VoWLAN spreads rapidly across Europe

Strong growth of Voice over Wireless Local Area Network (VoWLAN) in Europe is increasing the ability of workers to keep in touch with the office when on the move, it has been suggested.

Such is the growing popularity of the web-based voice communication that market research firm IDC has predicted a 67 per cent increase in its use by 2011 to become an industry worth £350 million.

"VoWLAN in the enterprise is only now starting to attract widespread attention," said Evelien Wiggers, research manager for European Enterprise Networks at IDC.

"Given the benefits that voice over WLAN can bring to an enterprise, we expect the number of companies ready to implement VoWLAN to quickly grow in the next few years."

However, she added that there remains a need for wireless infrastructure to be upgraded to deal with the prioritising of voice over data to ensure it travels quickly and reliably over the networks.

"Most of the current enterprise WLAN networks do not provide enough coverage to deploy a valuable voice network. Voice networks require pervasive coverage, something the existing networks often do not provide," Ms Wiggers said.