The report surveys 10 companies “to Watch” and compares 16 cloud solutions in a matrix to clarify strengths and weaknesses.

A complete description of the report [...]]]>

Want to know more about SMB video conferencing? Robert Poe has just released a 31 or 32 page report “SMB Video Conferencing: Getting Beyond Clouds & Interoperability.”

The report surveys 10 companies “to Watch” and compares 16 cloud solutions in a matrix to clarify strengths and weaknesses.

A complete description of the report can be found here.  You can get your hands on a copy for $299.

The service is “made possible” through cloud computing technology – whatever that means these days – and is managed by M5, who stores and [...]]]>

Speaking of VoIP recording, hosted business VoIP provider M5 Networks (www.m5.net) has announced M5 Replay, adding the ability for customers to record and retrieve recorded calls through a web interface.

The service is “made possible” through cloud computing technology – whatever that means these days – and is managed by M5, who stores and handles all the data involved.  Recording can be customized for any number of a business clients’ employees.  Basic features include searching through recorded calls by caller name, phone number, time of call, date, or call duration, among other attributes.

Customers can choose three modes for recording.  Full-time recording continually records each employee’s phone calls and enables recordings to be paused from their desk phone.  Employee-initiated recording is controlled directly from each employee’s desk.  Look back recording offers employees the ability to record a call in progress from when it was initiated.   

Needless to say, recording calls can have certain legal implications, so the customer needs to make sure they are following all applicable local, state, and federal laws.

The solution includes unlimited local and long distance calling, web conferencing with video, Internet fax *sigh*, call recording and “more.”  It’s a hosted [...]]]>

SMB business service provider 8×8 (www.8×8.com) – cuz if you’re offering more than phone, you’re more than an ITSP – has launched Virtual Office Solo service for $7.99 per month. 

The solution includes unlimited local and long distance calling, web conferencing with video, Internet fax *sigh*, call recording and “more.”  It’s a hosted (i.e., cloud) service, and includes free Virtual Office apps for iPhone and Android for call management/call handling and caller ID display; access to Virtual Meeting video web conferencing for up to 15 peeps; a UC-style inbox with inbound call log, voicemail, and faxes received, plus history tab that tracks meeting appointments and even chat records.

Installation takes “less than two minutes,” says 8×8.

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.

“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.

Phone.com (www.phone.com) has cranked out a whole bunch of mobile features for its SMB service, including clients for the iPhone and Apple plus SMB send support on phone.com phone numbers.

Released in June, Phone.com added the Phone.com Mobile VoIP client for the iPhone and the [...]]]>

Note: Phone.com is an advertiser on HD Voice News

Phone.com (www.phone.com) has cranked out a whole bunch of mobile features for its SMB service, including clients for the iPhone and Apple plus SMB send support on phone.com phone numbers.

Released in June, Phone.com added the Phone.com Mobile VoIP client for the iPhone and the Phone.com Mobile Office Client for Android.  The Mobile VoIP client enables iDevice users to use their Phone.com virtual account to place VoIP calls over either a Wi-Fi or 3G connection. 

The Mobile Office Android client provides a user interface to enable Phone.com users to listen to/manage/read voicemail, view received faxes, review call history, block calls from unwanted or unidentified numbers, send and receive SMS messages, click-to-connect to a private conference bridge and (of course) use Phone.com to make low cost international calls.

Both apps show the user’s Phone.com number as the caller ID when calls are made and both apps can be downloaded free from their respective app store sites.

SMS send and receive is now included with all Phone.com local numbers and plans, so anyone can send an SMS text message directly to a local Phone.com number.  The new feature is free of charge and included in every Phone.com plan.

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.

The speed is made possible by Comcast’s rollout of [...]]]>

Comcast has announced the launch of 100 Mbps high-speed Internet services for businesses in Minneapolis/St. Paul.  The asymmetric service (100 Mbps down/15 Mbps up) also includes a bundle of business applications including Microsoft Communication Service, anti-virus software.  And it’s all available at $370 per month..

The speed is made possible by Comcast’s rollout of DOCSIS 3.0 service while the Microsoft Communications Services bundle includes Windows SharePoint and Microsoft Outlook using Microsoft Exchange Server.  Anti-virus software is McAfee’s and covers up to 25 PCs.

Can’t wait to see this service turn up in Philly and watch the sparks fly between Comcast and Verizon .  Also be interesting to see when Comcast tosses a hosted VoIP bundle (preferably HD) into the mix to really make things interesting for telcos.

According to XO, the upgrade will be completed later this year and is being done to continue to meet the increasing demand for high-capacity network services from [...]]]>

XO Communications bragged about its third major nationwide network capacity upgrade last week.  Using Infinera equipment, the company has “more than” doubled its inter-city transport network capacity.

According to XO, the upgrade will be completed later this year and is being done to continue to meet the increasing demand for high-capacity network services from its customers, including carriers, service providers, and large enterprise customers.  As a part of the upgrade, XO will be offering a “10 Gigs in 10 Days” carrier service guarantee, able to provision high-speed service (from 1 GBps to 40 Gbps, with up to 100 Gbps in the future) between any two points in the network in 10 days or less.

(And I remember when it took weeks to get a T-3 in…)

XO says it has invest more than $450 million to enhance and expand its network infrastructure and its network is now capable of reaching nearly half of all busiensses in the United States. This is a good sign for both IP communications and economic growth in general…