the service for new PSP consoles sold in Europe and the United States in January but had to delay the launch in Japan because the microphones did not meet Skype's specifications. The Japanese market is considered the prime test market for Skype's PSP play with Skype already well accepted in Japan as a communications application. The Skype service has been anticipated for over a year after news about the VoIP add on leaked out early last year.

For more:
Sony launches Skype on PSP in Japan Article

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Sony offers IPTV on PlayStation Article
Sony's new VoIP headsets Article

Sony releases VoIP head sets

Tom Burton — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 06:59:54 -0500

Sony has released new VoIP headsets with hands-free capability. The headsets are designed to feature a high-enough quality audio speaker to be used for music and games as well as telephony ,for multi gaming, or normal conversation. The headsets come with a flexible, detachable USB microphone and "Silent Cap Design" noise-canceling technology, to reduce sound leakage. Sony has recently built VoIP technology into its PSP and had previously equipped its Playstation console with VoIP capability.

The headphones are available in black/silver and black/metallic orange colors. Many believe the IP hub for most homes will be based around gaming consoles with both Sony and Microsoft trialling IPTV via consoles.

For more:
- Sony adds color and voice to headsets Release

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Sony VoIPs out the PSP Report
Mobile Nintendo as a VoIP platform? Report

ITExpo extract

Thu, 13 Sep 2007 06:59:59 -0400

Chris Lyman called me "clairvoyant" when I said preloading voice software into laptops just seemed logical. Lyman is the founder of Fonality, a Los Angeles company providing open-source VoIP systems for enterprise users. Lyman, a hyperactive 20-something with $11.5 million in funding, started Fonality four years ago after selling a web hosting business he developed while still in high school.

Lyman demonstrated Fonality's softphone interface for me at ITExpo at the L.A. Convention Center. The interface resembles a cell phone, only with an auxiliary window where contacts can be voice dialed, IM'd or e-mailed with a click of a mouse. When a light goes on for a long-toothed trade hack from the TV world, it stands to reason that anyone can master a softphone. It seems far more useful than about 95 percent of the software that's prestuffed into a laptop. You must be negotiating with computer makers, I said to Lyman. That's when he accused me of reading minds.

Be on the lookout for Fonality-equipped laptops. Lyman's investors include Intel.

How about VoIP-on-demand? Greg Welch, CEO of GlobalTouch Telecom, also of Los Angeles, told me his company set up 200,000 .wav-equipped voicemail boxes for Sony Pictures for an audio promo of one of their movies. GlobalTouch is on track to clear $30 million in sales this year, up from $13 million last year. The company is sort of an OEM for resellers that want to offer voice without becoming a telephone company. GlobalTouch has around 50,000 endpoints in addition to its footprint in the movie biz.

Ken Kuenzel advises VoIP providers to secure based on applications. Kuenzel is founder and chief technology officer of Covergence in Maynard, Mass. It's not enough just to firewall a network, Kuenzel said during a panel presentation on security. Considerations have to be made at the application level, and for the upgrade path.

Kuenzel was joined by Kevin Mitchell, director of solutions marketing for Acme Packet in Burlington, Mass. Both agreed some of the biggest security threats to communications systems come from within the systems. "Service attacks are probably where providers are focused, but a registration flood took down Skype," Mitchell said. "Even 'American Idol' televoting time looks like a service attack."
Kuenzel said some of the biggest D-DOS attacks he's seen were the result of a broken server or a router update.

"There's a hacker or a spam or a spit once in a while," he said, "but mostly, it's about protecting the network from itself."

Signing off from L.A. Share you insight with me at dmcadams@fiercemarkets.com.