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VoIP - Not Just For Those on the Cutting Edge
by J. Eric Smith
Unless you've been living in a technological vacuum, you've probably heard of a new telephone technology called Voice-Over-IP (VoIP). Telecom vendors have sprung up overnight offering managed VoIP services to replace your traditional telephone Private Branch eXchange (PBX) and the headaches associated with managing and maintaining it. Meanwhile, traditional network equipment providers like Cisco are hawking wares aimed at moving your data network into position for VoIP. At the same time, traditional phone system vendors like Avaya are trying to move their phone equipment onto a network. The array of options multiplied by the rate of change leaves potential customers dizzy. Where to start?
First, it might be helpful to understand exactly what VoIP actually is -- or, more importantly, what it isn't. VoIP isn't some newfangled way of sending your voice from one phone to another, it's a variation on the PBX theme. For decades now, digital PBX's have been the norm, digitizing your voice and piping it as a stream of data packets to the PBX. There it is either routed to another phone on your network or sent out to the public telephone network. At a very high level, VoIP and PBX's are almost identical in what they do and how they do it.
So what's so good about VoIP if it's so similar to a traditional PBX? In a word: standardization. The PBX world has been ruled by proprietary setups since inception, with one vendors phones totally inoperable with another vendor's PBX's and vice versa. There have even been compatibility problems within a single vendor's product line. All the protocols allowing a phone to talk to a PBX have been completely proprietary, making upgrades difficult and complicating things like merging two offices or two companies with differing phone systems.
Making matters worse, phone system management has been cryptic for years, requiring expensive employees or consultants to manage them effectively. And since every vendor's management interface was different, if you changed phone systems, you either had to retrain your staff or hire new ones. From the perspective of a physical infrastructure, traditional PBX's demanded their own structured cabling, effectively doubling the amount of cable needed for each and every served location.
Contrast this with the standardization of VoIP. Phones run on standard Ethernet networks which are already present in 99% of the world's office buildings, cutting cabling costs. Management is largely handled by web-based graphical interfaces that are quick to learn and easy to use. An entire suite of standard protocols has been ratified and adopted by vendors across the spectrum, allowing Vendor A's phones to interoperate with Vendor B's call manager (the VoIP equivalent of a PBX). Expensive proprietary PBX hardware is replaced with standardized PC-based servers and management workstations.
Even better, VoIP phones are becoming more like small computers, running miniature applications and allowing unparalleled mobility. Or, you can eschew physical phones entirely and run a "virtual phone" application directly on your PC without a handset. Long distance calls between branch offices can be routed over the company's existing data network instead of expensive telephone lines, further saving money and increasing convenience. Voicemail and email can be merged, creating a "unified messaging" infrastructure allowing you access to all types of messaging, anywhere, anytime.
With all these advantages, it should come as no surprise that even the stodgiest traditional phone vendors see no future in PBX technology. Industry analysts see PBX vendors offering a VoIP-only product line within five years, although existing PBX products could continue to be supported for decades. For corporations looking to replace or substantially expand their existing phone infrastructure, VoIP is not only a viable choice, it is rapidly becoming the only choice.
VoIP is not just for companies that like to ride the technological edge. Companies steeped in tradition and slow to adopt new things have unexpectedly stepped into the VoIP world. Ford Motor Company, a firm not noted for mercurial technology adoption, recently committed to moving 50,000 employees at 110 facilities across the globe to VoIP. Ford expects to reap significant savings in long distance costs as well as support costs for the rollout, which will continue through 2008.
Clearly, VoIP isn't in the neat toy stage any longer, it's a full-fledged enterprise infrastructure component, one that offers ongoing savings and increased functionality at the same time. If you're looking to replace your aging phone system or expand an existing PBX, now is the time to seriously consider whether you want to own a system at the tail end of its technological lifespan or one that is just beginning to hit its prime.
