VoIP market has been one of the fastest growing markets in the world, in recent times. While, mobile technology changed the way we work and live, IP is the emerging technology to bring forth further changes in how people interact and communicate. With communication services now moving towards an IP focused environment, there has been significant development in building and communicating using IP based technologies.
Some of the key advancements to note are:
- Voice services moving away from TDM to Voice over IP (VoIP)
- Messaging services moving away from C7 signalling to instant messaging over IP
The international carrier companies or service providers have gone through a multitude of problems ranging from the telecom market bubble, to markets being liberated, to non-stop price declines and shrinking profit margins despite growth in volumes of traffic. While wholesale traffic has grown more, revenues have refused to go north. Therefore, the modest profits in the liberated market place are further strained.
Hence, international wholesale services are not left behind in taking advantage of the benefits of migrating to an IP environment. There is significant traction in wholesale services moving towards VoIP. This trend offers considerable growth prospects for those prepared to move towards IP and benefit from them, namely, swift deployment, lesser equipment costs, and flexible capacity.
Having said that, the VoIP market also demonstrates traits of being a complex area to do business, occupied with numerous carriers and weighed down by constantly altering rates. Currently the industry is going through a phase of severe competition and brisk technological innovation. Whilst, this is expected to stabilize and help the players and the end consumers in the long run, it is important that the carriers and technology solutions providers are prepared for the challenges.
Wholesale carriers are facing the need of processing high volumes of traffic – efficiently and at very low costs – to remain profitable in the business. Technology solutions providers are facing the need to develop stable, secure and convenient one-box switching/billing solutions for carriers/operators to drive new revenues streams, retain market share and maximize profits. Technology solutions providers also face an additional challenge of developing systems that aligns with ever-changing business processes and not the other way around.
I’ve been associated with Panamax for more than 5 years and have had the opportunity to see successful solutions emerge to the real life challenges. Panamax, for more than a decade, has been working with the philosophy of experiencing challenges first hand before developing solutions. Our close association with industry leading carriers help us to enable the right technology and ecosystem for maximizing profits. I’m therefore optimistic, that in the long run, there will be a successful ecosystem in place consisting of service providers, technology providers and happy consumers.
