Voip Tech Chat

Sun Microsystems Inc., (NASDAQ: JAVA) announced today a “series of changes” in response to the changing economic climate. You have to love their NASDAQ ticker name, don’t you?

In order to “accelerate the introduction of compelling open source innovations,” Sun will be restructuring the company into new business groups:

• Application Platform Software (JAVA, MySQL, etc.)
• Systems Platforms (Solaris Virtualization, Open Storage, etc.)
• Cloud Computing & Developer Platforms (StarOffice, NetBeans, etc.)

The restructuring aims to remove costs by 700 - 800 million dollars each year. Of course, there is also a human price tag — a reduction of 15 - 18% of the workforce (about 5000 - 6000 employees).

Sun provides popular open source software and promotes itself as a leader in the open source community. Popular Free, OpenSource Sun products include:

• Java
• MySQL Database Software
• OpenSolaris OS
• OpenOffice (Compare to MS Office)

snom introduced a new VoIP phone recently, the snom 820. We’re always excited to see new VoIP telephones enter the SIP market, especially ones that easily integrate with Asterisk and multiple VoIP solutions. And with built in WiFi, this phone looks to be a great addition to any deployment.

snom markets the 820 as reflecting “the 8 experience:”

The snom 820 is a new step in combining high class telephony with an extraordinary design. The snom 820 is the beginning of a superior line of business VoIP phones. It´s extraordinary elegance and performance combines both: latest technology and well known snom features. The snom 820 is an amazing experience for everybody who is used to the basic world of telephony.

The telephone boasts an impressive array of features such as:

• high resolution color display
• wideband voice
• integrated WiFi
• 5 way conferencing
• for all features, download the datasheet from VoIP Tech Chat

Pricing seems to range from $375.00 - $500.00.

Within a week of announcing store closures, Circuit City has now filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Cnet.com reports the store recently negotiated a 1.1 billion “debtor-in-possession revolving credit” to assist with working capital for the chain.

After closing 150 stores and providing massive lay-offs, the bankruptcy was almost a certainty.

Microsoft Response Point is the Microsoft version of VoIP. Do you sense a bit of sarcasm? Honestly, we don’t know. We will not use this post to feed the Microsoft vs. Linux debate. Instead we will use a “historical perspective” to explain our position and then move on…

Start Historical Perspective

The vast majority of VoIP solutions are built on top of a linux operating system. This translates to the stereotype of a rather large, geeky individual (have you seen the photo of Patrick and Fred?), installing the VoIP system, configuring phones, drinking caffeine, cursing at users, reconfiguring phones, talking about comic books, drinking more caffeine, and then working more on the VoIP system. When finished, the end result is generally a very stable and well run system. A system that works so well, that people are willing to listen to Fred and Patrick  (uh… we mean our geeky friend) talk about comic books; simply because the phone system (and network) run so well.

Enter Microsoft. Microsoft tries (and sometimes succeeds) in making products that a non-geek can implement. Through graphical user interfaces (GUIs), they allow the Microsoft user to point, click, and essentially “program” their needs into the Microsoft solution. For small businesses, without a geek on hand (or time on hand), the Microsoft solution can sometimes handle all of their needs and provide an excellent solution.

Yes… geeks are divided. Some geeks hate Microsoft as if Microsoft were the Space 1999 to their Star Trek. Other geeks, have evolved into more tolerant creatures; agreeing to disagree and live together with nice TCP/IP connected handshake. Sure, if you have a custom situation and wish to code a phone system to work specifically as you wish, you’re going to want to talk to some geeks. If you’re a small business, with let’s say 50 or less phones, and want a phone system for your office, Microsoft Response Point may be very helpful and also save you some money.

End Historical Perspective

Recently, VoIP Supply announced they will be offering the complete line of Microsoft Response Point small business VoIP phone systems from Aastra, D-Link, and Quanta. VoIP Supply even has a nice page for it on their website: http://www.voipsupply.com/phone-systems/response-point.

If you know an office looking for a simple, easy-to-use small business phone system, have them talk with the folks at VoIP Supply and see if the Microsoft Response Point system is a good fit.

As for us? We’re ready to talk about The Avengers movie coming out in less than 2 years.

The Wall Street Journal reported today that Circuit City is considering closing at least 150 stores in an attempt to avoid filing bankruptcy. The plan also includes the elimination of thousands of jobs.

For those who look for silver linings, the closing stores will be planning a liquidation sale of on-hand merchandise.

Update: cnet is already saying good-bye to Circuit City

Garrett Smith posted a great checklist on the VoIP Insider — Small Business VoIP Requirements List. Very good read.

Don’t take our word for it, read the article yourself.

Identifying the strength of Asterisk, the revenue of Switchvox, and the popularity of Astricon, iLocus predicts the next VoIP company to go public will be Digium. Of course, we believe that if you can put 5 hyperlinks in the first sentence, you should just stop and let the hyperlinks do the talking. We have been in a non-stock buying mode, but an IPO from Digium might just change our minds.

• Asterisk is free, open source software provided under the GNU General Public License (GPL). Asterisk is the most popular open source software available, with the Asterisk Community being the top influencer in VoIP.
• Digium®, Inc., the Asterisk company, is the original creator and primary developer of Asterisk, the industry’s first open source telephony platform. Digium provides quality hardware and software products, including AsteriskNOW™, the complete open source software appliance; Asterisk Business Edition™, the professional-grade version of Asterisk; the AA50, the Asterisk Appliance™ hardware-based telephony solution; and Switchvox, a complete turn-key IP PBX solution, to enterprises and telecommunications providers worldwide. Digium also offers a full range of professional services, including consulting, technical support, and custom software development. All of Digium’s commercially offered products come with the Exceptional Satisfaction Program™ (ESP), the only 100% customer satisfaction guarantee in the open source telephony world today.
• iLocus conducts Business-to-Business (B2B) market research i.e. market data concerning products/services that are traded between two businesses.

VoIP provider Packet 8 announced a profit of 1.2 million dollars in the first quarter. Last year the company reported a first quarter net profit of 508 thousand dollars. With the news sharing stories of economic crises and devastating business loses, a VoIP provider doubling profit couldn’t come at a better time.

The launch of Packet 8’s business trunking service helped the company gain more than 1,000 new business customers (they now have approximately 12,000 business clients).

Hotels provide nightmarish dreams for any phone engineer and many business were built solely to provide solutions to the hospitality industry. (The word hospitality almost never makes us think of a visit to a hotel, but that’s another story). Thing5 entered the business in 2004 to provide inbound, outbound, voicemail, IVR menus, and more to the hotel industry.

Well… yesterday Verizon Business announced that Thing5 will leverage the Verizon’s VoIP and hosting services to bring VoIP service to about 1,300 hotels having more than 275,000 telephones. Hotel phone service without VoIP — now there’s a true nightmare. Could you imagine changing an extension for thousands of phones without VoIP?