VOIP Solution and Service

Nokia is launching a platform will enable operators to block specific types of data services, namely peer to peer file sharing and VoIP calls. The centralized solution is implemented as a software upgrade to the Nokia Flexi Intelligent Service Node (ISN) and will be commercially available during the first half of 2007.

With this VoIP blocker, Nokia wants to empower the mobile operators better manage their data traffic by controlling bandwidth-consuming applications including Skype and IM-related services. Thus this peer-to-peer Traffic Control solution enhances the service, subscriber, and access awareness capabilities of the Nokia Flexi ISN to identify data traffic according to the type of service, for example file sharing, so that operators can treat that traffic in a way that best optimizes the use of network resources according to the operators’ business strategy.

“With the explosion of affordable high-speed mobile data access, operators are now being challenged to make the best possible use of their networks, especially when peer-to-peer applications increase their traffic load and compete with their own services,” says Roberto Loiola, Vice President, Marketing and Sales, Networks, Nokia. He also adds, “The Nokia Peer-to-peer Traffic Control solution now gives operators the means to analyse and manage such traffic. It allows them to apply their business models by prioritizing the traffic of preferred services and partners, maximize their return on network investment, and avoid becoming only bit pipes for other content providers.”

Luca Filigheddu has given such good reviews about Sitofono in his website that I was tempted to try it and let my readers know about it. I can definitely say he was not wrong. This click-to-call solution offered by Abbeynet is really worth noting.

Sitofono is a simple click-to-call service that any web site or portal can use to get calls from their customers/website visitors for free. The websites can receive calls from their customers without the need for them to be registered to any VoIP service. The website or the portals can bind it to any fixed-line phone number worldwide for the over 60 country codes where Sitofono is active.

As for the customers, they don’t need to be registered to any VoIP service, they don’t need to have headphones, they don’t need to pay one single cent to call you. They just have to click and call you from their browser.

Just hold on. You don’t even need to have a website as well. Your email will work fine or you can get a personal Sitofono which can become your personal website. Starting from January 2007, Sitofono will offer a Voicemail for free as well and you’ll also be able to choose different numbers where you can be reached depending on the time of the day.

Click to call services are here to stay. They will make the difference between a normal, old web site and a truly 2.0 “speaking” website. Who can use it? Tell me who can’t? E-commerce portals, bloggers, banks, pubs, insurance, shops, mortgage portals, travel agents and so on and so forth.

Sitofono has just reached 100.000 business customers this week. It costs just € 499 /year, just about € 1,37 / day. As a perfect marketing strategy, Abbeynet is now giving away Sitofono for two months to selected companies which would like to try it out for FREE.

At Symbian Smartphone Show in London, Truphone announced a beta version of its free VoIP download for Nokia’s best-selling, Wi-Fi-enabled N80 mobile handset which will be available from the Truphone website soon.

Truphone handsets are free, worldwide. As a launch offer to the end of the year, USA users benefit from free calls to USA and Canada, while the unique UK telecoms market enables Truphone to offer UK users calls some two billion landlines in major countries for free until Dec 31st 2006. This means free mobiles calls to other Truphone users or very cheap calls to anyone else.

You can install Truphone wherever you are and begin making free or VoIP-rate calls right now. All you need is to download it. You will be given a Truphone number, which you can use to get a number of benefits over your current mobile.

Initially, only users in the UK and US will get Truphone numbers appropriate to their countries (i.e. +44 and +1 respectively). These users will be able to make and receive calls on their Truphone numbers just like a traditional mobile/cell phone.

Users in other countries will temporarily be given US Truphone numbers. They will be able to make free calls to other Truphone users and VoIP-rate calls to anyone else. We intend to roll out local numbering to other countries as soon as we can.

The company has opened a discussion forum at www.mobilevoipforum.org where users and developers can share their views and reviews

According to a 2004 study of consumers by The Derringer Research Group, the number of teleworkers supported by broadband connections leapt from 4.4 million in 2003 to 8.1 million in 2004.

A number of VoIP softwares are there in the market for telecommuting. For example, the Avaya Inc. softphone. With a broadband Internet connection at the home, the telecommuter can blend in Netmeeting, The Avaya gear offers the flexibility of using the softphone or using an IP handset that connects to the corporate PBX via an IPSec virtual private network (VPN) connection. This gives end users flexibility and allows them to connect using whatever Internet connection they can get.

All the PBX features are extended to the telecommuter’s softphone or IP phone, including conferencing, call displays and call forwarding. Calls can also be forwarded to cell phones if telecommuters leave their home offices, and they can pick up voice mail and e-mail over the phone. Avaya text-to-speech software reads the e-mail. In addition, the remote workers can use speech access that listens to spoken commands to carry out calling or retrieving of information.

Recently Cisco Systems Inc. introduced VoIP phones that include VPN software, eliminating the need for a separate VPN router to tunnel calls over the Internet. This can reduce the initial cost of setup. Nortel Networks Corp. says its support for Session Initiation Protocol, while not new, is the most powerful telecommuter feature of its VoIP platforms, enabling workers to know the presence status of their co-workers and reach them by instant messaging, phone or videoconference.

VoIP technology in general lays the foundation for adding video capabilities, although these are not widely deployed yet. Voice quality over affordable broadband connections such as DSL and cable is too uncertain to trust to.

