Network management Toolkit

VoIP showcases advanced phone services

Ben Charny CNET News.com

Published: 22 Jan 2004 11:00 GMT

Upstart Internet phone providers are pushing novel features to lure subscribers and differentiate their services, as prices tumble.

Customers reluctant to break off a romantic relationship in person can now have their phones do the talking: The Rejection Hotline, with its broadband phone provider partner, VoicePulse, enables customers to automatically forward unwanted suitors' calls to any of several prerecorded messages that explain that there's no love interest there.

"Hey, we've all been there," said VoicePulse chief executive Ravi Sakaria, who recently touted the service alongside other new features made possible by voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), a fledgling technology that's taking the phone industry by storm.

Interest in VoIP is soaring among service providers, which expect a spike in demand from corporate and residential customers, in part because it promises lower prices for long-distance calls. But marketing pitches for VoIP have already shifted emphasis from cost savings to new features, as the industry confronts an uncomfortable realisation: Price alone may not be enough to persuade millions of customers to dump their phone provider for an untested alternative. It may, however, bring limited success, when competing with rivals offering similar rates.

Analysts predict that VoIP prices could hit bottom by late next year, putting pressure on service providers to quickly develop nonvoice features that can't be replicated on a traditional phone network.

One upshot could be a radical makeover for the lowly home telephone, held hostage by carrier monopolies for the better part of a century. New features could drive demand for more powerful handsets -- such as those already found in some corporate offices -- with large, interactive colour screens as well as computer processing power and memory.

That, in turn, could attract a software developer community, largely lacking until now, that would be dedicated to creating VoIP applications.

"It hasn't happened yet, but sometime soon, voice will become a commodity, and these applications will become very important to set (providers) apart," said Wayne Williams, a senior analyst at InfoTech.