voip industry news

Dutch telco KPN gets 1M VoIP customers

Pete Wylie — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:16:09 -0500

Though total Dutch adoption of VoIP slowed to only a 4 percent year-over-year increase, telco KPN took the lion's share of the growth, and now reaches more than 1 million VoIP customers in the Netherlands.

During the third quarter, KPN raised its market share nearly 5 percent to 34 percent of the total Dutch market. Its leading competitor, Ziggo, added fewer than half as many new customers as KPN did, with 18,500 adds for Ziggo compared with 47,000 wins for KPN. KPN has taken a different approach than most North America telcos and has aggressively expanded into IP communications, adding VoIP services with its 2007 acquisition of iBasis and signing up lots of customers to its IPTV service as well.

The total Dutch market now stands at 3.5 million users, according to telecompaper.com. The market is evenly split between DSL and cable providers of VoIP, with 1.521 million DSL VoIP connections compared with 1.408 million cable VoIP subscribers.

For more:
- see the telecompaper.com article here

NYSE delisting = more bad news for Vonage

Pete Wylie — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 16:32:48 -0400

Vonage Holdings admitted to more gloomy financial news Thursday, as it reported that the NYSE informed the VoIP company last week its stock was in danger of being de-listed. Vonage must get its share price over $1.00 within six months, or it risks being removed from the premier stock exchange in the world.

In a statement, Vonage said that it "intends to cure the deficiency."

You can bet that the current share price and de-listing notice will be a hot topic at the Vonage Special Stockholders meeting Monday, Nov. 3. The meeting was originally scheduled to discuss Vonage's debt refinancing agreement with SilverPoint Partners, but the board now has this to consider as well.

Vonage had to extend its tender offer four times before some one bit at refinancing the debt, and it has yet to fix issues with churn, or find new subscriber bases. And it was ordered to pay Sprint $80 million for a patent violation just over a year ago.

No doubt Vonage employees are hoping 2009 is a lot better than 2008.

For more:
- see the company's release here

8x8 reports slight growth

Pete Wylie — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 10:06:24 -0400

8x8, the provider of Packet 8 broadband services, announced its fiscal 2Q2009 results Thursday, and it finds itself in a considerably better position year-over-year. Although 8x8's income is down to $44,000 from $1.2 million last quarter, it now is debt free and has $16 million in cash, while last year's 2Q report showed a $2.6 million net loss.

The company added 1,846 new customers in the quarter, bringing its total customer base to more than 13,700 companies, according to the release. It also grew its cash and investments for the sixth-consecutive quarter, bringing its total to $15.8 million, an increase of $1 million from last quarter and nearly $3 million from the same fiscal period in 2008. Revenue was up a slight $100,000 from last quarter, increasing to $16.4 million from $16.3 million.

"8x8's money saving Virtual Office communications services are more critical than ever to businesses," said 8x8 Chairman & CEO Bryan R. Martin, in the release. "With nearly $16 million in cash and no debt, the Company remains well positioned in its efforts to transition more and more small businesses away from budget-wasting legacy phone solutions."

For more:
- see the 8x8 release here

Nortel's UC hospitality play

Pete Wylie — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 17:15:40 -0400

Nortel continued its aggressive expansion of UC offerings in the hospitality space Tuesday with the announcement of five hot customers that have created new revenue and improved guest experiences with Nortel solutions. Hotels and resorts with diverse customer needs and preferences have seen benefits in guest loyalty and staff productivity by turning up Nortel, according to the set of releases.

At the Venetian Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, guests can now order tickets to shows and other events through a Nortel-powered contact center that also gives them personalized message capabilities. At the Shangri-La Hotel in Vancouver, Canada, where customers seek a very natural, "tech-free" experience, Nortel's solution runs behind the scenes, optimizing the staff's time to guarantee as much face time as possible with the guest.

Wes Durow, vice president of global marketing, said the hospitality industry is migrating to IP for a variety of reasons.

