At the annual VoiceCon 2002 Conference and Exhibition, both Avaya
and 3Com announced new IP telephony products.
Avaya announced a roster of new products that demonstrate the
company's full embrace of IP telephony.
With a significant upgrade to its voice application software, new
servers and media gateways, Avaya is hoping its products will make
migration to a mixed voice and data network easier.
"With this announcement we really believe enterprises will have no
barriers to the move to convergence," said Pam Preston, director of
marketing for converged enterprise solutions at Avaya. "This really
brings the adoption significantly forward."
Avaya announced a new voice application software suite that runs on
multiple operating systems including Linux, dubbed MultiVantage;
three new servers, and two new media gateways; as well as the next
release of its IP Softphone.
Avaya's new voice application software suite, MultiVantage, runs on
multiple operating systems including Linux and Microsoft's Windows
2000. Evolved from the company's Definity software, MultiVantage
allows enterprises to integrate voice features and functionality
into IP-based LANs and WANs.
The three new Avaya Media Servers bolster their existing line of
servers and support most industry application program interfaces
and standards, thus making it easier for enterprises to run a mixed
vendor network.
Avaya's two new media gateways support voice traffic routed between
circuit-switched and packet-switched networks and also work in
standards-based data networks.
The new Avaya VisAbility Management Suite provides tools that make
it easier for enterprises to manage their network infrastructure,
including both voice and data communications, through a common
Web-based user interface.
Meanwhile, 3Com and PolyCom have introduced an IP-based conference
phone that was designed to integrate exclusively with 3Com's NB
platform for both voice and data networking.
One of the features of the SoundStation IP 300 3COM NBX phone
permits enterprises to hold their own voice conferences using tie
line functions over an IP network. This function eliminates the
need to provision an exclusive circuit between two offices within
close proximity to each other.