Bandwidth.com Enters Large Corporate VoIP Market

Telecom News Editorials Reports Glossary

6:30 am on May 21, 2006 | Category: Business, VoIP

VoIP provider, Bandwidth.com, which caters primarily to small and medium-sized businesses, has launched a new division that will appeal to larger enterprises.

Bandwidth.com has built a name for itself by finding the best deals for SMBs that lack the patience and expertise required to negotiate directly with carriers. Bandwidth buys bulk service from carriers like AT&T, Sprint, Qwest, and Level 3, then resells it to these small and mid-sized organizations.

The company’s special new focus on large corporate customers is due to the fact that such clients are now actively seeking out easy ways to make the transition to VoIP. Until recently, IP communication was sold mainly as a consumer technology, not seen as reliable enough for the business market.

“That has changed in the last 18 months or so,” said Bandwidth.com CEO, Henry Kaestner. “There is a now a pronounced difference between consumer and business-class VoIP. Today enterprise companies are increasingly looking to migrate their telecom infrastructure to converged IP-based networks and services.”

Kaestner also described how consumer-oriented VoIP carriers like Skype and Vonage are attempting to enter the business market, but that their offerings are insufficient for the majority of large corporate customers.

“They are consumer services in disguise. They are not a good fit for our customers, but they may be the perfect fit for companies with less than five employees,” Kaestner commented. “We see a re-branding of consumer best-efforts voice as business-class voice, but the real need is guaranteed quality of service.”