***VoiceCon 2003
February 17-20, 2003
By James Sneeringer
Washington, DC
Voice over IP was supposed to solve all the problems of
enterprise telephony:
- Free enterprises from reliance on a single provider;
- Enable easy interoperability of equipment;
- Reduce the complexity of network changes;
- Streamline the infrastructure to one network;
- Integrate with other communications;
- Provide new features; and
- Save money.
At VoiceCon 2003 this year we found that for many of these
promises, there are still major questions about the degree to
which they can be achieved. The big picture story is that while
the technology continues to develop, VoIP remains a market driven
primarily by its vendors, rather than demand. Unresolved
questions about standards, implementation, security, and
particularly cost will keep many enterprises from deploying VoIP
in anything more than a small pilot or early adopter mode, if at
all, for at least the next year. Uncertainty makes it difficult
to predict the return on an investment, a deal-killer especially
in current financial conditions.
Even vendors themselves are wary of VoIP as it stands today.
During a session entitled "The Great Debate: Is Enterprise VoIP
Secure Enough for Deployment Today?", Karyn Mashima, Senior VP of
Strategy and Technology at Avaya, and Lee Sutterfield, President
of SecureLogix, opened our eyes with two gotcha questions and
their answers:
- Lee: How much of Avaya's internal phone system today is VoIP?
- Karyn: It is not deployed in much of operations.
- Lee: No one is using VoIP widely. Our estimate is about 1-2% of
your system is VoIP. (Karyn did not challenge this estimate.)
- Karyn: Who should install VoIP?
- Lee: Companies doing small greenfield or pilot projects. I do
not recommend that companies deploy this on a large scale [due to
network and security issues].
The Independent Perspective
VoiceCon concluded with a "Locknote"--a panel discussion of 5
industry consultants and journalists. This was one of the most
valuable sessions, providing an overview on the topics and themes
raised at the conference. Consensus was surprisingly easy to
find.
- Are there compelling applications for VoIP above and beyond
current enterprise phone systems?
-- All five agreed that based on what is currently available, the
answer is no. There are promising developments, particularly in
vertical markets, but nothing now shipping. For many customers
the issue is still just a question of installing it and getting
it to work reliably.
- Does VoIP provide cost savings?
-- If the total cost of installing and maintaining a VoIP system
on an existing network is considered, the answer is generally no.
There are several components to this:
Wave Issue 0305 3/2/03 Article 2-01