The VOIP Provider Guide

Jajah, the VOIP telephony provider, has received backing from Deutsche Telekom via its financial investment unit T-Online Venture Fund. The investment follows hot on the heels of similar backing from Intel earlier this month.

Deutsche has been facing a downturn in demand for its fixed-line services for some time, and this is seen as a move to revive profits and shift focus into the promising VOIP market. Last week, the mobile telephony arm of DT launched “The Wing”, a new smartphone allowing owners to make calls via WiFi in supported hotspots across the United States.

With several of the leading VOIP Providers all vying for customers in an ultra-competitive market, it remains to be seen whether the relative late-comers can cut it in a sector which has seen incredible amounts of investment over the past couple of years. The purchase of Skype by eBay in 2005 was arguably the starting point of what is now fast-becoming a burgeoning and saturated marketplace.

Jajah offers a range of VOIP services to users, and is targeting a number of corporate accounts with business telephony services and call center functions. Their overall aim, though, seems to be the end user and their desire for “free calls from anywhere”. Jajah promise their customers a unique and varied range of services and VOIP solutions. Watch this space to see if they achieve their aims.

INTRODUCTION: Technologies that use the Internet and Internet protocol (“IP”) networks to deliver voice communications have the potential to reduce costs, support innovation, and improve access to communications services within developing countries and around the world.

VoIP, Internet Telephony, Voice-over-the-Internet: What are they?The terms Voice-over-Internet Protocol (“VoIP”), IP telephony, Internet telephony, and Voice-over-the-Internet (“VoN”) is given different meanings by different commentators and in fact have no universally agreed-upon meaning. There are, however, distinctions to be kept in mind, for IP can be used in various ways for the transmission of voice. As used in this memo, VoIP is a generic term that refers to all types of voice communication using Internet protocol (IP) technology instead of traditional circuit switched technology. This includes use of packet technologies by telecommunications companies to carry voice at the core of their networks in ways that are not controlled by and not apparent to end users. VoN, also called Internet telephony, on the other hand is a service that end users decide to use — it is a specialized form of VoIP in which a regular voice telephone call is transmitted via the public Internet, thus bypassing all or part of the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Internet telephony can occur between computers (computer-to-computer), between a computer and a phone (computer-to-phone), and between phones (phone-to-phone).

Advantages of IP for VoiceTelecommunications carriers around the world have already introduced IP into their networks because it provides economic benefits over traditional telecommunications networks. Greater Efficiency: The conventional circuit-switched technology of the PSTN requires a circuit — between the telephone company’s switch and the customer’s premise to be open and occupied for the — entire duration of a call, regardless of the amount of information transmitted. In contrast, on IP networks, all content — whether voice, text, video, computer programs, or numerous other forms of information — travels through the network in packets that are directed to their destination by diverse routes, sharing the same facilities most efficiently.

Lower Cost: IP systems will offer a more economical means for providing communication connections. Also — and this is one of the sources of concern on the part of incumbent voice long distance carriers — Internet technology makes available to anyone with a personal computer and modem the ability to bypass the long distance PSTN.

Higher Reliability: In some respects, IP networks also offer the potential for higher reliability than the circuit-switched network because IP networks automatically re-route packets around problems such as malfunctioning routers or damaged lines. Also, IP networks do not rely on a separate signaling network, which is vulnerable to outages.

Supporting Innovation: IP is a non proprietary standard agreed on by hardware and software developers, and is free to be used by anyone. This open architecture allows entrepreneurial firms to develop new hardware and software that can seamlessly fit into the network. In contrast, the circuit switched network operates as a closed system, thus making it more difficult for innovative developers to build and implement new applications.

CONCLUSIONS: The EU and the U.S. have concluded that IP telephony should not be subject to the same regulatory burdens as traditional telephone service. Imposing the heavy-hand of regulation now would stunt the development of this technology before it reached its potential. As the EU and FCC determined, if IP telephony technology improves to seriously challenge traditional telephone service, then a country can always revisit the question. But now is not the time to regulate this young technology that holds such promise. The promise Internet telephony offers is to enable people to communicate with others around the country and around the world at affordable rates. Countries would be smarter to not regulate IP telephony and to permit it to develop and provide benefits to the public. People everywhere will benefit most from a policy that enables many users and providers to take advantage of the technological capability offered by the Internet. The policy guidelines embodied by the ITU Report and Opinions provide a framework within which these same goals may be achieved.