IRVINE, Calif., April 19, 2000 (PRIMEZONE) -- (www.ibchannel.com) - Companies focused on VoIP products, services, and innovation have been exploding. Dialpad.com, the nation's leading free Internet phone service, has secured a $16.75 million initial round of venture funding led by CMGI @Ventures, the VC affiliate of CMGI (Nasdaq:CMGI).
Dialpad.com, Inc. - the Fastest Growing Web Service in History - is a privately held, Silicon Valley Internet company that has developed the nation's leading free calling service for the Internet. With the development of its advanced VoIP technology, integrated with targeted online advertising programs, Dialpad.com is able to offer its patent-pending, Web phone services at no cost to the end user.
VoIP Telecom Inc. (OTCBB:PRTE), formerly Presidents Telecom Inc., announced its entry into VoIP via two proposed acquisitions - Access Network's Ltd and International Communication & Equipment Corp., of Seattle, Washington (ICE).VoIP Telecom's strategic vision is to build a leading consortium of the highest quality Voice over Internet Protocol networks and a significant world wide market share of long distance traffic.
VoIP based networks are lower cost alternatives to the traditional LD calling solutions. According to Gartner Group's Dataquest - Global Voice-over-Packet Services Market will Grow to $87 Billion by 2004 and Retail VoIP Services are to Boom from $443 Million in 1999 to $19 Billion in 2004. Presidents Telecom Inc. recently announced its entry into the Global VoIP industry via the proposed acquisition of Access Network's Ltd and International Communication & Equipment Corp. Presidents Telecom Inc. is focused on the deployment of worldwide digital, voice and data via VoIP, fiber optic, Internet circuit, satellite and public switched telephone networks. Emerging Telecom players like Presidents Telecom, Net2Phone, iBasis and NetworkPlus are embracing new technologies that will take advantage of the shifting paradigm and leave behind the larger, slow-moving players.
The major telcoms are already scrambling to catch up with the Voice over IP leaders. Last week, Yahoo and an AT&T led consortium announced investments of $1.4 billion in Net2Phone taking a 32 percent stake in the young VoIP company. Net2Phone currently handles roughly 40 percent of all phone calls routed over the Internet.
Of Interest:
April 19, 2000 - Lucent was cited as the worldwide market share leader in the Frame Relay/ATM market in reports by five research firms, and as the worldwide leader in Voice-Over-Internet Protocol (VoIP)
Lucent Technologies (NYSE:LU) said Wednesday net income for its second quarter rose 41 percent to $754 million or 23 cents a share, a penny above First Call's estimate. The company also said it will change its manufacturing process to focus on the high growth areas of wireless and enterprise networking. The stock surged in March when the company first announced plans to spin-off its PBX, SYSTIMAX structured cabling and LAN-based data businesses to form a new company in the hot area of enterprise networking. After posting a 23-percent drop in first-quarter profits due, in part, to an inability to keep up with customer demand, Lucent said it would increase its optical manufacturing capacity and spin off slow-growing businesses to focus on wireless equipment and Internet infrastructure -- including optical and data networking systems and optical fiber.
April 19, 2000 - Ascom Selects Texas Instruments as Strategic Partner for New IP Telephony Product Family Local Area Network (LAN)-based IP Phones use VoIP to expand upon and replace traditional business phone systems with phones that connect directly to the enterprise LAN, resulting in savings on both installation and support costs. TI's industry leading, power efficient TMS320C5000(TM) DSPs, in conjunction with Telogy Software, enable VoIP to match or exceed the audio quality of traditional circuit-switched telephony. The majority of IP phones in development today leverage TI technologies.
"As a leading telecommunications group, worldwide service and support is critical to our business," noted Remo Viscardi, Head of Ascom Division PBX. "TI's TMS320(TM) DSPs and Telogy Software support was absolutely critical to our ability to demonstrate our Office 35IP Phone just one month after project conception. We were impressed by TI's ability to deliver its market leading programmable DSP, Telogy Voice over IP (VoIP) Software, H.323 software, real time operating system software, and dedicated technical support personnel to help us with our aggressive product launch plans."
April 19, 2000 - Com21 to Acquire GADline Ltd. for Cable Telephony Products;Capabilities Accelerate Com21's VoIP Strategy
The acquisition of GADline will broaden Com21's technology portfolio and product lines, and provide greater access to the broadband telephone market.GADline's cable telephony expertise is expected to allow Com21 to rapidly offer enhanced telephony solutions to cable operators worldwide, using circuit switched POTS and ISDN over HFC networks. The acquired technologies will not only complement Com21's current integrated voice/data product, ComUNITY VoX(TM) (Voice over eXchange), a newly introduced extension of its ComUNITY Access(R) cable modem system, but are also expected to hasten time to market for Com21 VoIP products, as well. Other promising companies in the VoIP industry include Copper Mountain Networks, Sycamore Networks, Asiainfo Holdings, ITXC Corp, Tekelec and VocalTec.
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