Hosted Business VoIP and UC Services to Significantly Increase in Four Years

Infonetics Research’s latest report entitled, “VoIP and UC Services and Subscribers Market Share and Forecast” reveals that the number of seats for hosted business VoIP and unified communications (UC) services is estimated to more than double between 2012 and 2016.

The report tracks residential/SOHO and business VoIP and unified communications (UC) services.

Global service provider revenue from business VoIP and residential/SOHO VoIP services totaled nearly $58 billion in 2011, up 16 percent from the previous year. In addition, SIP trunking service revenue jumped 128 percent in 2011 from the previous year, driven by the increased adoption of SIP trunking among business customers.

SIP trunking offers a high degree of flexibility, as well as some pretty impressive cost advantages in voice connectivity. The IP-based communications also help to centralize business resources.

As the days pass, cloud-based communications services are continuing to increase in popularity. And the demand for these services has helped push hosted PBX and UC service revenue up 33 percent and seats up by 44 percent in 2011.

Further, it seems that business VoIP services are being implemented more among SOHO customers. The research found that SOHO VoIP subscribers grew 14 percent in 2011 to over 178 million worldwide, thanks to organization’s aversion to fixed-line voice connection.

 “The revenue that service providers derive from their residential and SOHO VoIP subscribers still eclipses what they get from businesses, but the business segment is growing about twice as fast, due in large part to the surging popularity of SIP trunking and hosted VoIP and UC services,” said Diane Myers, directing analyst for VoIP and IMS at Infonetics Research in a statement.

“Adoption of VoIP services across both the residential and business segments continues to grow, and we expect strong global growth in VoIP service revenue over at least the next five years,” Myers added.

Infonetics also published the results of its “SIP Trunking and Enterprise SBC Strategies: North American Enterprise Survey.” The survey confirms the growing popularity of SIP trunking, with one third of North American enterprises who participated in Infonetics survey currently using SIP trunks and 42 percent planning to implement the service by 2014. 

Edited by Jamie Epstein