The Italian post office opts to introduce VoIP

The Italian national postal service is upgrading its communications infrastructure with Voice over IP (VoIP) technologies, it has emerged.

Gruppo Poste Italiane (GPI) oversees all postal operations in the European country, as well as providing logistical, financial and communication services.

Bosses at the organisation have agreed to a network infrastructure upgrade with view to rolling out VoIP services to all 14,000 of its branches throughout Italy.

The VoIP network will enable GPI employees to easily connect to the central network via dedicated phones, as well as access other digital communications services.

Vicenzo Musella, GPI's network development manager, said that the rollout will enable the group to "centralise the fundamental functions for supplying core network services [and] ensure maximum availability while at the same time contributing to the server consolidation process".

"The simplification of network service management also allows us to reduce the operational impact and the timescales for the definition and provision of these services," he added.

Birmingham City Council is currently considering a £5 million project to roll-out VoIP-enabled technology across all its operations.