Offering solutions from 10 users up to 1000 users – this would cover SMB up to [...]]]>

LG-Ericsson has launched the iPECS-LIK business communications products family.  The company says iPECS-LIK delivers all of the functionality of a traditional PBX (and seriously, who is buying a “traditional” PBX these days?) with the addition of UC features.

Offering solutions from 10 users up to 1000 users – this would cover SMB up to the “entry level” for the enterprise, depending on who’s definition you use – iPECS-LIK is a pure IP platform and includes applications such as PDA and PC softphones, a PC attendant for incoming call management, UC, unified messaging with an open interface based on TAPI and an Advanced Interface Messaging (AIM, hmm) interface for computer telephony integration with third-party apps.

There’s also specialized interfaces for the hospitality market and Skype Connect for SIP.

The iPECS-LIK Call Server provides a bunch of telephony features, including the usual hold/transfer and video calling, plus least-cost routing, incoming call distribution, and SIP trunking.  “Standard SIP terminals” and legacy digital phones are supported.

An LG-Ericsson Unified Communications System, provides unified messaging capability that combines voice, instant messaging, video and FAX and email messaging under a single easy-to-use intuitive user interface.  You’ve got the usual advanced features like multi-phone ring, ACD supervisor, ACD statistics reporting, caller-controlled routing, and caller ID routing.

Needless to say, there’s a lot of stuff that I’m not listing here.  Support for HD voice via G.722 is available.

The snom ONE plus is scalable from 20 to 150 extensions and comes pre-installed and configured as a plug-and-play hardware appliance for deployment with nearly all of the company’s IP phones.  

Two versions are [...]]]>

It was inevitable. Snom (www.snom.com) has put the company’s snom ONE IP PBX software into a rack-mountable package. 

The snom ONE plus is scalable from 20 to 150 extensions and comes pre-installed and configured as a plug-and-play hardware appliance for deployment with nearly all of the company’s IP phones.  

Two versions are available, corresponding to the two software versions of snom; Yellow is good for up to 20 extensions while Blue goes up to 150 extensions.  Starting price on yellow, depending on config, is $2131 suggested MSRP while blue can go up to $3921, with choices of ISDN, FXO, FXS, and T1 and E1.

Snom resellers will likely eat the ONE plus up because they don’t have to install software or futz with configuring hardware.

The software-only IP PBX is available immediately through snom distributors and VARs and comes in three flavors. A free [...]]]>

Snom (www.snom.com) has gone official with its IP PBX offering. “Tightly integrated” with the company’s desktop IP phones, snom ONE’s introduction is likely to make its resellers happy and perhaps Digium (www.digium.com) a little annoyed.

The software-only IP PBX is available immediately through snom distributors and VARs and comes in three flavors. A free downloadable version is available for up to 10 extensions; snom ONE yellow handles up to 20 extensions while snom ONE blue has an “unlimited” number of extensions and multi-tenant capabilities for up to five companies.

All versions offer a full feature set, including hunt and ACD groups, mailbox, auto attendant, conference rooms and paging, and are designed to take full advantage of the hardware features of snom’s suite of desktop phones and endpoints. snom ONE blue also allows up to five separate corporate tenants, supporting multiple organizations to operate using a single IP PBX.

Other features include what you’d expect from an IP PBX with simultaneous ringing of desktop and cell phone, multiple extension aliases, centralized address book, hot desking, voice mail, shared line emulation and a web interface for provisioning and management. The snom ONE is compatible with Windows, Linux and Mac environments and is equipped with robust web security through HTTPS and call security through TLS and SRTP. snom ONE supports mixed IPv4/IPv6 LAN and WAN environments and comes with an automatic blacklisting feature that makes it possible to expose public IP addresses.

Up until recently, snom was pretty tight with Digium.  Rolling out a “free” PBX at the low-end (under 10 users) and an unlimited turn-key version capable of running run multi-tenant suggests snom and its resellers aren’t seeing the sort of support and features out of Asterisk they need.

Founder Steinmann started up SIPfoundry and the sipXecs project in 2004, along with morphing [...]]]>

Newly launched eZuce (www.ezuce.com) comes with some familiar names in the IP PBX world. Hoping onto the UC bandwagon – ok, so everyone is these days – eZuce openUC is bragging about seven years of development through SIPfoundry efforts.

