INTERNET TELEPHONYdoc.mediaplanet.com/all_projects/830.pdf · Welcome to Internet Telephony A year...

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INTERNET TELEPHONY28 FEBRUARY 2007 YOUR GUIDE TO VOIP TECHNOLOGY FOR BUSINESS

AN INDEPENDENT SUPPLEMENT FROM MEDIAPLANET ABOUT INTERNET TELEPHONY, DISTRIBUTED IN THE TIMES2

CONTENTS

What is VoIP? p. 4

VoIP goes racing with Honda p. 6

Business switch on to VoIP’s benefits p. 7

From headset to handsets p. 9

Large companies dominate VoIP p.10

Small is beautiful for VoIP p.12

Is Skype fit for business p.12

Ensuring dialling without distortion p.13

On the move but still on VoIP p.14

VoIP security; ‘Vomit’ worse that ‘Spit’ p.16

Small companies can think big with VoIP p.17

Audio conferencing p.17

VoIP to go wireless p.19

Video conference boost from VoIP p.19

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INTERNET TELEPHONY A TITLE FROM MEDIAPLANET

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Welcome to Internet TelephonyA year or so ago, Voice over Internet Telephony (VoIP) was promotedalmost exclusively as a cost cutting technology but as you will see fromthis special report, that has changed. Today companies are opting forVoIP not just to save money but to also work smarter, to gain a competi-tive edge over rivals.

This is not to say there is anything wrong or too simple in cost savings;far from it. When companies look at what they pay to have their staff talk-ing to one another and clients over traditional ‘switched’ networks, thehuge reduction in cost can be very attractive. The cost savings in switchingto VoIP do not just come from multiple, incremental savings every time astaff member picks up the phone, there are also huge efficiencies to be hadfrom running a single IP network where one team ensures the bandwidthand performance levels are sufficient to run voice and data side by side,saving on the administrative costs of treating the two separately.

A clincher for any company that is run across more than one site is forthe IT manager to consider whether he or she would like staff in the vari-ous offices to call one another for free over an IP network or whetherthey would prefer to continue giving a telecoms company money everytime their staff pick up the phone to make a call. It is, of course, one ofbusiness’ simpler decisions.

Boosting efficiencyWhilst these cost savings can more than halve bills – according to somecase studies – there are savings in the commodity that is arguably moreprecious than a phone bill. When voice and data are combined over an IPnetwork, staff can suddenly work together far more effectively, lookingup each other’s status on the system so they make sure they do not callwhen somebody is ‘away’ or ‘busy’. Dialling numbers is also improved bybeing made as simple as selecting an icon on a corporate directory.

The ease and convenience of using VoIP is not just about savingmoney on phone bills, then, it is about boosting productivity and havingyour best people do what they do best. Another simple question busi-nesses may well need to answer before they switch on to VoIP is whetherthey want, say, their top marketing person concentrating on pushingtheir global brand or wondering what a colleague’s extension is and thenwondering why they have not returned a call and whether someone elsecould handle the enquiry.

Add these efficiencies to the flexibility of having a truly mobile work

force that can be as productive at home or on the way to a client’s officesas they can at their own office, by being fully contactable on a singlenumber, and it is clear why many companies are switching to VoIP.

Are SMEs next?An interesting aspect about these companies is that they are now becom-ing more representative of the country’s business make up. Over the pastcouple of years VoIP providers have unashamedly gone out of their wayto sell their systems to the country’s biggest companies for the simplereason that efficiencies can be multiplied by a huge number of staff andlead to lucrative contracts.

This is starting to change as news filters down to VoIP providers thatthe global players have now got the message about IP telephony and thatthe new battle ground is the receptive area of small and medium enter-prises (SMEs).

These companies that employ the vast majority of the population havelargely been overlooked by the majority of companies installing IPtelephony systems. However, many are predicting that 2007 is the yearwhere this changes and VoIP systems are simplified so they can be mademore cost effective for companies that do not have the huge budgets ofglobal corporates.

One number callsWhilst this continues, 2007 also looks set to be the year when Wi-Fi zonesstarted to be added together to make metropolitan zones. Several city cen-tres already have Wi-Fi networks which allow anybody with a VoIPaccount to make a receive calls on their handset or laptop as if they werein the office. This not only boosts productivity but can seriously reducethe mobile phones bills because it is obviously far cheaper to be makingcalls over Wi-Fi networks than the mobile airwaves.

This development will have a lasting effect on consumers and businessusers alike as we all start getting used to being able to make calls over theNet even when we are on the move. The lasting effect, other than reducedbills, will be the notion of having a single number that follows us aroundwill start to become a reality as people get used to giving out their VoIPnumber which will then find them. As such the days of dialling multiplenumbers hoping to reach somebody will be long gone and replaced bysimply selecting an icon and letting technology take care of finding them.

BY SEAN HARGRAVE

Maintel’s fresh approach� Tim MasonCEO of VoIPprovider Maintelbelieves a healthcheck is an inspiringchoice for any companydriven to deliver opera-tional and customer serviceexcellence.

In association with

Maintel believes the secret of its continuing success is to demystifythe complex world of communications. Within the era of con-verging technologies incorporating both Voice and Data, Maintelaims to work with its customers to provide clarity: ‘Where are younow?’ followed by implementing a planned and agreed ‘Step byStep’ approach.

Maintel offers a ‘HEALTH CHECK’ (at no cost) to customers of allsizes, by reviewing both remotely and onsite • telephone systems• call traffic • line rental billing • lines in use • LAN and WANinfrastructure • VoIP readiness test • reliability test

Rob Harder, Plymouth NHS Trust confirms the fresh approachdoes bring dividends in respect of maximizing cost efficiencieswhilst migrating gradually towards a converged solution. “Fol-lowing an initial full appraisal we didn’t have to replace our exist-

ing system and were able to migrate to IP at our pace”. Maintel’sdeployment managed an impressive IP telephony implementation,enabling 6000 IP users, networked across 80 sites.

Maintel's independent position combined with high level accredi-tations from the leading communication manufacturers enablesthem to offer impartial advice. For example Nortel Gold PartnerAccreditation: “Achieving this level of accreditation demonstratesMaintel's recognition of the importance in building their competencein positioning, selling, designing and supporting complex productsand solutions from Nortel." Mike Armstrong, Nortel Sales Director.

[email protected]; 0870 382 0200


What is VoIP?The biggest surprise about Voice over Internet Protocol(VoIP) is that every one of us is almost certainly using itevery day, without ever realising.

Call any company and the chancesare they will have made the decisionto route calls around the office on thesame Internet Protocol (IP) networkthat handles their data. Call up a com-pany or friends and relatives fromhome or the office and, again, thechances are the call will at some stagetravel over an IP network because thetechnology is now sound enough toform a part of the country’s every daytelecommunication’s backbone.

So, now you know you are using it,chances are you probably want toknow exactly what it is.

Traditional telephony is very sim-ple. On a Public Switch TelephoneNetwork (PSTN) two way conversa-tions travel down a telephone line in astraight line, rather like traffic flow-ing up and down a motorway inopposite directions.

The advent of the Internet gave riseto a different way of carrying infor-mation down the line. Instead ofsending everything in a constantstream, IP networks take segments ofdata which are sent in ‘packets’ totheir destinations. Often these packetswill be sent on different routes, align-ing themselves in order when theyreach the destination. For data this is

fine because you are not normallyworried over which order the data onthe information appears on thescreen. With voice, of course, thewords you are speaking have to arrivein the right order, hence it has notbeen until the last few years that thenetworks have been sophisticatedenough to carry voice traffic withoutany deterioration in quality.

Once businesses and consumersstart to make and receive digital callson the same IP network their dataflows in and out on – be that the com-pany Lan or a home broadband con-nection – a whole new world ofopportunities is opened up

Numbers follow youA decade or so ago we were told thatwe would all have a personal numberthat would follow us around whereverwe went. The only trouble was, theline would cost a fortune for others tocall and we would be billed for re-routing calls to whichever phone linewe were nearest at the time.

Well, it may be ten years or so late butthis is effectively what VoIP does, only itcuts bills instead of increasing them.Once you have an IP telephone num-ber it follows you wherever you are.

Whenever you have a broadbandconnection you simply plug in yourphone or laptop and you are ready totake calls. Of course, in a Wi-Fi area,you do not need to wrestle with wires,simply turn the phone or laptop onand you are ready to receive calls – inpublic areas you will probably need topay for the Wi-Fi access.

If there is no broadband access, theIP number can be set up to call anoth-er number, such as a mobile phone, toensure the call is not missed.

Cheaper callsOne of the first appealing qualities ofVoIP is cost savings. Although a busi-ness will need to make an upfrontinvestment to replace or complementlegacy systems, the cost of maintain-ing a single network is obviouslylower than maintaining two.

If a business has linked two or moreoffices through the IP network, callsbetween those locations will now befree and calls made from within thenetwork to outside will be charged ata fraction of what the company waslikely to have been previously payingfor an analogue system.

