Microsoft Vs. Cisco

For an unfortunately old telecom sort of guy, it really is something to watch the coming battle Cisco and Microsoft will be waging over voice services. If you've been around long enough, it seems discomforting that the key battles are not to be waged between Nortel and Lucent, or Avaya and Nortel.

In fact, it also is discomfiting that the coming battle won't even really be about voice per se. Instead, everything now hinges on capabilities in the unified communications or collaboration areas. Communications requires dumb pipes of high quality, to be sure. Beyond that, most of the heavy lifting now can be done by the applications.

So in some genuine sense, the whole global telecom business is about dumb pipes. Not completely, but largely.

Still, voice and real time communications remain challenging disciplines, though that generally is under appreciated by most people.

Microsoft probably is going to discover that, as Cisco has.

T-Mobile Prepping FMC Service?

T-Mobile, which has launched a dual-mode (GSM plus Wi-Fi) Hotspot@Home service, looks like it is getting ready to integrate landline service as well. T-Mobile is working with Linksys on a router that integrates home phone lines into the service along with providing VoIP service over cell phones, according to documents with the Federal Communications Commission.

In June, T-Mobile launched its Hotspot@Home service, which allows T-Mobile cell phone subscribers to transfer calls seamlessly between the T-Mobile cellular network and a Wi-Fi hot spot in the home.

My issue with the implementation is that it only supports two phones: the Samsung t409 and the Nokia 6086. So far, no tier one provider has found its dual-mode service very attractive to users when device limitations are that stringent.

The new router, not yet available but already bearing the model appellation WRTU54G, also has two slots that support two GSM SIM cards, allowing users to add up to two additional mobiles.

If T-Mobile wants to unify the access to VoIP and other IP-based communication services, over Wi-Fi in the home, wired connection in the home, at a T-Mobile Hotspot or on the GSM network, that might be more interesting. But there still is the handset issue. Given a choice between the tri-mode feature (even with seamless VoIP across all devices)and relatively unrestricted handset choice, I think handset choice wins, just about every time.

Global Crossing Didn't Do It

TeleBlend's VoIP network had an outage in late July and there was some confusion about why. Perhaps it was as simple as a temporary financial issue between trading partners. Global Crossing and Level 3 Communications, as major suppliers to SunRocket, likely got stuck with significant bad debt when SunRocket went dark. So you might understand why the providers might be worried about further bad debt exposure related to an account that had just gone south.

In all likelihood there was simply a period where a single payment got a bit delayed and at least one of the underlying carriers moved to protect themselves. We understand TeleBlend had been making incremental payments to the underlying carriers, obviously to limit their risk.

That's not to say there couldn't have been issues related to the SunRocket and TeleBlend back office processes. Under the circumstances, a late payment makes the most sense.

TeleBlend Quietly Provides SunRocket Service

If you have been following the SunRocket transition story, you might not have wondered just how it was that SunRocket went dark July 16, but nearly all SunRocket customers were still able to call in and out and use voice mail until the SunRocket creditor hard stop of Aug. 5. As it turns out, TeleBlend has quietly been paying Global Crossing and Level 3 Communications, as well as some others, to maintain service to all former SunRocket customers while TeleBlend conducted its marketing activities.

And the only reason TeleBlend wanted to keep that quiet was to avoid its own customer backlash. How's that? Customers are mad at SunRocket. If they then learn they are getting service from TeleBlend, even if free, there's still the possibility of ill will when the lights finally do have to go out at SunRocket. So TeleBlend said nothing.

Where Have SunRocket Customers Gone?

TeleBlend, the new provider formed to serve former SunRocket customers, says it has 60,000. CEO Bill Fogg says TeleBlend added 3,000 the week of Aug. 6 and 1,000 on Thursday, Aug. 9. Vonage says it has gotten about 20,000 and Packet8 says it also has gotten about 20,000, according to Huw Rees, 8x8 VP. That accounts for about half the former SunRocket base. And there may be significant movement this week and next. As it turns out, nearly all former SunRocket customers have quietly continued to get service that has been paid for by TeleBlend. So as service has gone completely and finally dark on Aug. 5, people who might have done nothing because they were still able to use their SunRocket service will have to do something else, for real.

SunRocket to Packet8 Transition: Why it is so Easy

Most former SunRocket customers who have moved to Packet8 service have had their new service up and running within three days, says Huw Rees, 8x8 VP. So why is the Packet8 service faring better than TeleBlend, in terms of transition ease?

Serendipity, at least in part. Global Crossing and Level 3 Communications were the primary SunRocket transport providers, and Packet8 works with both of them as well. So when a former SunRocket customer wants to switch to Packet8 service, pretty much all it takes is the letter of authorization, about 24 to 48 hours to get the account re-pointed to Packet8 and away from SunRocket, and time to ship out a new analog terminal adapter.

That's not to minimize the face that 8x8 has had quite some years to get its back office and warehouse operations into place. It's just that having common transport providers in common with SunRocket has made the logistical process of "porting" accounts easier.

Consumer, Mobile Satellite Drive Growth for HNS

Though its legacy enterprise networking business still generates the most revenue, consumer broadband access and mobile satellite provided the growth for Hughes Network Systems in the most recent quarter, says. Pradman Kaul,HNS CEO.

“The consumer, small and medium business and mobile satellite businesses continued to be the key contributors to our revenue growth,” says Kaul. Over 30,000 new broadband access subscribers were added in the second quarter of 2007, growing the HughesNet customer base to 353,000 at the end of June. That's year-over-year growth of 18 percent.

Revenue from our mobile satellite business showed strong growth of 88 percent
to $35 million in the second quarter of 2007 over the second quarter of 2006.

HNS does not report average revenue per unit for either its enterprise or consumer users. So you might not think 353,000 broadband access customers is a particularly big deal. But look at it this way. Assume that ARPU for a single enterprise customer site is $100 a month or so.

Then assume that each of the consumer, small office or small business sites each represents the same ARPU, as some analysts have suggested. That's a very healthy recurring revenue stream, by anybody's standards, for a consumer Internet access product.

And extremely rare in the communications business. How many other companies do you know that can claim the ARPU for a consumer access line is the same as the ARPU for an enterprise line? I know of no others.