Is Open Source Telephony Ready for Prime Time? Yes.
June 16, 2004
original article appears in Network World, 06/07/04
Now is the time to begin implementing open source IP telephony. Here's why:
Open source business models are changing market dynamics.
Open source, coupled with subscription-based software licensing, is
now a widely accepted business model with significant momentum. Linux
and Red Hat are the best examples of the successful pairing of open source
technology (Linux) with a subscription-based software license (Red Hat).
Red Hat says eight of the top 10 global investment banks are customers. Goldman
Sachs' recent IT spending survey reports that Red Hat ranks first among software
companies gaining share of IT dollars. Linux is having its greatest effect in the
data center, where mission-critical functions are run on higher-end servers and
the majority of enterprise IT dollars are spent.
Strong end-user benefits are driving the adoption of
open source technology and subscription-based business models. The benefits
of open source subscription-based business models include improved product quality,
enhanced innovation, reduced cost, promotion of standards and elimination of vendor
lock-in. In a recent IDC survey, more than 40% of CIOs said Linux is an important
part of their IT strategy. According to a recent Jupiter Research report, price-sensitive
small and midsize businesses are turning to Linux and other open source products as
a lower-cost alternative to proprietary vendor offerings.
Reliable, cost-effective open source IP telephony
products are available today. Open source IP toll-bypass products and open
source IP softphones are on the market. An open source IP PBX product scored
on par with proprietary products in a recent Miercom evaluation. In fact,
Miercom recently selected that same open source IP PBX product to benchmark
Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) interoperability. In addition, CT Labs
recently tested an open source IP PBX for feature completeness and found the
product provided all the necessary features required for an enterprise-grade
IP telephony solution.
Open source-based IP telephony companies can change the
market before traditional vendors respond. Traditional telephony system
vendors cannot meet user needs without radical changes to their products
and business models.
The cornerstone of the traditional telephony industry -
proprietary call control - must first be eliminated. The best means to achieve
this is through open source. Forward-thinking industry observers now expect
SIP-based open source IP telephony products will replace proprietary hardware
and software with standard Linux servers, open call control, and a mixture of
open source and proprietary application software. Combining open source
with a technology such as SIP offers the industry a stable, reliable and
independent platform on which to build distributed applications. SIP provides
a framework for multi-vendor interoperability and a compelling business proposition
to value-added resellers and system integrators, and for the first time gives
customers choices. Now is the time to say no to proprietary call control and
vendor lock-in, and deploy standards-based IP telephony products.
Related Memeber:
Zenas Hutcheson
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