An interesting aside is that havingVoIP changes employee attitudes asthey switch from using their mobilephone to logging on and taking callsover IP. One telecommunicationscompany has revealed that by usingVoIP among its own staff it hasalready managed to slash phone bills.People working much of their time onthe road have seen an 85% deductionin their bills and general staff phonebills have halved.

Pick your codeVoIP starts to really make sense topeople when they realise that theycan have several numbers but, moreimportantly, these numbers need notbe specific to where they are based.

A company based in Birminghamthat is eager to appear local to cus-tomers in Newcastle, for example, caneasily set up a VoIP number with an0191 code to run alongside their nor-mal 0121 numbers.

Voipfone Managing Director, ColinDuffy, claims it is this feature whichsuddenly helps people see the powerof VoIP.

“We can set up numbers for ourcustomers in lots of different cities inthe UK so typically someone will havea London number, even thoughthey’re based out in sticks some-where,” he reveals.

“It’s a great way of showing peoplein a city or area of the country whereyou don’t have an office that you stilloffer a service there. It’s a great wayof appearing more local than you areand it obviously means clients cancall you at local rates.”

This geographic freedom can beextended beyond the UK. Althoughthe market for telephone numbers isnot completely free outside the UK,some operators can now offer localarea code VoIP numbers for the UnitedStates and several European countries.

Data services with voiceIf you use Microsoft’s Instant Messen-ger, or a similar application, you willbe used to being able to set your posi-tion or ‘status’ to presets such as‘away’ or ‘busy’. Well, with VoIP, youcan do much the same thing.

As far as Peter Tebbutt, MarketingDirector of Alcatel’s Enterprise Solu-tions Division is concerned, what hecalls ‘intelligent rich presence’ is acentral advantage of VoIP.

“Once you start talking over VoIPyou can find out instantly if peopleare available, there’s far less pickingup the phone and wondering ifthey’re going to be available,” hepoints out.

Huge rise inSMEsIf anyone were in doubt that 2007is shaping up to the be the yearwhere SMEs follow in the footstepsof large companies and investigateIP telephony, the latest figuresreleased by VoIP provider Inclaritywould probably convince them.

The company has revealed a 750per cent rise in SMEs switching toVoIP, meaning that nearly two inthree of its customers in the pastyear have been SMEs. It estimatesthat the country’s SMEs couldsave £1bn per year by convertingto VoIP.

The company believes small andmedium companies are now start-ing to come under the same pres-sure as large companies to offerstaff flexible working and to showthey are ‘doing their bit’ for theenvironment.

Price leadsVoIPAn online poll of more than 100SMEs by VoIP provider Swyxfound that 28% believe that Inter-net Telephony would ‘reducecosts’ while almost a quarter (24per cent) were attracted by the‘increased functionality’ it coulddeliver.

The company also carried outresearch among SMEs to discoverwhat they found annoying abouttheir current phone system. Themost common frustration, 31 percent, was the inability to know theidentity of the caller beforeanswering a call. The inconven-ience of physically dialling num-bers ranked second at 29 per cent,whilst 25 per cent were irritated byhaving to look up a number beforecalling a contact.

Call centresswitchingUntil recently very few contactcentres worldwide were operatingwith a complete IPT (IP Telephony)infrastructure all the way to theagent desktop. Now, however,according to results from a 2006global research study commis-sioned by Genesys, 60 per cent ofall respondents expected to deployIPT in at least one contact centrewithin a year, rising to 82 per centwithin two years.

Also, among those organisa-tions with IPT being deployed orplanned, almost 90 per cent saidthey expect to activate their firstITP contact centre within one year– although most will only migratesome contact centres initially.

“Simply plug in yourphone or laptop and youare ready to take calls“

“It really comes in to its own if youwant to collaborate on somethingwith someone because you can see ifthey’re available, make the call, per-haps a video conference call, and putup the documents on screen so youcan discuss them together.”

Other examples of the flexibilityoffered when voice is treated like dataand travels along the same network issynching a calendar with voicemail.

If, for example, somebody receivesa call when they are in a meeting anddo not wish to be disturbed, the calen-dar can make sure a message is taken.If the calendar knows that someone isout in the field, away from a broad-band connection, it can forward thecall to a mobile.

Just as importantly, with VoIP thereis far greater control over messages.Instead of being locked in a phone inthe office, they can be accessedremotely as well as forwarded to thenumber owner. In fact, they can evenbe emailed so they can be played backvia a laptop or personal organiser.

Whether you’re moving toward a global IP solution or a

single application like VoIP, the experts at Verizon Business

can take you there. Our global IP network delivers

a wide range of scalable solutions. And our people

can help you design, manage and optimise your

transition to IP—on your timeline, and on your terms.

Visit verizonbusiness.com/uk

or see us at VoIP for Business 2007, stand no. 701.


VoIP goes racing with HondaWhen Honda Racing F1’s continued growth threatened to overwhelm its communications system, theteam needed to find a solution.

“That was the trigger,” said team ITDirector, David France. “There was nomore capacity on our server, so wewere con strained in assigning phonesto new employees. And we werebuilding a new test facility, a state-of-the-art wind tunnel that was going torequire even closer collaborationamong employees. So we knew wehad to quickly make a change.”

An Avaya Gold Certified BusinessPartner, conducted a prelimi nary net-work assessment on behalf of theirlong-time client, and called in AvayaGlobal Services to help with a design.The team recommended an IP solu-tion that would solve the capacityproblem, and do much more.

“When we started talking to Avaya,it became apparent that there is awhole new generation of technologythat would give us improvements toother areas of the business. These by-prod ucts were bonuses that came outof the discussions,” France said.

With the decision made, the projectwas ready to move forward quickly.With the IP Solution in place,employ ees enjoyed greater accessibil-ity. Except when they were walkingacross campus. Or traveling to testsites. Or conferring in the plant.

“Our key employees rarely sit at their

desks,” France said. So he approachedAvaya about finding a way to extendthe powerful features of the AvayaCommunications solution to mobileemployees.

Mobile F1Thanks to a recently announced part-nership with Nokia, a leader in the

mobile telephony market, there wasthe option of the Avaya Mobile forSeries 60 solution allows clients toextend Communication Managerfunctional ity by downloading AvayaMobile software to a special dual-useNokia Series 60 mobile phone.

The soft ware links the mobilephone to the Communication Manag-

er software on the corporate server,effectively turn ing the mobile phoneinto another endpoint on the corpo-rate telephony network. Employeescan receive calls made to their busi-ness number from their mobile phone,and an intui tive user interface makesit easy to invoke business telephonyfeatures such as abbreviated dialing,

transfer, multiparty conference tobetter serve their clients. In addition,because the mobile device is anextension of the corporate IP-PBX,business calls can be recorded andtracked, useful for financial and pro-fessional services applications.

Honda Racing F1 was quick to signup to trial the new offering, provid ingthe enhanced phones to 20 keyemployees whose travels take themaround the world, throughout the UK,or just across campus.

VoIP on the podiumThe results? Employees using thephones – as well as those back at theoffice – appreciate the ease of “onenumber” accessibility and the greaterproductivity it allows. Teams aroundthe world are fielding calls directed totheir desk phones, and when theyneed to call colleagues, it’s much eas -ier for them to dial the same exten -sion they use back at the office thanto dial a long string of digits.

“It’s all about making it easier to com-municate with each other,” said France.“Traveling employees can’t wait 24hours to get a message that was left backat their desks. With the mobile solution,now they are immedi ately accessible.”

Honda Racing F1 is already seeingdramatic process improvements both atthe headquarters campus and on theroad.

Increased collaboration amongemployees: The new, feature-rich IPphones have earned high praise fromemployees and there is faster linkagewith suppliers as well as reduced ITmaintenance require ments.

PROMOTIONAL FEATURE:

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Businesses switch on toVoIP’s benefitsBusinesses in the know are switching to VoIP for manyreasons. Whilst cost is an important issue, it is not onlysavings on phone bills and network administration thatare attracting companies to VoIP.

Those organisations that do start touse an IP network to handle their tele-phone calls suddenly find there areextra features which drive the compa-ny’s performance forwards just bymaking it cheaper, simpler and moreproductive to call a colleague.

ProductivityThe beauty of VoIP is that it allowsstaff to communicate with one anoth-er when it suits them. With conven-tional telephony, a person preparingan important sales report could chosenot to answer their phone but theywould still have to endure it constant-ly ringing as people leave messages tobe called back about an issue.

With VoIP the ‘presence’ featureallows users to select a status, just asthey would if using Instant Messenger.Rather than ignore the phone they canreveal they are ‘busy’ or ‘away’ and soprevent unnecessary calls.

“The presence feature is such ahuge boon to productivity,” revealsRoger Jones, Convergence BusinessDevelopment Director at VoIPprovider, Avaya.

“It’s a handy feature to let peopleknow what your status is but, in doingthat, it goes a step further. If someoneneeds to talk to you and they see youare ‘busy’, there may well be someoneelse they can call who is available.That way, they get the query answeredand the person who is busy doesn’t getdiverted. It’s a really handy feature forpushing productivity because peopleknow who to go to straight away fromthe presence list, rather than makingseveral calls.”

