Last week I wrote about one approach for service providers who want to respond to the threat of Microsoft Teams – to provide an integration of Teams into existing PBX functionality. That article has prompted quite a few conversations, and through these discussions I’ve realized that we should think about our possible responses in a… Continue Reading
Product
Can telcos compete against Teams and Zoom?
Microsoft recently announced that Teams had 115 million daily active users, up from just 20 million a year ago. Zoom had been growing rapidly before the pandemic hit (see graph below), and has seen a similar dramatic spike since March. As more and more businesses rely on these platforms – not only for video, but… Continue Reading
Microsoft Teams integration announced by Metaswitch
Ever since Microsoft purchased Metaswitch, we’ve all been wondering whether we’d see closer integration between Microsoft Teams and the Metaswitch Hosted PBX / UCaaS functionality. One the one hand this seemed like an obvious plan, but we also know that Metaswitch was acquired by the Azure division within Microsoft, so this would require some cross-division… Continue Reading
All phone calls should be free
One of the basic principles of telecoms in North America is that local calls are free and you pay per-minute for long-distance calls. This is how things have always been, but frankly it’s time we moved on. Free local calls used to make sense Back in the early days, free local calls probably made sense…. Continue Reading
Use DIDs from Bandwidth or Inteliquent to provide out-of-area service
In this video I’ll discuss the benefits of setting up SIP trunks to a provider like Bandwidth.com or Inteliquent and using that connection to access DIDs outside of your standard service area. If you’re an ILEC and you want to be able to provide service in a location where you don’t have connectivity this is… Continue Reading
Metaswitch Perimeta now works with Microsoft Teams
Last week Metaswitch and Microsoft announced that the Perimeta SBC has been certified to work with Microsoft Teams. This creates a new revenue opportunity for service providers who use Metaswitch for their core network. What is Microsoft Teams? Teams is a Unified Communications platform focused on businesses (it’s an update to the product previous known… Continue Reading