"We're seeing increased UC adoption in the hospitality space because it lets hotels and resorts give a new guest experience that is more personalized," Durow said. "We're also seeing demand because of increased productivity by staff because of IP communications and the new revenue streams that they are able to generate from the level of personalization the systems allow."

Sandra Thomson, hospitality marketing manager for Nortel, said the hotel's main goal of making a guest a repeat customer is at the heart of the migration to UC.

"You want the guest to come back, and little things like being able to greet them by name, or remembering the temperature they like their room can make that difference," Thomson said. "Also, when you have something unfortunate happen, like an overflowing toilet or something similar, the UC solution helps the hotel manager find the closest maintenance person who can help."

Durow said Nortel is able to better serve its hospitality partners than other companies offering UC because the company understands "that the relationship between a hotel and a guest is not purely transactional, it's personal." He also noted the reduced energy footprint of Nortel's solution as a plus mentioned by customers.

For more:
- see the releases at Nortel's website

SPOTLIGHT: Japanese VoIP scam artists busted

Pete Wylie — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 15:30:13 -0400

Japanese police are investigating a phone-scam ring that used VoIP technology to avoid identification. Police say the group, based out of Tokyo, used VoIP features to cause Tokyo's "03" area code to show up on outbound calls regardless of the user's actual location.

The group, which used the NTT network to make its calls, made off with close to $1 million since it began its fraudulent practices in August 2007, according to financial information reported by police. The scammers connected their VoIP client to the network through a broker, which made tracing them very difficult.

Mitsuhiro Hara, the alleged ringleader of the operation, was arrested along with five others in conjunction with the fraud, and has since admitted guilt saying, "After we started using VoIP, we didn't worry very much about the police finding our hideout."

The group was eventually outed after one of its members was arrested in connection with another case.

For more:
- see the youmuri.com article here

Related articles
VoIP attacks to jump 50% in 2008
Scammers using VoIP as pyramid scheme bate

Vonage finally inks refinancing

Pete Wylie — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 13:51:39 -0400

Vonage today announced it will refinance $253 million in convertible debt, pending a shareholder vote on the deal.

Silver Point Finance LLC will fund $202.3 million of the debt in a tiered system, including a first-tier $130.3 million security in senior convertible notes and $72 million second lien credit facility. Silver Point will also purchase $18 million in convertible third-tier notes from Vonage, according to company release.

Vonage plans to purchase the difference of around $33 million with cash on hand. These finalized plans put to rest speculation that Vonage might not find a taker for the refinancing of the debt facility, which was set to mature in 2009. Vonage has struggled in the past few quarters to grow its subscriber base. The company, which floated the tender offer June 30, 2008, announced on Friday that it was extending the offer for the fourth time.

John Rego, Vonage CFO, said in a release,"This agreement provides Vonage with the financial stability to focus on increasing profitability while continuing to provide customers with innovative, feature-rich phone service."

The company's stockholders will vote on the proposed purchase of the debt Nov. 3, 2008, at a special meeting.

For more:
- see the company release here

Doing and knowing

Mon, 20 Oct 2008 10:36:57 -0400

by Thomas Howe

Today's service providers are real "doers." From business model to world view, carriers see the world in terms of what they can do for their customers. They excel at doing things like connecting two phones, sending a text message or creating a conference. Larger operators do things like write custom telephone applications or integrate enterprise software into call centers. In theory and in practice, today's service providers work off of a single business model : take a rare thing, and charge the subscriber for "doing" something with it. For years, this has been a lucrative path, and still widely is, but the tide has changed, primarily because the "doing" has gotten easier. Open source software, multiple transport paths such as cable, fiber and the myriad wireless options all contribute to an exponential rise in the number of service providers able to "do" something for businesses and consumers. This increased supply adds pricing pressure to providers, forcing them to seek better approaches and business models.

