Digium Expands Focus of AstriCon 2009 Conference

In an effort to reach a broader group of professionals who design and manage large enterprise, government and carrier networks, Digium (News - Alert) is expanding the focus of the upcoming AstriCon Open Source Telephony Conference and Exhibition.

 

The event will take place Oct. 13 to 15 at the Renaissance Glendale Hotel and Spa near Phoenix. The conference comes as Digium, the Huntsville, Ala.-based company that created and develops Asterisk, the popular open source telephony platform, celebrates the 10^th anniversary of Asterisk’s release as an open source project.

 

The event is open to Asterisk software developers, Digium’s channel and technology partners, and users from small, medium and large companies. New this year, the conference will feature a dedicated track targeting Asterisk’s move into mainstream large enterprise and government markets, the company said.

 

“Asterisk’s increased uptake by bigger companies and carriers spurred our decision to broaden the focus of AstriCon this year,” Mark Spencer, Digium’s founder and chief technology officer, said in a statement. “We’re excited to offer a dedicated track for developers and to offer equally strong programs for other audiences.”

 

Keynote speakers for the conference will be revealed mid-month, Spencer said. Registration for the AstriCon 2009 event is available here.

 

The conference, which is in its sixth year, targets people who work with phone systems, unified communications and Voice over IP, the company said. It attracts hundreds of attendees.

 

And this year, Digium is working with Technology Marketing Corporation to promote the event to a larger group of people to drive attendance. TMC (News - Alert) helped support other Digium events, including Digium|Asterisk World, with training sessions, video production, attendee registration and exhibit management.

 

In related news, Digium recently expanded its relationship with Ascom, a wireless telephone and messaging systems company. Ascom (News - Alert) is adding Digium’s larger-capacity Asterisk Appliance 60 and Asterisk Appliance 350 telephony platform to its branded product line. The company plans to sell the products under the Ascom Analog VoIPGateway name in North America in select markets, the firm said.

 

Digium also announced that its Asterisk-based products are certified interoperable with Speakeasy's (News - Alert)  expanded SIP Trunking integrated voice and data services. As TMCnet reported, Small to medium-sized businesses using Speakeasy’s SIP trunking can now couple the service with a flexible Asterisk-based IP PBX from Digium -- including Digium's Switchvox (News - Alert) SMB and Switchvox SOHO IP PBXs, as well as its AsteriskNOW open source telephony platform. This gives SMBs another option to affordably deploy unified communications across organizations, the company said.