VoIP call centres 'to weather downturn'

Call centres which use VoIP phones are likely to do better in light of the worldwide economic slump than many other sectors, according to a new study.

Infonetics Research revealed that the IP contact centre (IPCC) market performed well last year, with growth of 37 per cent compared with 2007, despite the well-documented slowdown of the global economy.

The firm said the Asia Pacific region was particularly strong, although vendors as a whole reported good sales.

In terms of the coming year, Infonetics predicted that the overall unified communications market would slow in line with spending on telephony in general, but that the IPCC sector would do better than others.

"The IPCC market will slow down in 2009, but should do relatively well as customers find IP contact centres, self service, and automation cost effective ways to deliver on customer service," said Matthias Machowinski, the firm's directing analyst for enterprise voice and data.

Infonetics also revealed that the first half of last year saw more than one million IPCC seats sold globally.