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VoIP Week in Review From TMCnet: IPO's and Open Standards Galore
BY JOHANNE TORRES
TMCnet VoIP Minute Watch Columnist
This week has been a great one in the VoIP industry. From all of the big stories TMCnet has reported on this week, it is clear that Vonage reportedly filing for an IPO; Google announcing Google Talk and Skype opening up its platform so developers integrate the company's instant messaging software client to Web-based applications were the most significant.
Vonage filing for an IPO?
TMCnet's coverage on strong rumors about Vonage Holdings Corporation filing for an initial public offering (IPO) really stood out from all VoIP industry stories published this week. According to a TheDeal.com report on Thursday, the VoIP-based calling services provider's move will help the company raise as much as $600 million.
Last May, the company announced it had completed a successful $200-million private financing round, and then told a Red Herring magazine reporter that it had no immediate plans to file for an IPO.
This is what TMCnet's own Rich Tehrani had to say about Vonage's reported IPO filing: "Vonage IPO would be a huge deal in the VoIP market. It is huge because Vonage will be a barometer for the entire VoIP industry and more importantly its success or failure will be amplified a thousands times due to its influence on the companies in this space and the capital markets reaction (or over-reaction) to whatever develops."
For more on Tehrani's view on Vonage's venture please visit his blog journal, as well as TMC's Tom Keating's blog entries on this big news.
Google intros Google Talk
Google announced the launch of an instant messenger (IM)/voice chatting client on Wednesday called Google Talk. The search giant will first be launching the client to be compatible with Windows 2000 and Windows XP. The company expects to make the client Mac-compatible in the near future. According an Associated Press (AP) report released Wednesday, Google Talk will require users to "have an account with the company's free Gmail e-mail system."
Google Talk's voice chatting feature does not include PC to PSTN calling and it "requires that both the caller and recipient have speakers and a microphone hooked up to their computers. It does not currently offer an adapter to which regular phones can be connected," AP reported.
Don't forget to check out TMCnet's own Tom Keating's Google Talk review! In his blog, Keating shows live conversations taken place on Wednesday morning, in addition to screenshots. During his first call, Keating found the sound quality to be excellent and latency to be minimal.
Keating described his experience: "I actually made a PSTN call and a Google Talk call and held the microphone up to the PSTN phone I was using. On the remote end I had the person turn his external speakers up so I could hear when my voice came through. I did some simple counting and almost immediately I could hear my voice come out of the remote speakers, into the remote callers phone handset, over the PSTN, and then to my phone handset. Pretty amazing how minimal the latency was considering it was round trip."
Keating found, however that users are not able to "right-click" contacts to immediately initiate a Google Talk voice call. The editor found annoying that he had to actually "start a chat session first" in order to make a call.
For more on his review, please check out his blog.
TMC's VoIP Minute Watch reported on SIPphone Inc. announcing it planned to link its Gizmo Project (a Skype-like VoIP calling/text IM client) to the Google Talk network on Wednesday; and on Thursday, it heard from Akonix, an enterprise IM security company, announcing it will now provide full support for enterprise users of Google Talk.
Skype's open standards client
Perhaps fueled by Google's announcement, Skype made public intentions of having its application Programming Interface (API) for its SkypeNet and SkypeWeb services allow anyone in the Skype Developer Program to integrate the company's open instant messaging (IM) platform to Web-based applications.
TMCnet's own Robert Liu reported Skype's news. "Skype appears to be pinning its hopes on the ability for developers to take its open API and integrate the IM/presence platform to access the estimated 51 million people already registered to use Skype’s free services. Skype said its service is offered in 27 languages and has already been downloaded over 150 million ties by 225 countries and territories. In addition to the free users, Skype claims to have over 2 million people using its SkypeIn paid services and supports over 3 million people using the service concurrently. In that sense, Skype's believes it is already larger than AOL," wrote Liu on Wednesday.
There you have it folks, another exciting week in the VoIP industry! VoIP Minute Watch will keep you informed regarding these stories. Keep your eyes open for any news as we approach the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)'s August 29 (yes, that's this coming Monday!) deadline for all VoIP providers to inform their users of the state of their E-911 offerings. Keep tuned in!
UPDATE: VoIP providers have until Sept. 28 to notify customers of E911 limitations. VoIP subscribers are required to acknowledge they were informed about E911 access deficiencies by then, or lose service. Read all about it here.
Johanne Torres is contributing editor for TMCnet. To see more articles by Johanne Torres, please visit:
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