Forrester: SMBs increasing UC engagement

According to the latest Forrester report, 88% of North American and European SMBs will increase the deployment and use of unified communications technologies.

Forrester: UC is a high priority

According to a new report from Forrester, UC is a high priority for companies:

• For 11%, implement/expand UC is critical and for 40% it is a high priority
• For 12%, IP videoconferencing is critical and for 40% it is a high priority
• 43% have implemented/are implementing, expanding or piloting UC
• 12% are planning UC projects in the next 12 months
• 43% are planning UC projects in the next 12 or more months
• Only 3% are not interested in UC

NetworkWorld: 70% increase deployment of softphones

According to NetworkWorld, 70% of companies are increasing their deployment of softphones, while only 18% of firms have no plans to deploy softphones of any kind.

Softphones are now becoming commonplace and are mainly used in the following 3 ways:

- Replacement of desktop phones
- For teleworkers for whom provisioning a dedicated desktop phone is cost prohibitive
- For traveling workers, such as salespeople and service professionals, to provide telephony services via laptops and to decrease mobile phone costs.

Main users:

- Mobile and home workers
- Hoteling workers
- Workers in temporary locations (e.g. customer's site)
- Contact-center and support personnel

Forrester: Awareness of UC potential increasing

Forrester report "Jump-Starting The Unified Communications Market - Prospective UC Buyers Are Waiting For System Interoperability" from September 2010:

Prospective buyers of unified communications (UC) systems are becoming more aware of the potential benefits, but UC trial and deployment activity remains stagnant. Many buyers are waiting for interoperability — or at least a credible promise of future interoperability — to reduce the financial and technical risks they undertake when deploying UC systems. Like Vladimir and Estragon in Samuel Beckett's Waiting For Godot, they are not sure exactly what they are waiting for, but they continue to wait nonetheless. Vendors will accelerate the UC market by selling systems based on open standards like Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP), and SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions (SIMPLE) to a combination of IT, business management, and financial buyers. Systems original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) need the cooperation of channel partners, particularly those that offer a range of UC management capabilities, from simple on-site management to cloud-based UC solutions.

Stage of UC adaption:
- 28% interested, but no plans
- 19% planning to implement in a year or more
- 12% planning to implement in the next 12 months
- 9% piloting
- 9% expanding/upgrade existing implementation
- 5% not interested

60% of companies agree that their employees/users are actively using UC software

Forrester report

Frost & Sullivan: IP Telephony, SIP Services Market to Grow

VoIP and SIP market +40.1% in terms of user base and +22.3% in terms of revenues 2009. Revenues of $717.3 mio. in 2009, estimated revenues $3.9 billion in 2016.

Article on TMCnet

VoIP lines reach 21 million subs, 13% of wireline market

VoIP subscribers now account for 13% of wireline telephone service in the U.S (about 21 million users, according to a report released this week by the FCC (PDF). The commission tees up new approaches to regulating both the traditional voice and broadband sectors of the industry.

Juniper Research: 470.6 billion mobile VoIP minutes by 2015

A new Juniper Research predicts that 3G/4G mobile VoIP minutes will rise from 15 billion in 2010 to 470.6 billion by 2015, particularly in developed markets.

is-phone tested by David Strom with Vonage on OS X

David Storm has tested is-phone Portable on Mac with his Vonage account and has published his experiences on his blog.

There is also a screenshot published showing the settings needed to connect to a Vonage account:

Around 20 mio. Americans now use VoIP

Telappliant reports:

Around 20 million Americans now regularly use IP telephony solutions according to Research & Markets.

Cable companies in the US are now expanding their VoIP services to a significant number of users.

A statement read: "Strong subscriber and revenue growth rates have positioned VoIP firmly on the US telecommunications map."

R&M claims the entry of Microsoft and Apple, as well as internet giants Google and Yahoo! has assisted the growth of the industry.

Furthermore, mobile VoIP is predicted to boom following the widespread adoption of Wi-Fi enabled handsets.

Customers may also be tempted to adopt VoIP solutions following the improvements made to networks.

Mobile operators Verizon Wireless and AT&T Mobility have both decided to significantly invest in 4G networks which "will propel mobile VoIP into the mainstream of mobile telecommunications".

GigaOM: 30bn video calls by 2015

Tenfold increase in video calls & chats over the next 5 years, up from 3bn in 2010 to 29.6bn in 2015, according to GigaOM Pro. Large-scale broadband adoption, low-cost integrated web cams and free video-chat services driving expansion.

Most video calls are currently made on PCs, but use of web-connected TVs and smartphones will increase by 2015. Number of users making video calls from mobiles likely to rise from 3m to 143m, generating revenues of USD3.4bn by 2015. Mobile video calling to get a boost from new iPhone, which is expected to have a front-facing camera. The report warns that the introduction of tiered pricing and caps for mobile data may hinder growth in mobile video calls.

SMB VoIP: Huge growth

41% of UK businesses have already deployed VoIP. Further 20% looking at deploying VoIP over the coming year (+50% in penetration of IP telephony over the next 12 months). IP telephony was found to be the fastest growing segment of the European enterprise market in 2009.

SMBs are realising there are huge savings to be made from IP telephony for companies of all sizes from those with less than 20 employees to organisations with 1000-plus staff.

Full article on Commsdealer Online

Mobile VoIP users to exceed 100m by 2012

Juniper Research reports that worldwide users of mobile voice-over-IP (VoIP) will exceed 100m by 2012. >50% will reside in Europe and North America (correlation between 3G access and mobile VoIP take-up).

Mobile operators likely to lose USD5bn in revenue by 2015 because of mobile VoIP apps on Wi-Fi networks. Traffic volumes likely to be be higher in developing markets (calling patterns of migrant workers).