In fact, Jones insists there are busi-ness efficiency gains to be made just inmaking calls with VoIP.

“The presence list is very useful butthen so too are the corporate and privatedirectories VoIP users have,” he adds.

“After years of having to look up anumber in a book and then dial thedigits you suddenly find with VoIPthat all you have to do is select the

person you want to talk to from adirectory and push a button. It’s justso quick and simple and, if they’reusing the system properly, the callwill go through on the best device forthat person, it could be their officephone or their mobile or the soft-phone on their laptop. VoIP signifi-cantly simplifies and speeds up com-munication between colleagues.”

FlexibilityIf Andy Elliot, Marketing Director atVoIP provider Mitel sums up the one,key benefit he sees clients gainingfrom IP telephony, it is flexibility.

“We all know and recognise thatthe days of the 9 to 5 office where anentire team would always be togetheris now effectively dead,” he suggests.

“It’s something we’re seeing in boththe public and private sector as com-panies and organisations start to seethat they need to allow their staff towork flexibly. They want them to beable to work as productively on theroad, at home or in an airport loungeas they would do in the office.

“It is this need that has pushed thetechnology to the point now where it iseasy to use and cheaper than before, yetstill gives staff flexibility to workremotely from the office.”

The principle of allowing staff to beproductive no matter where they are isa very obvious benefit of VoIP butaligned with this is the less obvious, butequally important, advantage of beingable to target and keep key workers.

“We find that professional firmsand smaller businesses in particularrealise they have key knowledgeworkers that are central to the organi-sation’s success,” points out Elliot.

“It’s the same for enterprises but

just more exaggerated in smallercompanies. The boss knows that somepeople are irreplaceable so they alsorealise that if they can help out byallowing them to work flexibly to fitin with their family commitments orchanging personal life, then that per-son will recognise that and stay withthe company. A good example wouldbe the Natural History Museum wherethere are obviously people with verydetailed knowledge on their subjectthat the museum realises it has toretain, so flexible working is veryimportant to them.”

No crystal ball gazingAnother huge advantage of VoIP isthat IP networks are simple to scaleup should a business prosper. In thepast, extra lines could be provided butit was more costly and generallyrequired a company to have a verygood idea of what the future wouldhold so it could be planned for. How-ever, with hosted VoIP solutions,Richard Dorgan, Head of Mid Marketat Colt Telecom believes companiescan achieve far more flexible growththan before.

“IP allows a company to change itsnetwork as it circumstances changeso there’s not so much need to crystalball gaze,” he suggests.

“Companies don’t have to askthemselves if they’ll need to be start-ing up a call centre or if they’ll be

twice as big as the network can growwith them. With hosted solutions,where the telecoms provider runs thenetwork for them, there’s also thebonus of them not having to worryabout training up someone to be ableto get new staff an extension or han-dle staff that have moved offices, itcan all be done for companies.

Easy recordingLegislation and industry codes areincreasing pressure on companies torecord telephone calls to ensure theyhave acted within the law as well asprovide material for staff training.

This has traditionally been very dif-ficult but, as David Wise, Manager ofGlobal Programmes at Witness Sys-tems points out, VoIP has made thetechnology far more flexible.

“With analogue, conventional tele-coms you literally had to have everyphone going in to the back of a cen-tral recording machine which justchurned out tape after tape of calls,”he reflects.

“With IP we don’t need tapes, it’s allstored digitally and you can add a newextension just by typing its details into our software. The days of having tophysically wire up a new phone arelong gone, thankfully. Being digitallystored, the call records are obviously alot easier to search through and acompany has one central computerwhere they are stored but they can be

“The presence featureis such a huge boon to

productivity“

listened to by any authorised memberof staff from any Net connection any-where in the world.”

Green ‘telepresence’All companies are coming underincreasing pressure to show them-selves as being socially responsible. Infact, one can hardly open up a globalfirm’s web site without being directedto a section that outlines how envi-ronmentally aware the company is.

It is an area where VoIP can helpbecause it makes communication somuch simpler between colleagues andbecause it is designed to travel overan IP network, which traditionallywas built for data, voice can easily beaccompanied by video at no cost(other than ensuring the network hassufficient bandwidth).

So this can seriously reduce a com-pany’s travel budget and help itsgreen credentials at the same time.

“Every company is under pressuretoday to show that it takes its impacton the environment seriously,” saysMike Robinson, Business Director forConverged Communications at VoIPprovider Dimension Data.

“If you give your workers ‘telepres-ence’ so they can video conferencewith one another from their desktop,you can reduce your company’s travelbill at the same time as well as reduceits carbon footprint as people drive orfly to as many meetings.”

Exceed together

Data Voice Managed Services

COLT Telecommunications. Registered in England No: 245 2736. Registered Office: Beaufort House, 15 St. Botolph Street, London EC3A 7QN, UK. COLT Telecommunications is part of COLT Telecom Group plc. © 2007 COLT Telecom Group plc. All rights reserved. The COLT logo and COLT pennants are registered trade marks.

With COLT’s IP Voice service you benefit from a single supplier managing your

entire IP Telephony solution. We will manage your network and system as one

solution in order to optimise performance and security for your business. COLT

is a leading European service provider with a unique pedigree in providing

converged solutions.

This is the future – come and see us at VoIP for business at Olympia

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for a personal consultation.

For further information, please visit www.colt.net/uk/ipvoice

I want someone to manage the complexities of my IP Telephony solution.

With COLT

you can – today.


From headset to handsetsIn its early days VoIP at home traditionally meant confident web users downloading a package, such as Skype, and thenplugging an earpiece in to a computer before calling relatives in Australia for a fraction of the BT land line charge.

Whilst this is still partly the case, VoIPis proving a hugely popular area foreveryday home users who are attract-ed by cheaper call rates, particularlywhen the internet telephony packageis bundled in with their home wirelessbroadband package.

Certainly the feeling at Philips isVoIP is now so popular in the homethat it needs a new generation ofhandsets to be built around it. Hence,the consumer electronics manufac-turer has launched its VoIP 841 andVoIP 433 handsets which, respective-ly, work with Skype and WindowsLive Messenger.

The models are also DECT phones,and so work like any normal phoneyou can talk on as you walk aroundthe home, but they come with theadded benefits of VoIP which evenworks, in the case of the 841, whenthe PC is not turned on.

“VoIP is hugely popular now in thehome and it’s moved away from thedays when it was perceived to begeeky and centred around peopleplugged in to PCs,” explains PhilipsVice President, Nick Dosanjh

“That’s why we’ve produced nor-mal DECT phones that let users makeVoIP calls. The 841 is interestingbecause you can log on to Skypewithout a computer on a phone thatyou can still use as an everydayphone, just as before.”

Price and buddiesConsumer VoIP had always beenexpected to only show small signs ofgrowth in UK because the cost of landline calls has been cut over recentyears. Whilst there are still manyarguments about the level of compul-sory line rental, tariffs can now meannational calls are either free or cutprice and overseas calling serviceshave further cut the cost of keeping intouch with relatives.

Hence, if pushed to name the majoradvance VoIP offers consumers,above traditional telephony, Dosanjhbelieves it is the ‘buddy’ list whichusers come to find irreplaceable.

“People that are very Net savvy areused to being online and getting a listin, say, Windows Messenger, ofwhether their friends are online, busy,away or logged off,” he explains.

“So they get very excited whenthey see this on just a normal handsetwhich allowing them to make cheap,and even free calls, but also lettingthem know who’s contactable. It’sthat feature where you see people’seyes light up and they suddenly seewhat the real power of VoIP is. Youinstantly know whether someone’saround to take a call and if you’rebusy you can set your status to reflectthat so friends don’t waste their timecalling you.”

There is also the issue of quality. Inprinciple, if the VoIP system is prop-erly configured by the provider andthe home connection has sufficientbandwidth then calls can be madewithout the background hiss thatpeople are used to.

“People can sound more like they

do in real life,” adds Dosanjh.“It’s because the switches that oper-

ate traditional telephone lines do notallow the full wavelength of the voiceto go through so people sound differ-ent and you often can’t tell the differ-ence between certain letters whenthey spell something out. VoIP givesbetter quality because it’s not basedon switches opening and shutting.”

A wizard ideaThis idea that people at home want touse VoIP but do not want to have tomake calls sat at a computer is centralto the product line Actiontec hasdeveloped. It recently updated its £30Phone Wizard with a £40 Call Centrebox which plugs in to the telephonesocket and allows people to makeSkype calls on a normal DECT phonewherever they are.

“People are not going to ditch theirnormal landline connection complete-ly for VoIP at the moment and theydon’t want to make calls from a PC allthe time,” explains Actiontec’s Euro-pean General Manager, Ian Robin.

“So we marry the two. Our boxes

allow people to use their home phoneas they always would but then theyneed only press a button, such as thehash key, and they can then speed dialpeople via Skype. All they need to ispress the button, they then receive amessage saying they are on Skype andthey can just press the number for theperson they want to call – people nor-mally only having around five peoplesaved – and they’re away, making

calls for free to another Skype user.“It works the same the other way

round, allowing people to be calledover Skype on their normal phone. Infact, it works so well that you’ve noidea whether the call has been madeover Skype or a landline.”

