The Choices of UC and SIP Trunking

While Unified Communications (News - Alert) is not exactly new, it’s always changing, improving and innovating. UC and VoIP have managed to provide affordable, streamlined communications, making it easier than ever to communicate with colleagues across long distances, but also presenting companies with some big decisions that must be made.

Many companies are faced with the choice of leasing distributed SIP trunking, and similar services, from providers and carriers – or centralize them on private networks. Most tend to opt for the latter, with an estimated 60 percent of organizations in North America and Europe centralizing their UC operations, resulting in great cost savings.

However, that has not stopped many voice and data providers from offering services such as SIP trunking. Smaller firms are attracted to enterprise-class applications and services from major carriers, as it allows them to handle higher voice and data traffic than their own networks would permit. SIP trunking services tend to be very scalable, so customers can get the services that meet their needs and budget, while upgrading as necessary.

Many even help move their customers to hosted solutions when they’re ready to make the switch.

Basically, what it boils down to is what a company can afford in both money and bandwidth, and how much it requires. Fortunately, there are companies that have great offerings for whichever choice one makes.

For example, Oracle has recently acquired Acme Packet (News - Alert), helping it provide end-to-end UC platforms and services. Cisco, one of Oracle’s competitors, provides great options for enterprises looking for UC as well.

When it comes to SIP trunking, MegaPath is offering a variety of services for enterprises with multiple locations, or smaller businesses with just one. Broadvox (News - Alert) also offers scalable trunking services, with as many lines as a company needs – no more, no less.

As such, there are plenty of options, but it is an important choice to make. Each company has different needs for its communications, as well as different budgets and different amounts of data they can support. Fortunately, with all the choices available, there’s always something that can suit each company’s unique needs.