Should I be looking at Voice Over Internet Protocol technology at
this point in time? What are the advantages of merging voice and
data networks and will there be any cost savings?
Consider the advantagesChristoph Wittman, senior
principal, AMS
The short answer is yes, you should be looking at the advantages of
Voice Over Internet protocol (VoIP). However, whether you proceed
is very specific to your organisation. Reduced cost is the primary
benefit and business driver for the move to VoIP. This will
encompass fees to external service providers, equipment purchase
(or depreciation) and maintenance. But VoIP will not significantly
reduce costs in all cases.
If you are seriously considering the move, the primary trade-off
will be service quality. You should analyse current voice traffic
patterns and ask whether this traffic is mostly internal, local or
international. To which countries and at what times are your calls
made? And can you afford to suffer slight service degradation?
VoIP quality is not consistent for all voice traffic. It can't be
relied on for long distance and international sales calls with
clients. When VoIP calls go across multiple carriers and networks,
you also can't guarantee the quality of service.
Some common quality of service standards will be provided by
version 6 of the IP technology, but it will not be a panacea and
this version will not be ubiquitous for at least three to four
years. Most quality of service problems will get better through
improvements in network management techniques within and across
network operators not based on the implementation of IPv6.
From this baseline, you can start moving some traffic to VoIP by
conducting a differential cost analysis. Companies don't find it
beneficial to move all their traffic to VoIP. Typically, internal
international traffic is the low hanging fruit for VoIP cost
savings. But as the price and quality of data communications
improves, you should continue migrating voice traffic to VoIP.
Try it and seeMark Hodienne, engagement director,
Concours Group
Organisations that use scenarios to underpin their e-strategies
will have a head start. A good radar process will have picked up
advancements in speech recognition technology and the introduction
of VoiceXML that move us towards rich multimodal applications.
The time is right for business managers to begin playing with the
concept of a voice-Web. What new products and services are
possible? How can customer and partner relationships be
strengthened? What new efficiencies can be achieved? A robust model
of the benefits that voice technology brings will help
organisations to understand when to dive in and invest.
"Launch and learn" is the appropriate mindset. Look for a basic
application for a limited market to assess opportunity and build
capability before scaling up investment. The interactive digital
television market in the UK provides many examples of players that
are launching and learning; these early movers are taking in
important lessons about the characteristics of a new channel.
Likewise, early movers in voice will learn important lessons that
translate into sustainable business value.
If it looks like voice will have a major impact on your business
model, then it is probably time to start playing.
Check your
network firstRoger Rawlinson, head of consultancy, NCC
Group
On the assumption that you are looking at data/ voice integration,
then voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) should be considered.
The key questions cover the issue of whether it will work for your
requirements and whether there will be cost savings. Your patterns
of usage are an important factor. For instance, are there a
significant number of international calls? Or are the majority
local or internal to the organisation?
The fundamental requirement for voice provision is quality of
service and there must be guaranteed bandwidth. Delays in
transmission or garbled speech is not acceptable and is a far worse
scenario than "drop outs" typically associated with mobile phone
calls.
It is not just a case of implementing voice over the data network,
you will need to re-design it to produce a voice/data network
catering for both types of traffic.
If the network is outside your areas of control, you have a
problem, as you cannot guarantee quality of service. There are
scenarios in the public sector where joined-up networks will
deliver the quality of service, similarly a private company could
implement a "closed" system between offices. The key is having the
control over the bandwidth.
There are gains to be made, such as significantly cheaper long
distance and international calls over IP, consolidation of voice
and data network and less duplication of support services. A key
factor to remember, though, is that it is not a simple add-on, you
must consider a re-design to obtain the benefits.