Mobile SkypeThe system has an added benefit forconsumers wanting to make calls

abroad whilst on the move withoutpaying international call rates whichcan soar when a mobile is used.

“Our system allows you to dial in toyour normal home phone number,from wherever you might happen tobe,” Robin continues.

“A classic example would be whenI’m out and about in the UK and I wantto chat to my sister in Texas. Thatwould normally cost me an arm and aleg on my mobile phone but I can callmy home number and it will cost menothing, so long as I don’t go abovemy monthly limit of inclusive minutes.

“So, I call my home number and myCall Centre box asks me to enter acode. Once that’s done, I can speeddial my sister just as if I were at home.So, I end up calling Texas on mymobile phone for free because myconnection to home comes out of myinclusive tariff and the rest of the callis over Skype.”

Huge and growingQuite when consumer VoIP will reacha tipping point and replace traditionaltelephony is the subject of muchdebate. Accepted wisdom suggestsaround 12 per cent of UK consumerscurrently use VoIP at home but, ofcourse, this will often be in addition torenting at a convention BT land line.

However, when one considers it isvirtually impossible to buy broadbandin the current market without beingoffered a VoIP bundle as part of thedeal, then it is clear VoIP is going to

“VoIP gives bettersound quality because

it’s not based onswitches opening and

shutting“continue to increase in popularity,even if the people using it do not actu-ally realise their calls are being routedover their broadband connection.

Nick Dosanjh notes that already 7%of international calls are made overSkype and so consumer VoIP is aforce to be reckoned with.

“The days of the switches we’ve hadsince Alexander Graham Bell arenumbered,” concludes Dosanjh.“We’re moving to the packet switch-ing technology of the Net and theinfrastructure will reflect that but,still, for quite some time you’re goingto see conventional telephony andVoIP co-exist because people don’tgenerally ditch their traditional con-nection altogether. However, if youlook at what BT, France Telecom andDeutsche Telekom, to name just a few,are doing, it’s all about bundling VoIPwith broadband, so it would seem tobe an inevitable move to VoIP.”

59%

20%

0%

3%

3%

3%

1%

1%

Skype

AOL

BT unspecified

BT Communicator

BT Broadband voice

Vonage

MSN Messenger

Wanadoo

WHICH PROVIDERS ARE CONSUMERS USING?Continental Research estimates that today’s 1.7m home VoIP users couldnumber 4m by the end of the year. Its research shows Skype dominates themarket but it expects BT to make gains this year as VoIP starts to appeal to themass market and not just the net savvy.

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The concept of fixed-mobile convergence has been around since the first days of digital cellular in the early 1990s but most of the deployments seen to date have only been partially effective owing to issues with the software that binds the hardware together.

Global e Networks, a new player on the European telecoms scene, in partnership with ZTE, the international telecoms software and systems specialist, plan to change this viewpoint with

a revolutionary approach to wholesale IP-based communica-tions, focusing on the hitherto disparate attributes of conver-gence, quality of service (QOS) and market-leading wholesale prices.

Global e can do this, because it is the first European telco to invest in ZTE’s Class 5 Softswitch tech-nology, which it plans to install at Global Switch One, London’s premier communications hub.

Robert Rees, COO of Global e Networks, said that, thanks to ZTE’s Softswitch technology, his company will offer a high quality portfolio of telecoms facilities to a wide range of third-party quality resellers.

“These facilities will embrace a variety of services that include voice, SMS, content, IP Centrex, advertising and audio-visual conferencing, all of which will be handled by ZTE’s Softswitch technology,” he explained, adding that the unique aspect of the service is its advertising, sponsorship and branding potential.

“What we have done is to brand our offerings in such a way that context-sensitive advertising, sponsorship and/or branding is presented to the customer wherever possible. As well as reinforcing the reseller’s brand image, it also opens up the way for revenue-generating content, which in turn helps to keep our

wholesale prices as sharp as possible,” he explained.

The Class 5 Softswitch tech-nology used by Global e is the direct result of ZTE’s multi-year, multi-million pound investment in R&D – more than 10 per cent of the company’s revenue is

re-invested in research, and more than half of its staff around the world are involved in R&D.

Fang Rong, ZTE’s senior vice president of European strategy, said that the Global e deal is the company’s first major Softswitch sale in Europe and comes as a result of several months of hard work by ZTE’s technical sales and engineering staff, as well as their counterparts at Global e Networks.

“ZTE is proud to be associated with such a groundbreaking telco as Global e Networks and intends to work closely with the company as it rapidly rolls out and develops a wide range of communications services,” she added.

To register for the launch event please email:[email protected]

Global e NetworksTel: +44 (0) 207 549 7800Web: www.globaleplc.com

ZTETel: +44 (0) 20 8231 7100Web: www.zte.com.cn

Global e partners with ZTE to offer a unique telecoms proposition

“The IP telecoms quality and value proposition has truly arrived”

Global e Networks Robert Rees COO

Large companies dominate VoIPWithout doubt VoIP has had its greatest impact at enter-prise level; an achievement that has brought with itsome criticism that telecommunications providers areconcentrating on large companies at the expense ofsmaller organisations.

According to VoIP providers, howev-er, there are several reasons whyenterprises have been the first to betargeted. Whilst cost reduction is stillan issue for companies investigatingVoIP, it was more central to the deci-sion a couple of years ago and theclearest gains were, and still are,among companies that have manystaff spread across various sites. Tra-

ditionally these staff members wouldbe charged every time they picked upthe phone to one another. However,with VoIP, the calls over the compa-ny’s own IP network are now free,which can equate to large savings,particularly if the organisationemploys a lot of staff.

There is also the issue of not havingto run and support separate telephone

and IP networks which, again, repre-sent a saving that would be greaterfor large companies.

Hence, with the benefits stacked infavour of enterprises and the VoIPproviders keen to sell to large compa-nies, it has been no wonder thatenterprises have dominated IP teleph-ony, particularly as small companiesdo not normally have a person thatwould take ‘ownership’ of investigat-ing whether VoIP would be beneficialfor the company.

“The advantage for any technologycompany talking to a large enterpriseis they have an IT team,” points outAndy Elliot, Marketing Director atVoIP provider Mitel.

“With a small or medium business,there are just as many benefits from

VoIP, but you often find that the per-son you’re talking to isn’t technicaland so you have to be careful toexplain the benefits very carefully butyou’re also up against the fact that it’snot their main job and they’re typi-cally too busy actually running thecompany to give VoIP the type ofattention it gets from an enterprise’sIT department.”

Medium attentionNevertheless, BT’s Acting GeneralManager for Broadband and VoIP,Chris Lindsay, believes that whilstthere is a perception that the largetelecommunications companies sole-ly target enterprises, the truth is a lit-tle more subtle.

“It’s interesting because enterprises

have been very well served becausethey could initially work out the sav-ings of a single network and linkingoffices together on a free network,” hepoints out.

“At the other extreme, small com-panies normally have people whohave taken it upon themselves to loadup a service such as Skype, so they’renormally already using VoIP, albeiton a rather ad hoc basis.

“It’s medium sized companies thatare caught, literally, in the middlebecause they probably haven’tenough users in the past to make thesaving stack up yet they’re bigenough to have a policy that preventsunauthorised VoIP usage, so noSkype. It’s these medium companiesthat I predict are due to see a changethis year as services that were initiallytop level moved down from enterpriseto medium business level.”


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Small is beautiful for VoIP

Is Skype fit for business?

BY COLIN DUFFY

It’s one of those statements that people say “really?” towhen they first hear it: “97% of UK businesses employ lessthan 20 people - and there are over 4 million of them”.

Knowing that, it’s odd that smallbusinesses have been pretty muchignored by telecommunications com-panies over the years. When they’vebeen shown any attention at all, it’sbeen to sell them consumer productsat ‘business’ prices or cut down ver-sions of enterprise scale equipment ateye-watering cost.

But even very small businesses findthat they do need some of the featuresthat big businesses take for granted.They need to be able to make andreceive several calls at once, transfercalls to colleagues and divert calls totheir mobiles or home when they pick

up the kids or just have to “nip out fora minute”.

Often they need several telephonenumbers but have only got one phoneand one employee; “I need to knowwhich of my companies is being calledso that I can answer it properly”.

They need to be able to work fromhome sometimes but not want theircustomers to know it and they need tobe able to receive a fax but withouthaving to buy a fax machine or a sec-ond telephone line to plug it into.

Growing needsWhen small businesses become moreestablished and start taking onemployees, their telecom’s needswiden. They need some of the func-tionality of an automated switchboard(a PBX) – maybe a few telephoneextensions and clever ways of sendingcalls to them. They need to put peopleon hold and play them music – pre-ferrably of their own choice.

