VoIP News: April 2007

Fixed mobile convergence (FMC) is growing at an incredible pace, according to new research released today. Pyramid Research claims that the current figure of 400,000 FMC users is set to rise to 18 million by 2011. This level of growth will lead, Pyramid projects, to an almost 70-fold increase in value of the FMC sector, up to $9 billion annually.

The EU has released a survey showing significant increases in use of phone calls over the internet and mobile networks, as the Commission looks to investigate the telecom giants. The survey was conducted across all EU member states on a sample of 27,000 representative households. It showed an increasing uptake of mobile and internet solutions over the traditional fixed line services.

Business spending on legacy services will be overtaken by IP and Ethernet in 2010 as firms move towards next generation networks, In-Stat reports. "Carriers continue to expand the capabilities of IP VPN and Ethernet services, making them an increasingly attractive alternative to legacy services such as Frame Relay and Private Line," said Steve Hansen, In-Stat analyst. "Looking forward to 2010, these services will be the leading revenue generators in the enterprise segment.

The country's academic institutions could be linked via VoIP as part of plans to encourage more remote telephony and conferencing. Ukerna (the UK Education and Research Networking Association) which currently oversees the successful Janet academic network is planning to introduce VoIP to around 750 institutions across the country and reach around 18 million potential users, reports Computing. It is hoped that the Janet Talk initiative will help academics to reduce call costs as well as encouraging greater cooperation by utilising the facilities already in place.

The concept of voice communications as a service is becoming very appealing to the small businesses sector, and the market for such services will reach $416 million this year - up from about $165 million in 2005, AMI Partners reports. The research firm said that between 2005 and 2010, the cumulative growth rate will cross 56. 9 per cent in the United States.