Tomorrow's service providers will rely on a very different sort of model: "knowing." Instead of generating value by "doing" things for people, they will generate value by "knowing" things that they learn by "doing" things for people. Focused on data collection, the carriers will be experts at your social network, because your real social network exists in your call detail records. They will be knowledgeable about where you spend your time, because they can track your cell phone. They will know what sorts of TV shows you watch, because they deliver video to your handset, or, because of quad play, they provide your home TV service as well. Unlike "doing", which is rather easily replicated, "knowing" is nearly impossible to replicate. Sure, a new carrier can start to collect your personal data, but they cannot recreate your past data. That sort of data is safe and sound in the walls of your current operator, and it's not going anywhere, and one day - because the data isn't moving - neither will you.

What sorts of things can a service provider know? The obvious ones are personal information and context. The trusted billing relationship between carrier and customer provides information like address, age, family structure, gender and nationality. Only the carriers can really determine our life context: where we are, who we talk to, if we are in a moving car... STL Partners identifies seven different categories of digital assets a carrier has access to, including information about relationships, interactions and devices. All of these assets are examples of things that carriers "know" - all things that are difficult to reproduce and all things are that are immensely valuable.

The problem? Privacy. At this point, you hear the privacy objections immediately. Here's what's missing from that: permission. There are all sorts of times when users gladly give up their personal information, and there's no reason to think that this is going to be different here. When consumers see giving personal information up as a benefit, and they're asked for it, they will generally give it. Location based Apple iPhone apps are a great example: when I want to use Yelp to find a place to eat, and it asks to use my current location, I'm annoyed that it even asked. I'd rather it just do that automatically. The value I find from finding a great place to eat far outweighs my concerns about who knows where I am. One day, the carriers might power the Barnes and Noble member card service. For a 10 percent discount on my purchases, I will allow the bookstore access to my data. As I walk into the store, the carrier will notify the shop keeper that I've entered, and send coupons to my phone based on my past purchases. Maybe they know my wife bought this book yesterday, or suggest one that a Facebook friend bought last week. As I walk up to the counter, my smart device will automatically pay for my purchase - no need to whip out credit card or member card. For me, the consumer, it's all good. For the carrier, it's better than good - it's the final answer to the dump pipe problem.

Thomas Howe is a long-time telecom consultant, writer and speaker who is the CEO of the Thomas Howe Company, providing expertise in improving the business process with real-time communications. His website is at http://www.thomashowe.com

XO nets 15,000th enterprise VoIP customer

Pete Wylie — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 10:03:34 -0400

XO Communications announced Monday it has deployed its XO IP Flex business VoIP bundle to 15,000 enterprise customers. Launched launched in April 2005, XO says it now supports more than 475,000 customer employees.

XO IP Flex is a managed service set that conveniently can be delivered over existing equipment and is priced as a single service rather than on a per phone line basis; customers purchase port speeds anywhere between 1.5 and 45 Mbps, instead of paying additional fees for each added voice line. So, XO sells an IP connection, adds on hosted services on top with simplified pricing and everyone is happy.

XO Communications has continually added new features to IP Flex including integration with XO's MPLS IP-VPN service and adding unified communications/mobile UC capabilities with XO Anywhere.

For more:
- see the XO release here

Related articles
XO Hosting Mobile UC
XO expands wholesale IP play

SPOTLIGHT: Skype's Libertelli likes Levin for FCC Chairman, current policy not so much

Pete Wylie — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 10:30:39 -0400

Paying a visit to the Fierce offices last week, Skype's senior director of government and regulatory affairs for North America Christopher Libertelli said former Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chief of staffer Blair Levin would look good as FCC Chairman while he'd like to see much more openness and net neutrality at carriers.

"Levin would make an excellent FCC chairman," said Libertelli. Currently a managing director at Stifel Nicolaus, Levin often pops up on a short list of potential chairman candidates in the speculation game should Senator Barak Obama win the White House this fall. Levin served as chief of staff to FCC Chairman and Obama contributor/advisor Reed Hundt from December 1993 through October 1997. He is credited with overseeing the implementation of the 1996 Telecommunications Reform act, the development of digital TV standards, the first spectrum auctions, and the FCC's Internet initiative.

Turning to openness and net neutrality issues, Libertelli noted that Skype's current initiative via letter to get wireless carriers to freely allow third-party applications onto their networks is part of a broader concern for the company. A recent FCC ruling against Comcast interfering with video peer-to-peer traffic is equally applicable to Skype's offerings in the broader scheme of things.