Some of them need simple IVR sys-tems - press 1 for sales etc – and evena call queue so they don’t miss anycalls at all. Unlike Global MegacorpPlc, their customers’ calls “really areimportant to them” they want servic-es that help their customers not hin-der them. They want to customise andpersonalise their messages “press onefor Colin, press two for today’s menu,press 3 to call my mobile etc so thattheir customers get who or what theywant quickly.

They often need extensions in dif-ferent locations, even different conti-nents and they want it to feel (and

cost) the same as if everyone is in thesame building.

They want all this, and they want itto be flexible enough to grow withthem as their business grows. Theydon’t want to be locked into long terminflexible contracts. They want it towork every-time and most of all theywant it to cost, well, not very much atall, thank you.

Growing servicesAmazingly, VoIP makes all this, andmore, possible – a real telephone num-ber, a fax number, 5 telephone exten-sions, a call queuing system and a cou-ple of IVR departments can now costless than a single BT business line rental.

VoIP is changing not only how tele-phone calls are made and how muchthey cost but also who provides themand what they can do. It makes newproducts and services possible andmakes those that were un-affordableto all but the very biggest companies,easily accessible to the masses.

It’s also a democratising technolo-gy: just as the internet brought infor-mation to us all, VoIP brings sophisti-cated and very low cost communica-tions to those that need it. And it’ssmall businesses that need it most sothat they can get on with generatingover 50 per cent of the UK’s turnoverand 64 per cent of all commercialinnovation.

Colin Duffy is the CEO of the inde-pendent UK VoIP company, Voipfoneand a Director of ITSPA, the InternetTelephony Services Providers’ Associ-ation www.itspa.co.uk

There is no doubt about it, Skype has transformed telecommunications forever. TheInternet start-up that was bought by eBay nearly eighteen months ago has more than170 million users who can call one another for free as well as call non Skype users forvastly reduced call charges.

In fact, one would find it hard to find acompany that better personifies thepromise of ‘disruptive technology’ totake on an established industry andlead the way.

The trouble is, the technology,which started out as a consumer offer-ing, but has since launched as a busi-ness service as well, is often labelled as‘unsafe’ by corporate VoIP providers.

Safe for firms?Whilst Skype points to its very strongencryption technology, the compa-nies rolling out VoIP networks in tolarge enterprises have long warnedthat because its standards are notopen, companies cannot be sure thatstaff using Skype at work are compro-mising security.

“Skype’s an amazing success storyand it’s a great product,” says MarkOsbourne, Chief Information SecurityOfficer at Interoute.

“The trouble is it’s very hard tohave control over it because it doesn’tconform to normal, open standardsVoIP operators use and so it’s veryhard to stop it working across and outof the corporate network.

“Also, and this is what concerns meas a security person, Skype means aperson can leave your company andwork for a rival and people are still

contacting them via Skype and maybeunaware they have left. Also, I alwaysinsist that clients’ staff change pass-words every three months and thatthey are completely random. The prob-lem with home systems is people don’tever change their passwords and,when it’s not forced upon them, theytend to go for very predictable words.It’s that loss of control that companiesshould be concerned about. Skype is afantastic product but it’s not, in myopinion a corporate product.”

Fit for officeAs one might imagine, Stefan Oberg,Skype’s General Manager disagrees,pointing out that the software isbeing widely used by business withno reported problems.

“Approximately 30 per cent of theSkype community today use Skypefor business purposes and say thatsaving money is just the start,” hecounters.

“Skype’s an amazingsuccess story and it’s a

great product““Some companies who employ anIT manager have asked us for morevisibility as to how Skype works andso with our latest version we haveenabled IT administrators to havemore control over how Skype is usedon their networks. We want business-es to be able to use Skype in a waythat works for their company andcomplies with their specific IT policiesbecause we believe companiesshouldn’t have to pay for the privilegeof having their staff talk to oneanother more easily or naturally.”


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Ensuring dialling without distortionAnybody who trialled internet telephony in the 1990s,when it first began being mooted as an alternative toconventional calls, will remember the stuttering conver-sations which were best described as representing thekind of quality one would expect from a badly tunedshort wave radio.

The technology has improved greatlysince those days for the simple rea-son; it had to. Enterprises would notcompromise on quality and hencesoftware was improved to ensure that‘packets’ of speech travelled across anIP network without being distorted.

Hence today the quality issue

around voice over the Net has movedon to ensuring there is sufficientcapacity to handle traffic.

Quality to capacity“There are two very different kinds ofVoIP, there’s what you get with aSkype over the Net and what you get

from a professional VoIP providerover a dedicated network,” explainsRichard Pinnington, Head of Market-ing at VoIP provider CCT.

“With a public service there’s nopromise on the level of quality butwhen a company has their own serv-ice installed we can use tools to mon-itor the traffic on the network.

“Voice is just like data going over theIP network, you need to be able tomeasure when it peaks and ensure thereis enough capacity there. The tools wehave allow us to look at the networkswe install and then see a red warningsign when traffic is getting high enoughto risk compromising quality so weknow to put more capacity in.”

Modern business VoIP is alsosophisticated enough to chose a routefor calls that minimises strain on thesystem by, in particular, the networkdiverting calls from a busy office toone that is less busy but which isequally capable of taking the enquiry.

BT trusted for VoIPBT looks set to do well out of thesurge of domestic VoIP cus-tomers that ContinentalResearch is predicting for theyear ahead. Its figures suggesttoday’s 1.7 million VoIP con-sumers will increase to 4m in2007 and has found that thosenew to VoIP are seeking outfamiliar ‘comfort brands’, mostnotably BT.

The company scored highestwhen consumers would ask whothey would be comfortable tomake VoIP calls with. O2 andSky were second and third withSkype only coming 10th out of14 companies. VoIP specialistVonage came last.

“When a company hastheir own service

installed we can use toolsto monitor the traffic on

the network“


On the move but still on VoIPOne of the main reasons why many companies chose VoIP is because it allows staff to work on theroad yet still be contactable via a single number.

Today the vast majority of mobileVoIP calls are made via a laptop. Soft-ware, generically referred to as a‘softphone’, allows a portable com-puter to act like a telephone with anumeric keypad on the screen thatowners can use to dial numbers andthen hold conversations through anearpiece and microphone.

It may seem ironic that such anadvance in telecommunicationswould centre on a device ten times thesize of a mobile phone but Ari Virta-nen, Vice President ConvergenceProducts Multimedia, Nokia assuresmobile phone makers are catching up.

“We have our ‘Internet tablet’ andour E series of phones has many mod-els with Wi-Fi on them,” he points out.

“Of course, if you have a mobilethat does not have Wi-Fi you canalways use Bluetooth to connect it toa product such as the Internet Tabletand you can make VoIP calls.”

Wi-Fi mobilesThis new generation of mobile phoneswhich feature Wi-Fi means that theyare not only limited to making andreceiving calls across their mobilephone network. Take the phone in toan area with Wi-Fi and the phone canmake calls over the Net. Hence a per-son in a ‘hotspot’, such as a bar, café,airport lounge or a client’s office canmake and receive calls over IP.

This has several benefits. Perhapsmost obviously, there is the issue ofcost. Calls made over IP networks costa fraction of mobile phone calls andwill often be free. Although there maywell be a charge for somebody to belogged on to a wireless network, suchas a hotspot in a café, a lot of the timestaff will find themselves in an area

offering free Wi-Fi access, such astheir home (if they have wirelessbroadband) or a client’s office.

If the connection to the Net is freeand constant then the benefits ofmobile VoIP become very obvious. Twopeople working for the same companybut who are visiting different clientswould be able to call one another ontheir mobile phones for free. This canequate to massive savings if the staffmembers are in different countries andso normally just a short conversationcould cost several pounds.

A single numberThere is also the major issue of easilycontacting people. If VoIP will usher inone change in the way we work, it willbe to move away from the days of hav-ing several numbers. With IP telepho-ny people only need their office num-ber, if they are out of the office, thenthe system can forward calls to amobile number which, if they are in aWi-Fi area, they can take a call on atno extra charge to the company. If theperson does not have wireless broad-band available, then they, or theircompany, will pick up the cost of thelast, mobile leg of the call.

The early feedback from companiesthat are introducing VoIP is thatwhilst it works well, one of the biggesthurdles is getting staff that are used tobeing out on the road to actually putdown their mobile phone and use theVoIP number they have been providedwith. All too often, staff can forgetthey are not actually working outsidethe office and can make calls that costa tiny fraction of the cost of diallingon the mobile phone.

“The ‘road warriors’ just get in tothe habit of always using a mobile

phone, even if it’s to call someone inanother office within their organisa-tion which they could do for free withVoIP,” quips one provider.

“Training people to use their VoIPnumber is important. They need to beshown they can still use their mobilewhen they are out and about, theyjust need to get in the habit of tellingthe system they are on the mobileand, in the office, they need to getused to using the company’s VoIPdirectory rather than the speed dial ontheir mobile’s address book.”