Founder Steinmann started up SIPfoundry and the sipXecs project in 2004, along with morphing Pingtel from a handset manufacturer into an open source IP PBX software company .  He was rolled into Nortel in 2008 with the acquisition of Pingtel from its parking spot at BlueSocket to support its implementation of sipXecs as the Software Communications System (SCS), but you know what happened to Nortel, right? Also onboard is SIPfoundry/sipXecs-er Doug Huber, who is listed as “Lead Architect.”

eZuce openUC is being touted as an enterprise-grade open alternative to Microsoft, and being targeted at firms with anywhere from 200 to 10,000 users.  There’s also some positioning to put it as “where Asterisk left off” – uh, guys, do you really want to go there again? – by offering a fully standards-based solution for replacing existing legacy IP PBX systems both as premise-based CPE and through hosted deployments.

Yes, I’m skeptical. If one remembers the snake-bit history of Pingtel – parked at BlueSocket because the cash ran out, then bought by Nortel before it went bankrupt – you might be skeptical as well.

“Rich Calling” integrates data from CRM and IVR tools for SMBs, giving [...]]]>

Ringio (www.ringio.com) has completed its public beta (It doeth beg the question as to what that means, but it’s nicer than how Google handles its beta process, regardless) and has added more than a dozen new features to its “Rich Calling” service.

“Rich Calling” integrates data from CRM and IVR tools for SMBs, giving customers “call center style” screen pops, visibility into coworker availability and “sophisticated” call routing.

New features include a “Bring Your Own PBX” function, allowing pre-existing PBXes to work with Ringio, enabling calls and CRM displays to be routed directly to those on PBX extensions as well as (of course) on direct-inward-dial numbers without having to change recorded greetings or prompts; Ringio can also do the whole “virtual extension” PBX trick, adding/creating a PBX out of home and mobile numbers.

Caller-centric router sounds cool, by being able to automatically great callers by name (OK, it’s a cheap caller ID trick, but long overdue) and automatically routing them to the person they spoke with last. Calls can be routed to a predefined list of employees or evenly distributed to all employees to handle particular heavy call volume.

Starting cost for Ringio is $99 a month for four (4) users, with additional users added at $25 per month.

Goodness is expected in seamless SIP [...]]]>

Among the news I’m catching up on from IT EXPO East 2010 is the team up between Dialogic and Ingate to build Ingate’s SIP Trunking software module into a new enterprise border element designed to connect “virtually any” (well, it is virtual…) SIP trunk with virtually any PBX.

Goodness is expected in seamless SIP trunk deployments in legacy TDM and hybrid PBX environments, as well as new SIP-based PBX systems. Ingate’s SIP trunking software module provides enterprise session border control (SBC) along with advanced routing capabilities for connecting SIP trunks to enterprise networks and branch offices by using Ingate’s proxy-based traversal and security technology. The software is also designed to resolve interop issues between service provider SIP services and the SIP-based systems being deployed inside corporate data networks.

Dialogic’s contribution is media gateway technologies to provide the protocols and interfaces necessary to connect to a wide variety of legacy phone and network equipment, both TDM and IP. The new enterprise border element from Dialogic will combine the functions normally found in a media gateway and an enterprise session border controller into a single product.

Dialogic plans to make a first set of enterprise border elements available later this year, with configurations offering SIP trunking, legacy PBX connectivity through the usual suspects (PRI/E1/T1 and ISDN BRI).

FREETALK Connect is schedule to roll out in March and will allow SBs (two to 49 users) to enable Skype calls from supported office phones, including the “free” Skype-to-Skype calls, mange Skype contact lists, and [...]]]>

Down in Miami last week, all the buzz was around FREETALK Connect, an PBX solution built to leverage Skype.

FREETALK Connect is schedule to roll out in March and will allow SBs (two to 49 users) to enable Skype calls from supported office phones, including the “free” Skype-to-Skype calls, mange Skype contact lists, and get inbound voice calls from Skype users.  In addition, they can also participate in the Skype for SIP open beta to make low-cost global calls around the world from a desktop phone.

The box is a partnership between FREETALK and Jazinga, with the latter company providing the software platform for doing thing like callback/dial-around/ access to Skype buddy lists, auto attendant/IVR, paging, cal parking, remote extensions, music on hold, and conferencing.  The FREETALK Connect box also includes managed routes to users, phone services, and apps, SIP/Skype service management, and router management.

Supported phones on the network are auto-detected and configured by FREETALK Connect and there’s an on-screen wizard for configuring everything that needs to be configured.

