The upcoming ITEXPO (News - Alert) West event scheduled to take place in Austin will involve many of the key leaders and trend setters in today’s telecommunications space. In anticipation of the event, TMCnet’s Rich Tehrani (News - Alert) spoke with Mike Coffee, CEO of Commetrex. The market segment changes with the most impact for Commetrex is the continued implementation of FoIP. As for the next disruptive technology, Coffee points again to FoIP and the benefits to be gained from broad deployment with smart routing by carriers.
While the adoption of the cloud model has not yet impacted Commetrex’s (News - Alert) development cycle and process, Coffee anticipates that it will as the company introduces cloud-based resources to fax enabled cloud-based applications. The most common request from Commetrex customers is to make FoIP work in the wide area. The continued growth of social media is changing services strategies as companies use social media to communicate directly with the broader audience.
Coffee isn’t ready to give a prediction on Google (News - Alert)+, and Commetrex employees are equipped to work remotely. In the mobile operating system war, Coffee believes the battle for apps is on the front line. He also believes HTML5 could be the game changer many predict. At the ITEXPO event, Coffee is looking forward to the Smart ATA announcement. As for his ITEXPO session, Coffee will be addressing the currents state and evolution of FoIP. Their entire conversation follows:
RT: How has your market segment evolved over the past year and what trends have fueled those changes?MC: FoIP continues its push beyond the confines of the enterprise network (FoIP Phase I) to take advantage of SIP trunking and FoIP-capable IP carriers (FoIP Phase II). The next step in FoIP’s evolution will be international-carrier support for FoIP with the launching of intelligent routing of FoIP calls over T.38-capable IP networks (FoIP Phase III). For example, although FoIP has been used for intra-enterprise fax for over a decade, mission-critical fax over wide-area IP networks has only become practicable within the last 12 months, allowing these users to halve their operational costs by 50-percent. That’s Phase II at work.
RT: What do you see as the next disruptive force in technology and how will it impact your market or business?MC: As the industry’s leading developer of FoIP technologies, Commetrex, and indeed the whole industry, stands to gain from the broad deployment of FoIP. And broad FoIP deployment depends on smart FoIP routing by carriers. The way that will happen is for the global adoption of carrier ENUM. That way, FoIP calls can be routed over T.38-capable IP networks to bring call success for international faxes up to the level of PSTN fax. This makes FoIP and HD voice natural allies since HD voice also needs ENUM for smart routing.
RT: How has the acceptance and adoption of the cloud model influenced your development cycle and process?MC: It hasn’t, but it will as we introduce cloud-based resources to fax enabled cloud-based applications.
RT: What is the most common request you are seeing from your customers? How is your company addressing these demands?MC: Please make FoIP work in the wide area! Commetrex has made a major resource allocation to perform the testing, make best-practice recommendations, and develop new technologies to do just that. For example, at ITEXPO West 2011, Commetrex will announce the Q4 availability of Smart ATA, the industry’s first ATA with outbound FoIP success rates on a par with PSTN fax.
RT: How is the continued growth of social media changing service and product development strategies?
MC: It’s changing service strategies as companies us social media to communicate directly with a broad consumer audience.
RT: Will Google+ become bigger than Facebook and Twitter? Why or why not?MC: Don’t know, but it could become a major player. It depends on scale and marketing, and Google has one and is rather adept at the other.
RT: As businesses continue their move toward virtual workforces, how are you meeting the need for increased mobility? What barriers are keeping others from adopting mobile strategies? MC: All of our employees are equipped for work-at-home. As for mobile, Commetrex is not involved.
RT: How do you see the mobile operating system war (iPhone (News - Alert) vs. Android vs. RIM vs. WM7) playing out?
MC: Currently, the front line is the battle for apps. But what if the developers could somehow get the vendors to support application portability?
RT: Is HTML5 the game changer many predict it will be?
MC: It certainly has that potential. We won’t recognize TMCNET.COM.
RT: What are you most looking forward to at ITEXPO West in Austin? What do you see as being the biggest trends at the show?
MC: We are looking forward to our Smart ATA announcement.
RT: What issues will you be addressing during your ITEXPO session and why should attendees be sure to attend?
MC: I’ll be addressing the current state and evolution of FoIP as I’ve discussed here. So it you are interested in deploying an FoIP-based service or product, it’s a must-attend session.
To find out more about Mike Coffee and Commetrex, visit the company at ITEXPO West 2011. To be held Sept. 13-15 in Austin, TX, ITEXPO is the world’s premier IP communications event. Coffee is speaking during “Next Generation Faxing in Today’s Enterprise IP Environment.”
Don’t wait. Register now.
Susan J. Campbell is a contributing editor for TMCnet and has also written for eastbiz.com. To read more of Susan’s articles, please visit her columnist page.
Edited by Juliana Kenny