Save at homeConsumers and small and mediumbusinesses can also now benefit fromWi-Fi mobile calls. BT’s Fusion serv-ice, which works with three Motorolahandsets, allows mobile calls to bemade via a home or small office’swireless broadband connection.Before the beginning of the year, theservice worked only over Bluetooth,meaning the handset had to be indirect ‘sight’ of the home’s router butthe system has now been made Wi-Ficapable, so calls can be made withinthe far wider reach of a wireless

broadband network, both inside theoffice or home as well as outdoors inhotspots.

“Fusion makes so much sensebecause it greatly reduces the cost ofusing your mobile when you’re homeand it obviously improves call qualityif you live in an area with poor GSMreception,” points out Motorola’sPrincipal Solutions Architect, StevenPlunkett.

“Now that it’s Wi-Fi, and not justBluetooth, it’s opening up real oppor-tunities for people to use their mobileanywhere in the home or around asmall office and only pay a greatlyreduced tariff. With Wi-Fi networksspringing up around the country, itmeans they user will also be able tosave a lot of money away from theirhome or office connection as well.”

Plunkett predicts services such asBT Fusion will pave the way for awide range of competitors who willoffer mobile services which arecheaper than traditional GSMproviders, on the proviso that cheapcalls will need to be made over theNet, via a home or café’s Wi-Fi net-work.

Irish parlia-ment saveswith VoIPThe Irish National Parliament(Oireachtas) is using VoIP toimprove the communications serv-ices delivered to 1,100 users, irre-spective of where they are based.

Oireachtas has deployed an Alca-tel-Lucent converged internet pro-tocol (IP) network to connect 200remote sites across Ireland, includ-ing Leinster House in Dublin, homeof Dáil Eireann and Seanad Éireann- the two houses of the Oireachtas.

At all sites, the deployment ofVoIP has enabled users to takeadvantage of free internal calling -greatly reducing costs for theorganisation as a whole – while alsoencouraging increased interactionbetween sites.

Users have been equipped withAlcatel-Lucent’s advanced IP Touchhandsets, and going forward, thenew system can support additionalVoIP functionality, such as unifiedcommunications tools, to furtherimprove interaction across the vari-ous remote sites.

Museum connects withVoIP

VOIP AND MOBILITY FACTS

-68% of Nortel’s VoIP customers cite mobility and flexibility as their key driver inswitching to IP telephony

-Colt Telecom estimates that 50% of the average company’s telephone bill comes from mobile phones, yet they only make up 15% of call volume

-BT estimates a staggering 70% of mobile calls are actually made indoors-The Cloud, the country’s largest Wi-Fi network now coves nine city centres

(including London, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Oxford) as well as more than 4,500 pubs and restaurants

The Woodhorn museum andarchive centre in Northumberlandhas deployed a converged IP net-work from Alcatel-Lucent to giveits visitors secure high-speedaccess to 150,000 genealogyrecords.

Behind the scenes, VoIP hasenabled its employees to make freephone calls, both within theorganisation and also with neigh-bouring authorities such as Wans-beck District Council, which isresponsible for maintaining partof the new network. Thanks to theincreased connectivity offered byVoIP, Woodhorn’s staff are nowenjoying greater access to Wans-beck employees and councilresources, greatly enhancing col-laboration between the twoorganisations.

“The link between Wansbeckand Woodhorn is a great exampleof connected local government,demonstrating a firm focus onimproving delivery of servicesthrough the use of technology,”said Graeme Allan for Alcatel-Lucent’s Enterprise BusinessGroup UK and Ireland.

Woodhorn has recently under-gone a 24 million euro transforma-tion to become a cutting-edgemuseum and archives complex,housing and providing access to800 years of Northumberland’spast. The centre has already provedto be immensely popular, drawingmore than five thousand visitors onits opening weekend in November2006.

barablu offers free callsfrom your mobile

barablu, a UK start up companyhas started offering free VoIPcalls on Wi-Fi enabled mobiles,PDAs, and PCs.

Making free calls via a PC overthe Internet has become increas-ingly popular with over 171 mil-lion worldwide already signed upfor these services and some300,000 people each day signingup to a PC VoIP service.

barablu wants to see the benefitof VoIP expand beyond the PC tobe used when you’re travelling oron holiday or any time whenyou’re simply unable to sit at a PC.

barablu mobile software en-ables you to talk from your mo-bile to other barablu users for freeas long as they are online -whether they are on a PC or on aWi-Fi enabled phone.

Download barablu onto your Wi-Fi enabled mobile phone via thebarablu website www.barablu.comand for no charge you can talk,text, IM and conference call. Thedownload is free and is sent toyour mobile via a SMS message.It’s as simple as that and takesless than a minute.

You can also use barablu tomake reduced rate calls to peoplewho are not in the barablu net-work and to landlines and mo-biles anywhere around the worldfrom as little as 1p, a minute fromyour mobile. The barablu busi-ness model is based around thiscalling out feature – simply calledbarablu Out

Typically software used for free

VoIP PC to PC calls takes up a lotof bandwidth which makes it un-suitable for mobile use. barablu isdesigned to take up much lessbandwidth which means it can besupported on a mobile phone withno trouble and provide a voicequality that’s just as good as alandline.

One of the best things aboutbarablu is that you get to usemany other telephony features forfree aside from standard callingand texting that make it suitablefor business and private use.

�Hold free conference calls up to49 other barablu users

�Send instant messages for free to your barablu contacts around the world

�Get a better picture of your caller through free video calling

�Free file sharing and transfer lets you send files of an unlimited size to other users

�Leave and retrieve your barabluvoicemail for free.

�barablu is striving to be innovative and offer services that are always leading edge.

The latest version of barablu canswitch seamlessly between GSMand Wi-Fi, connecting you in themost cost-effective way without

dropping your call or losing qual-ity. This effectively means you arenot restricted to a Wi-Fi zone touse barablu on your mobile phone.

You may already be using VoIPPC to PC services and have builtup an extensive list of contactswho use the same service. You cantransfer the lists to your Wi-Fi en-abled phone and still use barabluand make free calls and free textsto any of these contacts.

“Free calls using the Internet arerapidly attracting a growing num-

ber of converts. This demand hasbeen driven up to now by PC toPC services. They are fantasticcommunication platforms butthey are limited and they are notavailable on the likes of Nokiahandsets. barablu makes peopleindependent of their PC. This is avery exciting development,” saidMarius O’Reilly, Chief MarketingOffice for barablu.

barablu’s services will becomeeven more accessible with the in-creased number of Wi-Fi phones

due on the market this year. Nokiaalready has nine models and it ispredicted there will be around 100different Wi-Fi models launchedthrough manufacturers by the endof 2007.

The growing number of Wi-Fihot spots in homes, offices, rail-way stations, airports, cafes andcity centres could make usingbarablu part of everyday life.

Free calls using a mobile are nolonger a dream but a reality.

We’ve all heard of the benefits ofVoIP from PC to PC, but whatabout from your mobile phone?

An SMS is sent to your phone after downloading the barablu software from the web site. Click on this and the software is automaticallydownloaded to your phone. The barablu symbol shows on the phone. Import your contacts list, click on the barablu system and click on thecontact or tap in the number you wish to call. It’s a simple as that.

Skype and Google VoIP users cantalk for free on their mobile phonesbarablu is giving Skype and Google Talk users the chance to make free calls from a mobile

barablu has perfected the tech-nology enabling contacts fomSkype and Google Talk to be eas-ily transferred to a Wi-Fi enabledmobile phone. You simply importyour Skype contacts to thebarablu network.

This means users of Skype andGoogle Talk can utilise thebarablu service and call anyonefrom their contacts list without

being tied to their PC. They notonly gain free calls, but free textsand voice mail.

The growing popularity of Wi-Fi phones will make barablu avail-able to millions of mobile users.Nokia currently has nine Wi-Fienabled models in the marketplaceand this coming year will see 100different Wi-Fi phones launchedthrough manufacturers.

“The growing popularity ofWi-Fi enabled phones, especiallyNokia phones, provides a majoropportunity for barablu. There isa generation of phone users whonot only want the latest develop-ments that Wi-Fi can give thembut want to reduce the cost ofcalls and the bills they pay,” saidMarius O’Reilly, Chief MarketingOfficer of barablu.

“Nokia has 36 per cent of theworldwide mobile phone marketand barablu provides their ownerswith a fantastic opportunity tosave on calls. As well as providingfree calls for those with Wi-Fi en-abled phones, we also have fea-tures for people and businesseslooking to save money when call-ing mobile numbers and tradi-tional landlines.”

“This is the future of teleph-ony. Everything is going to bewireless and barablu will be at theforefront of this development. Weare giving people the chance tomake free calls away from theirPC,” added. Marius O’Reilly.


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VoIP security: ‘Vomit’ worse that ‘Spit’It may be tempting to think that talk of hackers getting into VoIP systems is just another way for security compa-nies to sell more protection but, according to those whoare daily turning on new VoIP systems, the warnings arenot without foundation.“Every time we turn any kind of box on any IP networkwe immediately notice people are trying to hack in to it,”reveals Mark Osbourne, Chief Information Security Offi-cer at VoIP provider, Interoute.

