VoIP Evolution

The Top 25 VoIP Advances of 2009

There were more advances than true innovations in the VoIP world in 2009. That's because some of the most important developments had more to do with commercial and political maneuvers than with technical creativity. Still, such maneuvers often helped spread the benefits of VoIP as much as did technical innovation. And collectively, the advances brought some already-evident trends into clearer focus. A key such trend is the increasing integration of voice with other applications and services. Another is the intensifying interest in HD voice. A third is the growing interconnection of VoIP services, in part in response to the possibilities that end-to-end HD voice offers. With such trends as background, here, in no particular order, are our top 25 VoIP advances of 2009.

Ribbit Mobile No Google Voice Clone

The most common reaction to the newly introduced Ribbit Mobile service is that it's a Google Voice competitor. In some ways that's true, but there are significant differences between the two. The main one is that Ribbit Mobile makes one's existing mobile number the main number, while Google Voice hangs all its services on a new number it provides. For most users, one approach will be clearly better than the other.

Mobivox Acquisition Adds Voice Interface to SabSe's Portfolio of Services

It's clear that many VoIP companies aren't meant to be standalone telecom businesses – they function far better as providers of features and capabilities to other telecom businesses. The latest example of this is SabSe Technology's acquisition of Mobivox. Although Montreal-based Mobivox offered cheap VoIP calling services of various types, what set it apart was its so-called voice-activated user interface, or VUI. The interface let users dial by speaking rather than pressing keys – a significant benefit for mobile talkers. The addition of this capability will boost the attractiveness of the array of services SabSe is offering worldwide.