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Like Corporate VoIP, Consumer VoIP has progressed from hobbyist-like endeavors to telco-like real services, such as those from Vonage and 8x8. Ironically, despite the tremendous marketing expenditures made by the pioneer Vonage to acquire customers, most consumers these days get their VoIP in the form of cable voice from Comcast and Time Warner (News - Alert), which have over half the market in terms of both subscribers and revenue. However, the move to Fixed-Mobile Substitution (FMS) continues, which involves the exclusive use of a mobile (cellular) phone rather than a fixed, wired or cordless telephone. One must distinguish FMS from another innovation, FMC, or Fixed-Mobile Convergence (News - Alert), which designates the use of two different technologies via “convergence” (as in dual-mode handsets supporting both cellular and WiFi (News - Alert) communications) to deliver a consistent, continuous user experience as the user wanders among different forms of wireless transport.

 

Any way you look at it, a large percentage of fixed-line service subscribers are choosing to migrate their fixed-line service to lower-cost VoIP providers and cable companies, supposedly because of today’s economic slowdown (though this trend has actually been gathering steam for several years now). Indeed, this trend is accelerating as mobile operators are pushing FMC to generate more revenue and growth.

 

Operators have gotten some technological help in this regard in the form of Unlicensed Mobile Access or UMA, the commercial name of the 3GPP Generic Access Network (GAN). Developed and championed by Kineto Wireless, you can find it mostly in UMA-enabled dual-mode WiFi handsets, which allows operators to provide high-performance, low-cost mobile services to subscribers when in range of a home, office or public WiFi network. With a UMA-enabled dual-mode WiFi handset, subscribers can automatically roam and handover between cellular and WiFi access, receiving a consistent set of services as they transition between networks.

 

Buy you can also find it in UMA-enabled terminal adapters and UMA-enabled femtocells, which gives the wireless services industry a low-cost licensed indoor coverage solution. There are various commercial UMA-based fixed line VoIP services today as well as UMA-enabled terminal adapters.

 

T-Mobile’s @Home service, for example, provides subscribers with unique service options by offering extremely low cost calling plans as a strategy to drive fixed-to-mobile substitution in a highly competitive market for in-home minutes of use. This service allows T-Mobile to capture multiple forms for in-home calling — from both mobile cell phones and fixed lines — to target a broader and very lucrative subscriber base that was once the exclusive domain of traditional operators. It has also allowed them to carve out a niche among the top-tier wireless carriers by expanding UMA-based services to target increased subscriber growth and service opportunities in the Home Zone. With the flexibility of Kineto Wireless’ UMA technology, T-Mobile is able to offer its subscribers improved calling at a lower cost, and at the same time take advantage of the Home Zone market by extending their existing mobile core to provide a fixed-line VoIP service.

 

The Vice President of Marketing for Kineto Wireless, Ken Kolderup, says: “With their UMA-based @Home service, T-Mobile now has the ability to capitalize on multiple forms of in-home calling, and step into a domain that was previously considered the sole territory of traditional landline operators.”

 

Now targeting a broader and more profitable subscriber base, T-Mobile has a competitive advantage among the top-tier wireless carriers by expanding UMA-based services to offer subscribers improved calling at lower costs.

 

“As demonstrated by the introduction of T-Mobile’s @Home service, UMA technology enables operators to expand their Home Zone services over time, and cater to increasingly cost-conscious consumers,” says Kolderup. “We’re seeing this trend move across the globe as more operators recognize the long-term advantages of UMA as a strategic technology for fixed-mobile convergence.”

 

Consumers who want the cheapest service possible tend to gravitate to the immensely popular Skype (News - Alert), which uses the Internet for free phone calls (and nearly free ones if the call has to cross over into the PSTN).

 

Skype and the UK carrier “3” have melded Skype with the FMS concept in the form of the 3 Skypephone, which brings Skype technology to the mobile world. A 3G phone with a 2-megapixel camera, mp3 player, mobile TV and Internet capability, the small and shiny 3 Skypephone comes in black or white, with blue or pink trim. If you’re a Skype user, you can enter your login on the phone’s Skype screen and all of your existing Skype buddies will be loaded into your contact list. Then you just choose who you want to call. (If you’re not a Skype user you can set one up quickly from the keypad.) And of course you can still use the Skype softphone on your PC — but you can’t be logged in to two Skypephones simultaneously.

 

There are two Skypephone models: The higher-end one (S2) offers both free calls and inexpensive wireless broadband Internet access using an onboard HSDPA modem. (In fact, you can plug the phone into your computer and use it as an HSDPA modem, and it also stores 4 GB of data.)

 

If a call is made from another mobile or fixed line to your mobile number, the caller pays standard network charges. However, if the caller is calling from Skype on their PC or mobile, it’s a free call for them and for you.

 

Although not available in the U.S., the phone and service are available in the following countries: U.K., Australia, Austria, Denmark, Hong Kong, Italy, Ireland and Sweden. Roaming charges will apply if you are outside the 3 network.

 

Other VoIP Consumer options include the unbelievably inexpensive ($20 a year) magicJack. A true wild card in the telecom industry, the $39.95, USB stick-like device offers unlimited local and long distance calling within the U.S. and Canada for $19.95 a year, with international dialing prepaid packages available, some for only $5). It even offers voicemail (you can receive messages offline), caller ID, call waiting, call forwarding and 911 dialing capability.

 

To install the MagicJack, you just plug it into a Windows PC USB port and the software automatically loads. You register the device and receive a magicJack phone number. You then plug a standard or cordless phone into the device’s phone jack and start dialing away using your PC’s keypad (your PC must be running for magicJack to work) or the onscreen softphone keypad. You can use a headset or your PC’s microphone and speaker.

 

Amazingly, users rate magicJack’s transmission quality somewhere between that of cell phones and toll-quality landlines. If nothing else, it’s an intriguing way to dip one’s toes into consumer VoIP.