“It’s a problem for anything connect-ed to IP that people will try and hackin to it. Personally, I think a lot of theproblem is cowboy operators whohack in to other peoples’ networksand then sell on that capacity. We allknow there are some dodgy compa-nies out there who are at least tryingto do that.”

Firewall neededFor this reason, any company consid-ering installing a VoIP system shouldinsist their provider puts in a firewall.The term comes from the defensivemetal plate placed in between a carengine and the vehicle’s passengers toprotect against an engine fire. In IPterms it is a device which filtersthrough traffic and ensures that onlyregistered users can make calls andprevents hackers from either makingcalls on a third party network or,worse, using a VoIP connection topotentially hack in to a company’scomputer systems.

Most VoIP providers offer varyinglevels of encryption so that voice traf-fic is scrambled across the network socalls passing between offices belong-ing to the same company are onlyrendered intelligible when the voicereaches the other end. Hence,although eavesdropping is a possibili-ty, it is not the main security fear.

Spam to ‘Spit’One potential misuse of a VoIP net-work businesses need to be aware ofis Spit (Spam Internet Telephony)which, as the name suggests, is thevoice equivalent of junk emails wherea company’s network could potential-ly be flooded with recorded voicecalls offering double glazing quotesand so on.

The problem has yet to manifestitself and, even so, would be, at worst,an annoyance that could be coun-tered by a decent firewall and numberfiltering technology.

However, Osbourne feels the realthreat to VoIP systems lies withanother, similarly vulgar soundingacronym, Vomit (Vulnerability OfMisconfigured Internet Telephony).

“Unsolicited sales calls would beannoying but what could really beworrying for a company is if theydon’t set up their VoIP system to besecure from hackers,” he suggests.

“The type of things hackers coulddo is use an unprotected VoIP gate-way to look at files on company com-puters and hack in to answer phoneaccounts to pick up executives’ mes-sages. It could be hugely embarrass-ing and damaging.”

Disruption attacksUnprotected VoIP systems could alsobe prone to criminal attacks acrossthe Net which flood networks with somuch data that they are forced toclose down. These Distributed Denialof Service (DDos) attacks have beencommonly used by criminal gangs tobring web sites to a halt as serversfind themselves unable to cope withan attack which orchestrates hun-dreds of thousands, or even millions,of log-in attempts all at the sametime. Betting companies who haverefused to pay a ransom have beenopen targets for these attacks, partic-ularly just before major sportingevents, such as the Grand National.


Small companies canthink big with VoIPLarge enterprises have traditionally dominated the commercial roll out of VoIP butsome providers are now turning their attention to the small and medium enterprises(SMEs) that between them employ the vast majority of UK workers.

It may seem ironic that attention isonly now being turned to SMEsbecause, in many way, they have themost to gain from switching to VoIP.

Traditionally telephony has been amajor head for the average businessthat only wants, say, half a dozenextensions. The major providers aregeared up to sell huge exchanges tomassive companies and so the kit thata smaller company would need hasalways tended to be expensive, asColin Duffy, Managing Director ofVoipfone points out.

“Our average customer employsaround five or six people and they’regetting in to VoIP because it allows asmall company to act big,” he suggests.

“To put a telephone system in to a

business with just a few people wouldstill normally cost thousands becausethe switching gear is just so expen-sive. With VoIP you’ve no need for allthat, we can sell companies exten-sions at just a pound each per month.

“When phones become IP address-es, you’ve got rid of all the complicat-ed, expensive equipment.”

Portable numbersNot only can SMEs save a hugeamount on equipment and installa-tion costs, there are also many advan-tages to VoIP. One of the most popularis the ability for the number to followa person wherever they are as well asdigital voicemail which is stored onthe system, so it can be replayed over

any telephone connection, as well asemailed to the recipient.

A recent product extension thatVoipfone has introduced is InteractiveVoice Recognition (IVR) which Duffyclaims is proving popular with com-panies that has always wanted to rootgeneral enquiries to the correct per-son but have been put off by the cost.

“With IVR a small company can actbig and make sure the right personreceives a general enquiry,” he says.

“It’s a classic case of how once youstart to root calls over IP the cost cancome crashing down because youdon’t need huge boxes of complexswitches any more and you don’tneed to run a switchboard to haveseveral extensions.”

SMES NOT SHOPPING FOR VOIP DEALS

Internet telephony provider Vonage has conducted research among UK SMEs and found that the vast majority could benefitfrom VoIP but have not looked in to switching phone provider. The survey found:

10% rise in utility bills for SMEs over past year61% are paying up to £300 per month on landline bills, more than half are paying £400 per month on mobile bills 88% have broadband but22% have never considered changing their traditional telephony provider33% of respondents surveyed did not know what VoIP was

Conference calls are like any modern telecommunica-tions advance; a useful means of speeding up businesscollaboration which can frustrate users to distraction.

All too often callers find themselves making small talk whilst they await afinal colleague to dial in and, even when all participants have dialled in,nobody is ever too sure who else is on the line.

Just as VoIP has transformed traditional telephony, it is also allowingcompanies to take far better control of audio conference calls. In a marketworth £500 million in the UK and $4 billion globally, Ring2 CEO SteveFlavell believes there is much room for improvement.

“Everybody who makes conference calls knows how frustrating they areto be a part of,” he sums up.

“So we allow the call coordinator to control the call via their Blackberry.It shows them who is on the call and allows them to control each person’sinput. We can allow a person to talk privately to one of the participants andwe can also mute a participant if they’re in a loud environment, say at atrain station, and inadvertently drowning out the rest of the call.

“It comes in to its own for chasing up people who haven’t dialled inbecause being VoIP based the user can select the contact from their own tele-phone directory or their private telephone directory to send them a remindermessage to dial in. It saves on someone having to log out of a call and try tofind out where a missing participant is through a series of mobile calls.”

Windows comingThe Blackberry has been chosen as the device to control calls because only aquarter of conference calling takes place at a person’s desk. Usually partici-pants are in a conference room or on the road and so need a mobile deviceto log who is on the call.

“We launched a PC product that lets people control conference calls but itonly got 5 per cent uptake with clients because people aren’t generally in frontof their PC,” Flavell points out.

“We’re now getting 60 per cent adoption rates with the Blackberry andwe’ve moving the software on to Windows Mobile in the second quarter of theyear.”

More secureThe system is only made possible because VoIP allows data to travel along-side voice, allowing participants’ entries to be logged and missing partici-pants’ details to be looked up on a database.

There is a serious security side to having a log of who is on a conferencecall. Despite so much effort being put in to protecting sensitive data storedon computers, very little is done to protect conference calls.

“We encourage people to change PINs regularly but they generally like tokeep the same dial in details so everyone can remember them. So the featurethrough which their Blackberry alerts the call organiser everyone someonedials in to their number is a very good way of checking to ensure that onlythose that are supposed to be calling in are doing so. If your Blackberryshows people have been calling in at other times, you can see it’s a goodtime to change details and if an unsolicited caller dials in while you are on acall, you will see them on a the Blackberry screen and can simply disconnectthem from the call.”

Fruit and VoIPTesco believes that a third of the population will be making VoIP calls by 2010and so has recently launched its own internet telephone adapter. The £50 boxplugs in to a telephone line, converting calls made on a conventional phone into internet calls. This reduces the cost to 2p per minute for many internationalcalls and 10p per minute for UK mobile calls.

Not prepared for fluOne of VoIPs huge advantages over traditional telephony is that staff can workfrom their normal work telephone number, no matter where they are (so longas they have broadband access). Whilst this makes it the perfect business con-tinuity tool, new research, carried out by DataMonitor for VoIP provider Mitelhas revealed that more than half (52%) of city firms have no plans in place todeal with the outbreak of a pandemic. Ian Bevington, vertical marketing spe-cialist at Mitel, said: “The financial services sector, in particular, should beleading the way because of the very nature of their business and importance tothe economy. They must have plans in place to deal with a potential disaster,or face the very real prospect of severe financial losses.”

Still time to register forVoIP For Business showRegistration is still open for the VoIP For Business show atwww.voipforbusiness.co.uk. The event takes place at theNational Hall, Olympia, London on March 21st-22nd andincludes free education seminars in four theatres. These are freefor those who have pre-registered for the show to obtain aattendee’s badge.

MobileGoogleMobile VoIP company Truphonehas announced that Google Talkusers can now connect with Tru-phone mobile handsets anywherein the world for free. James Tagg,Truphone’s CEO, said: “Interoper-ability between Google Talk andTruphone means the web/mobileVoIP divide has been bridged.Google Talk can call Truphone, andTruphone can call Google Talk.”

Truphone has confirmed thatits mobile VoIP service is nowalso supported on three newNokia handsets announcedtoday: the Wi-Fi-equipped E61i,E65 and E90 models.

Users of Truphone’s low-costmobile VoIP service can now

make and receive internetphone calls on their

mobiles from more than700 additional Wi-Fihotspots in popularlocations across 14countries in Europe,

following an agreementbetween Truphone and

freehotspot.com.