Nokia will find it hard to come out of its successful record sales of over four lakh phones all over India on October 19, the day when Diwali was celebrated in India. This is the highest figure it has sold anywhere in the world.

“Its more than what Nokia has ever sold on any Chinese new year,” says a dealer who has seen an Nokia internal communiqué on the matter.

The Company’s previous single day sales record was about one lakh phones. This is the kind of sales its competitors generally do over the entire year in India.

So, what has driven this buying frenzy? Blame it on Diwali mania but also credit Nokia with a smart product strategy. It has currently 38 models available on the retail shelf of which around 12-13 models can be categorized into the low-end segment.

This is also a reversal of fortunes for the Finnish company. Nokia was not too keen to focus on this area.

Chilean VoIP company Netline Telecomunicaciones has launched VoIP mobile and fixed line phone services for the mass market.

Netline general manager Joel Bendersky told the reporters that the company aims for 30,000 clients by October 2007 and 500,000 to 1 million in five years. The mobile phone uses Wi-Fi signals to connect to other fixed line and mobile units. Its release starts a three month pilot program in Chile. The service could eventually be launched in other Latin American countries and the US.

This service holds advantages over internet VoIP carriers such as Skype because it can be used to make emergency calls, comes in a smaller package and Netline is fully licensed as a local carrier.

The company offers pre-paid services payable through the internet in either monthly packages or per minute. The phone can also be used to make long distance calls.The company also unveiled a fixed line phone that connects directly to a broadband cable, something that it believes could appeal to SMEs as well as residential customers.

Bendersky said that the phone was aimed primarily at customers interested in cost savings more than increased mobility, adding that coverage was limited.

Source: Cellular news

VoIP conference software comes in two basic varieties: free and commercial.

The free VoIP conference software packages tend to be difficult to setup and use; the commercial VoIP conference software packages tend to be slick and easy to install and use.

Of course, the commercial VoIP conference software packages also come with setup fees and recurring costs for conference room access. The choice of the option depends on the budget of time and money.

Using VoIP in conferencing can surely help the companies reduce their expenses with the advent of new and substantially improved Web conferencing systems that integrate voice services. Some of them are Elluminate’s Elluminate Live 7.0, Interwise’s Interwise Connect 7.0 and Sonexis’ ConferenceManager. However these solutions still have a long way to go in eliminating teleconferencing costs.

Orange plans to offer mobile phones that can also make VoIP calls over a home Wi-Fi router. Orange had first announced its plans for the service naming it as Unik (for “unique”) on May 31. With this announcement Orange joins a growing number of European network operators offering similar services.

The new service will be available to Orange customers who subscribe to both its GSM mobile phone network and its DSL broadband Internet access service. Using a special mobile phone costing from €99 ($125), they will be able to make unlimited calls from home, connecting via Wi-Fi to their Livebox DSL home router. When they are outdoors, calls will be carried over Orange’s GSM network at the usual rates.

The Livebox can carry up to three simultaneous Wi-Fi calls, Orange said. Although Orange also offers GSM and DSL services in the U.K, it had said earlier that Unik would only be available in France.

Similar services combining GSM and Wi-Fi are available elsewhere in Europe, including BT Group’s Fusion, launched in the U.K. last year, Deutsche Telekom’s T-One, which opened in Germany in August, and TeliaSonera’s service Home Free, now available in Denmark.

Helsinki-headquartered F-Secure Corp, a leader in the internet and mobile security space, launched its technology centre in Kuala Lumpur this week. This is in sync with the company’s plans to bolster its presence in Asia. F-Secure is market leader in offering security through internet service providers (ISPs), having cornered 36% market share in the European Broadband ISP space and 25% in the combined European and North American markets.

F-Secure already has a technology centre in Helsinki. The Kuala Lumpur centre will be responsible for detecting and removing malware, spyware and rootkits, besides protecting customers from phishing attempts.

Voice over Internet protocol (VOIP), Wireless local area network (WLAN), Skype, etc. are some of the areas vulnerable to future virus attacks in Asia. Also, Internet security threats are on the rise with the expansion of broadband facilities. Cheaply available Voice over Internet Protocol numbers and Net calling are helping crooks launch new data-thieving scams.

In a twist on phishing, fraudsters are now calling their intended victims instead of e-mailing them. The fraudsters likely use stolen identities to set up a voice-response system and acquire local VoIP phone numbers.

Until recently, UK-based Vodafone had prided itself in being a ‘pure play’ mobile operator, unaffected by a declining fixedline business. But as the fixed and mobile businesses move to cheaper, combined services, the firm had to change track.

Vodafone Group Plc is the world’s leading mobile telecommunications company, providing a wide range of services including voice and data communications.

The company confirmed its plan to enter the fixed line broadband internet market via a deal with the wholesale arm of telecom firm BT Group. Vodafone, which had disclosed in May 2006 its plans to enter the broadband internet space, said it expected to launch the fixedline broadband internet service by the year end.

“This partnership will enable Vodafone’s customers to benefit from bundled packages of mobile and broadband services nationwide due to BT’s unique footprint in the UK,” Vodafone said in a statement.

In May, 2006 the company was aiming to get up the revenues over the next three to four years from its new Mobile Zone businesses, including converged fixed-mobile internet services. Competition in Britain;s broadband market is intense, with the Carphone Warehouse and BSkyB recently announcing cut-price packages.

Britain’s second biggest telecom group Cable & Wireless plc, recently exited the UK retail broadband market, because of stiff competition.