Internet telephony rides back into fashion

• Tags:
• Victor Tsao,
• Linksys,
• Internet Telephony

Winston Chai CNETAsia

Published: 22 Apr 2004 16:00 BST

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Are there changes to your product line?
The acquisition also helps with product differentiation. Cisco is one of the few American companies with a lot of engineers and programmers in-house. During the downturn in the last two to three years, Cisco hasn't really slowed down on their product development.

For example, in terms of VoIP product lines, it has 80 percent market share. Consider this -- Linksys is getting into this market as well. If you talk about VoIP, you really don't know of any leader in the home or small-business segment. So, why not Linksys? We can start to use Cisco's intellectual property and license its products and software.

In terms of core technology for VoIP, for example, echo cancellation is a must in voice applications. Cisco uses that, so why not bring it to a consumer-grade level?
How about cannibalisation? It's very easy to differentiate the products. For example, Linksys' products can support two ports, four ports, maybe up to 50 or 100 users. Cisco supports hundreds and thousands of enterprise users.

Many companies have tried to offer VoIP-based products to consumers, but they have not fared too well. Why are you confident of succeeding?
Ten years ago, we talked about VoIP as the killer application. But really, it has been killing itself over the last 10 years.

The challenge now is really how to make (VoIP) easier to use.
Now, there are a lot of applications that can't work on the analogue phone -- such as video. They just can't do that. Three to five years ago, the technology for VoIP equipment was there, but the problem was, once you go outside your LAN (local area network), it's unpredictable. But with the infrastructure being set up in the last few years, the bandwidth is acceptable, now.

The challenge now is, really, how to make it easier to use. Don't change the user experience. Do I have to turn on my computer and plug in my headset and run NetMeeting? We must improve the user experience, and the product must also work with voice service providers.

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