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VoIP to go wireless

Video conferenceboost from VoIP

This time next year, the VoIP landscape will be very dif-ferent. Plans are being worked out at BT to rollout met-ropolitan Wi-Fi areas in several key British cities whichwould enable VoIP customers to make and receive callson their mobile or laptop whilst on the move.

Already the likes of London, Liverpool,Leeds and Manchester have had Wi-Fimetropolitan zones launched by BTand the plan is to have several morecities added to the list by this time nextyear. The significance, according toMotorola’s Principal Solutions Archi-tect, Steve Plunkett, will be internettelephony moving on from challeng-ing fixed line providers to revolution-ising the mobile phone industry.

“At the moment, consumer VoIP hasreally been about internet telephonycompeting with your fixed lineprovider,” he points out.

“This is all going to change with Wi-Fi networks linking up to provide citycentre access. These metropolitan net-works are going to mean you can takeyour home or office phone aroundwith you and use it just as you wouldat home or in the office, it would be thesame handset and people would still bereaching you on the same number.

“It’s all part of a really exciting roll

of Wi-Fi that’s going to really changethe way we live, from parking metersthat talk to the local authority so theycan have their rates changes or warnwhen their time has expired, to peoplesitting on a park bench playing a com-puter game against someone the otherside of the world.”

According to Plunkett the revolu-tion will not stop at city centres

“What will be incredibly interesting

is when these Wi-Fi networks that arebeing built in metropolitan areas arecombined with Wi-Max networks. Wi-Max is a different, but related, technol-ogy that will work with Wi-Fi, and willprovide access on a far wider scale. Sowhen the two combine, it would meansomebody could be on the move acrossmuch of the country and still be able touse a mobile phone to make VoIP calls.”

Call handlingThe quest for true mobility is alsosomething VoIP experts believe willbe provided within the next couple ofyears, if work on standardisation iscompleted. At the moment, a personmaking calls on a Wi-Fi network can-not switch seamlessly in to a GSMnetwork, and vice versa. Hence, thevision of a person starting a call ontheir office Wi-Fi networks and thenhailing a cab outside and carrying onthe conversation on the way to ameeting remains just that, a vision.

Motorola claims to have built sucha system but it is ‘on ice’ waiting forstandards to become available.

“We’ve built it for our own testoffice in America,” Plunkett reveals.“The trouble is, although it worksfine, we need agreed standards other-wise it won’t take off. There is workbeing done on this Voice Call Conti-nuity (VCT), when that’s complete Ithink it will be common to movebetween Wi-Fi and GSM networkswith the phone always seeking outthe cheapest route for the user.”

Video conferencing has always been a feature compa-nies have been interested in yet many have done little toimplement because, traditionally, the technology hasbeen expensive and inflexible.

That is all changing with IP telepho-ny. Just as VoIP enables voice to betransmitted over the same network asdata, it also allows video content toaccompany a voice. For the first time,the promise of cutting back on thecorporate travel bill without severelypushing up the telecoms budget isbecoming realistic.

“Traditionally video conferencingrelied on ISDN lines,” explains Dun-can Feakes, Sales Manager at Sony’svideo conferencing and security divi-sion, Ipela.

“So every time you made a video

conference call it cost you money andto get the necessary bandwidth youwould need to typically install twolines which were more often than notrouted in to a central meeting room.

“IP is changing all that. Today com-panies will have an IP networkaround their sites which means peo-ple can video conference at the pushof a button and there’s no callcharge.”

Desktop viewingPerhaps, most importantly, by makingvideo conferencing easier and cheap-

er, it is now becoming a common desktop feature. Rather than require peo-ple to book a meeting room and set upa complicated call, staff can simplyselect a button on their PC screen.

“With companies that haveequipped their staff to have what’scalled a ‘telepresence’ they can see ontheir PC screen who is contactable,just like a buddy list for instant mes-senger,” Feakes adds.

“Then you just click on them to ini-tiate a video conference, if someoneelse picks up for them and they don’thave video, then you will just have avoice conversation with them. If theycan then transfer you to the personyou were trying to call, you can goback to having a video call.”

Big future aheadVoIP industry experts are predictingthat video conferencing will be a keyfeature companies build in to IP sys-tems in the future because it has longbeen recognised that roughly 70 percent of communication is non verbal.Hence if staff can see the person theyare talking to, they not only under-stand one another better, they alsofeel like they are building up a profes-sional ‘human’ relationship – some-thing the phone cannot replicatealone.

There is also the very real benefit ofstaff being able to collaborate andshow one another products and pro-totypes.

Whilst nobody would suggest videoconferencing will replace the need totravel, it is clear that the technology isnow far more affordable and flexibleallowing teams in different parts ofthe world to truly feel that they areworking together as a team, even ifthey only rarely fly in to headquartersfor face to face meetings.

VoIP plans for ‘What if?’No business can afford to be without its phone lines, yet no matter how expen-sive or sophisticated a network may be, most companies are only the slip of aworkman’s drill away from losing voice or data, or even both, for several hours.

Factor in the risks of a natural disaster or terrorist attack, or a plain old-fashioned IT mishap, and companies would be remiss not to at least askthemselves, “What if?”

One of the major selling points of VoIP is that it fits in to the concerns ofthe modern world, better than traditional land lines. With voice over IP thenumber a person has follows them around and they can easily plug in aphone in to any broadband network around the world and still be called ontheir regular number. This is totally different to conventional telecomswhere a socket has a number attached to it – be it in the office or at home –and whatever phone you plug in to it, the number remains the same. Henceif a terror attack, natural disaster or pandemic hits, staff do not need to trav-el in to work, they can log on from home or a client’s office for as long as ittakes for an office to reopen.

VoIP also has the advantage that it is ultimately computer based and so itcan be set up to carry out specific tasks in the event of a problem. If a tradi-tional landline is cut and clients are trying to call in, they will not be able toget through and have no idea that there is a problem. With many VoIP serv-ices, the moment an employee or department is set up with a number analternative default number can also be programmed in. It is a service whichKerry Ritz, managing director of VoIP provider, Vonage claims is provingvery popular. “Not everyone offers it but it’s such a useful feature, althoughyou don’t find out how useful until you actually need it,” he argues.

“When you set up a number with us you can put in another, most normal-ly for a mobile or perhaps a home or alternative office number. This canobviously be changed in an instant by logging on and adding a differentnumber. “Then if there’s ever a problem with the IP network you’re making acall on, the call, will be routed to the default number, as will future callsuntil the problem is fixed.”

Video and face to face important tooResearchers have found that an over-reliance on email, a failure to respondto messages, and the use of inappropriate modes of communication candamage trust and hamper the progress of critical projects. When virtualteams neglect the need to socialise, make visual contact and establish up-to-date communication guidelines, the trust they form is often fragile and eas-ily compromised, leading to conflicts and the breakdown of relationships,the report finds.

The Cisco study, “The Psychology of Effective Business Communicationsin Geographically Dispersed Teams”, carried out by occupational psycholo-gy specialists at Pearn Kandola, examines the erosion of trust which canaffect virtual teams. By comparing the pros and cons of computer-basedcommunication with face-to-face interactions, the report identifies newrules for communicating that will help virtual teams to work together suc-cessfully.

Virtual communication ‘best practices’ recommended in the reportinclude agreeing to protocols on response times, and establishing rules forthe selection of media and the frequency of communications, especially inmulti-cultural teams. Encouraging socialising and ad-hoc chats over a vir-tual ‘coffee machine’ by using spontaneous and richer media for communi-cations can also speed up the development of trust.

“Through globalisation, virtual teams are becoming a common feature inmany organisations – but virtual teams often struggle to be as successful asco-located teams,” commented Carolyn Shearsmith, an occupational psy-chologist at Pearn Kandola and a co-author of the report.

The report highlights the issues that contribute to the success or failure ofvirtual teamwork. Users of electronic communication can take up to fourtimes as long to exchange the same number of messages as communicatingface-to-face, particularly as non-verbal cues can account for up to 63 per-cent of the social meaning within face-to-face exchanges.

Medium attentionThis year is also expected to be thetime in which VoIP systems, whichhave traditionally been built aroundglobal enterprises, are scaled down sothey are more suited to small andmedium businesses.

Chris Lindsay, Acting General Man-ager of Broadband and VoIP at BT,predicts whilst large companies willcontinue to opt for VoIP medium sizedbusiness, that have been traditionally‘caught in the middle’, will see them-selves targeted this year with the typeof telephony services they had previ-ously considered too expensive.

“These metropolitannetworks are going to

mean you can take yourhome or office phone

around with you and useit just as you would at

home or in the office“

At Mitel®, being different is key to everything we do.

Our approach is different. It’s not about the technology. It’s about you and how you manageyour customer relationships.

We unify your communications so you can improve your business processes. Gain a distinctcompetitive advantage. Maintain and grow your customer base. Our solutions are designedwith you in mind. To be flexible, tailored and cost-effective – and to strengthen your businessand empower your people through better communications.

Get the winning difference. Get Mitel.

Find out what different can do for you. Contact Mitel today at 0870 909 3030.

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Business communications solutionsthat are all about you.

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