VoIP News: September 2007

VoIP 'can help mothers work from home'

Children need not be left at home while their mothers head off to work in the office, it has been suggested.

The growth of homeworking, supported by VoIP telephony systems, means that women have the opportunity to keep up with their career while still being a mother, claimed Karen Gill, the founder of business resource and support service everywoman.

"Working from home is an enormous motivator for women with children, who still do the lion's share of home and family care," she said.

Ms Gill highlighted that the major benefits of working from home for women are greater flexibility in managing their lives and the added time women can create for themselves or their children.

The spread of VoIP may see more women returning to jobs at larger corporations as they can balance their home life with work more easily.

Currently, one-fifth of self-employed women say that the main reason they are working for themselves is their family commitments.

Posted on: 2007-09-28, in: General VoIP

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VoIP gets voice-activated ads

In a new online advertising twist, one US-based VoIP provider has created a method of sending ads to the user depending on what they are talking about.

Pudding Media is trying to take advantage of the advertising potential of its user base by allowing marketers to display adverts of users' screens if the conversation mentioned topics highlighted in new terms.

"For example, a consumer talking about movies may see links to trailers, reviews and show times," the company explains.

Chief executive and co-founder of the firm, Ariel Maislos, said that the voice-activated adverts should let "brands reach consumers with more targeted, relevant offers and communications providers gain a new revenue stream".

The company said that tens of thousands of keywords are set to be made available for marketers to pay for, while there will also be the ability for advertisers to highlight special offers using the service.

Pudding Media also suggested that other VoIP operators may use its technology to run ad-supported voice-calling plans of their own in the future.

Posted on: 2007-09-28, in: General VoIP

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Maintenance 'critical' for VoIP service satisfaction

Ensuring VoIP telephony systems are well maintained and providing good customer support have been described as "critical" to the success of service providers.

The latest InfoTrack report examining the quality of maintenance and the level of customer satisfaction in the VoIP industry concluded that these two issues were having the largest impact on the success of an installation.

Warren Williams, the senior program director for InfoTrack for Enterprise Services and the author of the report, said that decision-makers in firms may pay attention to the features on offer, but assurances of reliability and low levels of risk were most likely to drive a VoIP systems purchase.

Such findings show that the relative youth of VoIP telephony systems compared to traditional communications is still making some companies wary of making the switch, despite many firms - ranging from the large to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) - already signing up.

However, this attitude is set to change as VoIP becomes more mainstream and firms continue to transfer to internet telephony to make call-cost savings and gain greater flexibility with their communications.

Earlier this month, the chairman of the Internet Telephony Services Providers Association, Eli Katz, said that VoIP had seen strong growth in the UK and its penetration in the telephony market had increased by "two to three times".

Posted on: 2007-09-27, in: General VoIP

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Government urged to set example in 'green' IT

In order to show companies the way forward in using information technology (IT) to reduce carbon emissions, cabinet minister Gillian Merron has urged government departments to invest in 'green' IT systems such as VoIP.

Speaking at a European e-government conference in Lisbon, Ms Merron told public sector information officers to take responsibility for sustainable IT projects and set an example for the rest of the UK.

"We have a responsibility to set a positive example on the environment, so I am asking our IT leaders to work with industry to find new ways to improve the sustainability of government computer systems," she said.

"This doesn't just mean reducing the amount of electricity they use, but also looking at how they can be designed and built in ways that consume fewer materials and which make recycling easier."

Organisations ranging from governments to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have found that by increasing the number of employees who work from home they can lessen their carbon footprint due to the reduced pollution from workers' cars.

Homeworking is made a more viable proposition for companies who invest in secure VoIP and IP PBX systems to transfer calls via the web to employees outside of the office without compromising on security.

Posted on: 2007-09-27, in: General VoIP

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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.

Posted on: 2007-09-27, in: Telephony technology

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