Forrester: CaaS heats up

According to Forrester Research, the Communications-as-a-service (CaaS) market is heating up. CaaS delivers voice, conferencing, contact center, IVR, and unified communications services from services providers' or vendors' networks and secure platform. Customers typically pay per user, per month, or per transaction for full life-cycle support. Providers offer sophisticated applications in the cloud, allowing companies to deploy advanced unified communications services quickly and affordably across a distributed environment. Surveys show that there is high interest by enterprise communication decision-makers in adopting CaaS services in the future.

Forrester report

Home office: Many advantages

Oliver Gassmann, chairman of the Institute for Technology Management at the University in St. Gallen: Home office work clearly decreases illness and absences. Occurence of burn-out syndroms is 45% lower (5% instead of 48%) when employees are working periodically from home. An average office worker is disturbed every 11 minutes and needs after each break 8 minutes till reaching full concentration. Also unproductive meetings and noise of other employees are disturbing the flow of work. Home office workers are not only more focused, but also faster.

Survey in the US: 60% of Americans prefer home office work for a better work-life balance. Around 30% have more time for their family due to home office work. 47% appreciate that due to home office work, they spare travel time.

Mathias Binswanger, professor for political economy at the advanced technical college of Nordwestschweiz: Home office work is reducing stress and increasing quality of life. In Switzerland, productivity could be improved 30% due to home office work and till 2020, home office use will increase tenfold.

Nearly 300 mio. will use mobile VoIP by 2013

There will be 288m mobile voice-over-IP (VoIP) users by 2013, generating annual revenues of USD35.2bn, according to market research firm In-Stat. More than 50% of these will use online mobile VoIP providers, nearly 33% will access the service via their mobile operator or 3G MVNO, and 11% will use 4G WiMAX or LTE operators. According to the report, the Asia-Pacific region will see the biggest growth rates and overtake Europe to become the market leader.

The growth of VoIP services and 3G networks has led analysts to speculate that all calls made via mobile phones will eventually be VoIP. The services are

• much less expensive than traditional phone calls, especially internationally, and
  
• could force operators to cut the prices of mobile plans with inclusive minutes.

For this reason, operators are reluctant to embrace VoIP.

Mobile VoIP set to explode

• Number of consumers using mobile VoIP will approach 288 million by 2013
• 50% of these users will get their service from an online mobile VoIP provider, under 1/3 will use it over 3G through a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) or wireless operator, and 11% will use a WiMax or LTE operator
• 10 years from now more than 50% of mobile voice traffic will be carried end to end using VoIP
• It is clear that mobile VoIP is starting to become a lot more palatable to wireless operators if they are able to retain some of the control

Full article on Connected Planet

Research companies' positive view on Hosted/IP/VoIP PBX

Several research companies incl. In-Stat, GIA and Synergy Research Group believe in an increasing Hosted/IP/VoIP PBX market:

• Hosted PBX offers business-specific benefits
• Interest in IP PBX is revitalizing
• VoIP PBX appeals to businesses due to the innovation, costs savings and potential revenue generation it offers
• superior business-grade flavour of VoIP offered by IP PBX is attracting businesses to it
• IP PBX is more acceptable to IT managers in terms of management, security and integration
• VoIP adoption by businesses is expected to regain momentum in 2010

Full article from Telappliant

Cisco: VoIP Enables Innovation

Two Cisco Execs describing VoIP technology for SMBs:

• VoIP has enabled innovation in telephony like nothing before it
• We will see higher adoption rates of video telephony with small business customers
• Each user can have the same basic experience, regardless of fixed location or mobile

Full article on Phone+

TMC: Over 100 mio. VoIP subscriptions worldwide

The latest analysis from Point Topic reveals that by the end of September 2009 VoIP subscriptions had grown by 15% in the first 3 quarters of the year to pass the 100 million milestone. The number is close to 110 million today.

Top 10 Countries - VoIP subscribers (not softclient: Point Topic includes only verifiable IP-based telephone subscriptions in these statistics. Services like Skype which are softclient (ie originating on the PC) and which do not report user numbers but only ''minutes'' of calls are excluded.)

1 USA 22,704,900
2 Japan 21,368,000
3 France 16,125,000
4 Germany 8,100,000
5 China 5,000,000
6 South Korea 4,846,839
7 Italy 4,187,000
8 Canada 3,607,318
9 Netherlands 3,446,400
10 UK 2,950,000

"Conditions are starting to become common that should allow for faster growth in the next couple of years, especially when VoIP is provided for a low price in a bundle with broadband and TV. There's certainly enough headroom in enough markets to see adoption increase markedly," says Bosnell.

Full report

Global IP PBX Market $9.05 billion by 2015

Global Industry Analysts “GIA”: IP PBX market is reviving the otherwise stagnant telecommunication industry. Businesses are replacing TDM systems with IP PBX’s across verticals who can benefit from an IP PBX or hosted PBX.

European & North American businesses will increase budgets to allow purchase and deployment of IP PBX and IP telephony services and systems, intend to complete migrations to IP telephony by 2012.

Providers who offer solutions to meet business needs at a good price point, and that are reliable, will have a chance to take hold in this market.

Full article on TMC

Frost & Sullivan: Cost efficiency of VoIP/IP Telephony too large to ignore

TMC wrote in an article about a new Frost & Sullivan report, that more businesses realize the value of IP solutions over legacy infrastructure, and as more value-added applications are being introduced.

"IP has emerged as the foundation for a number of technologies designed to build a new cost-efficient infrastructure for the enterprise."

Collaborative tools drives innovation and productivitiy and together with cost savings, IP is essential to corporates' strategy.

The market is likely to generate $7.6 billion in 2014 as in 2008. Line shipments will continue to grow from 46.8 mio. in 2008 to 52.3 mio. in 2024.