Rick --
This is a great question, as the area is highly interesting to
computer, network, telecommunications and cable companies.
The opportunities in IP telephony are exploding, both in replacing
voice services and in entirely new "value added" IP services. The
interest is so high that Sage Research, a telecommunications research
firm in Natick, MA, said in 2001 that 86% of U.S. corporations were
evaluating IP telephone.
In a recent issue of Multichannel News, a publication for the cable
industry, Michael Harris (former editor of Cable Datacom News) and now
principal analyst for Kinetic Strategies predicts 5.8M subscribers in
4 years, with IP rollouts accelerating in 2004.
Multichannel News
"Comcast Rises to VOIP Challenge"
(Sept. 9, 2002)
http://www.proberesearch.com/presscoverage/sep02-multi-comcast.pdf
Probe Research has published a report that says large corporate use of
voice-over-IP will rise to 80% in the next five years and that a new
segment of "enhanced" IP services will grow rapidly enough to account
for 20% of revenues by 2007. The value-added services include
teleconferencing, instant messaging, white boards and multi-media
distribution.
Note too that Probe Research does a good job covering all of the
issues for this topic area; you may wish to browse through their site
for other articles -- particularly to see the impact on frame relay
and ATM services.
Probe Research
"Optimistic Forecast for Enterprise VOIP Services Market"
(Sept. 11, 2002)
http://www.proberesearch.com/presscoverage/sep02-prn-optimistic.pdf
However, Probe doesn't see significant immediate impact to frame relay
and ATM services.
"Demand Strong But Finite for Frame Relay, ATM Services"
(Oct. 2, 2002)
http://www.proberesearch.com/press%20releases/uscsmec02v5n8.pdf
In the European market, growth rates are also very high. Analysys
Research, a Cambridge, UK, research company, predicts that VOIP will
be between 15-41% of the European corporate market. Similar to Probe,
Analysys says that the difference will depend on "value-added"
applications. The report is summarized in a press release on the
Analysys site titled
"Corporate VOIP Market Could Reach 7.4 Billion EUROS by 2007"
(June 6, 2002)
www.analysys.com
The worries for both European and American concerns are whether
companies will be able to respond to the need for additional
investment in infrastructure to deliver VOIP services.
Finally, Sage Research, outlines a number of user issues in
implementing VOIP in a press release on a forum held early this
summer.
"VoIP: A Conversation With Early Adopters"
(June 20, 2002)
http://www.sageresearch.com/JulyVOIP.htm
Google search strategy: start with the telecommunications research
companies and do a site search for:
voice + IP
VOIP
If you need additional clarification, please don't hesitate to ask
before rating this question.
Best regards,
Omnivorous-GA |
Clarification of Answer by
omnivorous-ga
on
11 Nov 2002 06:31 PST
Rick --
After posting the answer on Sunday, I was organizing some research
sources that I routinely use and found a new one for
telecommunications and VOIP data. Though I'd never seen it before, I
seems to have some incredibly detailed information on message traffic:
http://www.telegeography.com/
Telegeography is pegging current volumes for VOIP at 10% worldwide.
Though the public reports don't state it, I think that you'll find the
most-extensive use in the U.S. because Internet use is most-extensive
in the U.S. However, as the Analysys information notes, European use
is following closely.
Best regards,
Omnivorous-GA
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