If that’s not enough, FREETALK announced the FREETALK Connect Alliance, an ecosystem of 13 supporting companies for the product to provide apps, products, and services for the box.  Alliance members range around the globe from Italy to Taiwan and include Cloudvox, IfByPhone, Iotum, Jazinga, Skype, Tatung, Thomas Howe’s Light and Electric, Voxeo, and Voxbone.

Last week, I and about 26 other analysts and media were in Huntsville, Alabama as guests of ADTRAN.  The company was making its introductory launch of a unified communications (UC) software [...]]]>

WARNING: Some of the pictures below are pretty big and might freak out your browser and/or cause slow load times for this page.

Last week, I and about 26 other analysts and media were in Huntsville, Alabama as guests of ADTRAN.  The company was making its introductory launch of a unified communications (UC) software solution — a big step off the company’s traditional path of making telecommunications equipment such as switches, routers, and multi-service access solutions…more about that later.

Southern hospitality is the rule in Huntsville, so there’s a welcoming bag in the hotel room.

Inside the bag are samples of the area’s cultural touchstones–

Gotta love folks who provides you with Jack and coke upon check in, along with a Moon Pie, freeze-dried ice cream, and one of those Cracker Barrel triangle/golf tee games.

Our “home” for the next two days was ADTRAN’s Mark C. Smith Conference Center.  People may recall that Smith also has a conference room named after him over at Digium.

Smith, the founder of ADTRAN, is still revered at the company and the values he established for running and operating the business are still in strong force.

ADTRAN has a total of three high-rise buildings around a “lake” in the office park.

The picture above is taken from a window of the conference center.  Inside those buildings are a bunch of testing labs, one of two assembly lines for products, and a secure storage area to put products before they are shipped out.

This is the third building, and the one where the conference center is. It also has a manufacturing line and a whole bunch of testing labs.

ADTRAN CEO Tom Stanton welcoming the goonies, er media to the Unify press event.

Why Unify? ADTRAN is layering unified communications upon its product offerings, moving up the food chain from infrastructure to IP PBXes to apps.  Company execs admit they aren’t sure how the introduction of a software product is going to affect their channel partner relationships – a startling honest statement from the traditional “everything has its place” engineering culture.

Smith, brought in to [...]]]>

Glendale AZ & Washington DC – As Digium celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Asterisk IP telephony platform this week at the AstriCon developer’s conference with cake and funny hats, this year’s keynote presentation by IBM CTO Mike Smith drifted into the mundane and dull — a very good thing.

Smith, brought in to talk about Digium’s role as an ISV (independent software vendor) in IBM’s Smart Cube platform/Smart Business program, put up a series of slides and descriptions for IBM’s ISV certification process to warm the heart of any nervous SMB IT work thinking about purchasing Asterisk for a Smart Cube server through IBM’s online applications store.

Since IBM services as the single point of contact or — as Smith described it – “the single throat to choke” — for technical support on the Smart Cube, Digium had to adjust and code and jump through  a number of hoops so a commercial version of Asterisk would be available through Big Blue.

Net-net of the qualification process is a product that IBM is comfortable offering.  It may be dull, but this is a good thing since IBM’s process and attention to detail is the sort of thing that will give warm fuzzies to anyone prone to buy IBM servers for their business — fuzzies that extend to the purchase of Asterisk as an IP PBX solution loaded on the Smart Cube Server.

This is a Good Thing. It isn’t PR sexy like the whole Skype for Asterisk announcement last year (and BTW, we know where those Skype folks are these days), but it is another solid step in moving Asterisk into the corporate mainstream.

IBM is also providing another channel for Digium to distribute Asterisk and channel partners who sell the Smart Cube solution now get a chance to provide a PBX along with a data server — plus making some money in providing handsets and configuring a phone system for their customers.  Again, contrast the potential here for Digium to grow its business through (dull but trusted) IBM and its channel partners verses last year’s talk from Skype to A) Develop a business strategy B) Find and train channel partners and C) Ultimately make money by recurring revenue on SkypeOut minutes sold…

(FYI, Skype was talking up love of channels and the Skype partner program about a month ago in Miami, but that’s what they were talking about last year at AstriCon 2008 and at CES 2009… so what’s the hold up?)

Net-net: IBM may not be exciting and flashy, but for most buyers, this is a Very Good Thing indeed.