For more:
- see a copy of the letter Skype sent to the FCC

Agito launches new UC solution

Pete Wylie — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 08:52:08 -0400

Agito Networks announced the release of RoamAnywhere v2.0, a UC solution that enables secure remote VoIP calls, allows enterprise customers to keep a "dual persona" and cuts costs through advanced location routing technology. Agito's software is also compatible with thirty five dual-mode handsets, which company co-founder Pejman Roshan said is far more than any competitor.

Roshan said the dual persona capability RoamAnywhere v2.0 offers is very attractive to enterprise customers.

"Our application allows the customer to connect to the office securely and remotely, with the additional benefit of having dedicated numbers for business and home life accessible on the same VoIP enabled phone," Roshan said. "Customers can flag specific contacts, either setting them to always come through, to come through only during certain hours, or to never come through."

An additional benefit of RoamAnywhere v2.0 is a group of sophisticated proactive and policy based settings for Least Cost Routing, which is controlled by an administrator to optimize performance and cut costs.

"The standard way calls used to be transferred in similar solutions was through reactive measures, such as when a call started to lose signal strength," Roshan said. "Our solution lets administrators set points for instant transfer, such as doorways to the business. This allows seamless transfer before a call starts to fail, which improves quality of service."

Network operators can also set switch points between cellular and VoWLAN services on basis of battery life and location of calls to cut costs on long distance service.

For more:
- Agito spreads the news about RoamAnywhere Release

IP carrier market shrinks

Pete Wylie — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 14:45:04 -0400

IP telephony carrier market revenues decreased 10 percent in the past quarter to $861 million, according to a report released Thursday by Dell'Oro Group.

Greg Collins, president of Dell'Oro, said carriers eased investment in infrastructure due to the general U.S. market slowdown, instead preferring to earmark investment dollars that will produce revenue. Collins insinuated that constricting market conditions for carriers-caused by loss of fixed-line income and heated competition with wireless companies-led them to want to see more immediate and certain results.

Infrastructure investment may take time to show ROI, whereas other projects that carriers are diverting funds toward may generate revenue more quickly.

In the sagging market, Notel and Huwaei managed to grow their respective stakes. Huwaei continues to see excellent growth in Asia and EMEA, due to large-scale fixed-line installations. Nortel capitalized on strong sales to rural area in North America to fuel growth.

For more:
- see the Dell'Oro report on the sector

iSkoot gets Social

Pete Wylie — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 12:07:36 -0400

Mobile VoIP start-up iSkoot has expanded out of its previous Skype-client model with the purchase of messaging client Social.im, which allows customers to IM Facebook friends. Before Facebook launched its own messaging feature, iSkoot looked capable to fill the profitable niche. The purchase gives iSkoot messaging capabilities that it can meld with its current VoIP offerings.

Although the terms of the deal were not disclosed, it is likely iSkoot got social.im for a song, given that Social.im's prime market has been dominated by larger players.

iSkoot has received $13 million in venture funds, and this is a notable acquisition that could increase its standing in the VoIP arena and beyond.

For more:
- skoot to the TechCrunch blog on the acquisition

VoIP drives broadband service growth

Pete Wylie — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:46:27 -0400

Broadband value-added services reaped $25.7 billion worldwide in 2007, an increase of 62 percent from 2006, according to Point-Topic research. VoIP and security made up the largest percentage of this gross as well, accounting for 56 percent of the service revenue, or more than $14 billion.

"Value added services are growing strongly and are increasingly significant in overall revenue terms," said John Bosnell, senior analyst at Point-Topic. "The success story of 2007 has been VOIP. Overall revenue has very nearly doubled, average revenue per user (ARPU) is up and take-up in major markets, particularly North America and Western Europe is growing quickly."

Bosnell predicted continued rapid growth in both components of the VoIP business, IP telephony and Internet telephony. He said market saturation is not imminent, but could occur in the future.

For more:
- read the rest of the rosy Point-Topic forecast here