Cable operators eyeing hosted VoIP for SMEs

Cable operators are hoping to gain a share of the hosted VoIP small business market, according to new research.

ABI Research claims that the global market for hosted services will exceed $34 billion in 2012 and cable operators are increasingly seeing it as a good source of revenue.

"Cable companies have a lot of fibre capacity available in their urban and suburban networks," explained principal analyst Michael Arden.

"The cores of these networks are fairly free of bottlenecks, and operators have realised that they can target small businesses largely using existing resources, and at relatively little added expense."

ABI points out that voice services are usually bundled with internet access, and sometimes with storage network or VPN (virtual private network) services.

"Offering VoIP and related services to small businesses is one way for the cable operators to undercut the telecom companies," Mr Arden said.

He added that cable companies need to develop solutions that scale down easily, thereby undercutting large telecoms firms which tend to develop solutions "so large that they're often inefficient and uneconomical at the small end".

Posted on: 2007-03-02, in: General VoIP

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