May 05, 2011

Making SIP Trunking Work Starts with a Plan

By Erik Linask
Group Editorial Director

For the past two years, SIP Trunking has been one of the most significant growth markets in communications, a trend that many expect to continue over the next several years as well, as IP Communications continues its move through mainstream adoption to owning a majority share of the communications market.

Indeed, having been touted as the protocol of the future, SIP is now part of mainstream technology, having gone through much of the initial implementation and testing by early adopters.

“SIP Trunking is real, and people realize they can get a fantastic return on their SIP Trunking investments,” Ingate president Steve Johnson recently told me. “The payback we are hearing from customers is in the order of 9-12 months – that is a fantastic return on any investment.”

In addition to an impressive ROI, the other driving force behind the growth of SIP Trunking is the productivity enhancing tools – better known as Unified Communications (News - Alert) – that can easily be implemented once a SIP infrastructure is in place. That includes capabilities like desktop video, presence, instant messaging, and collaboration with customer, partners, vendors, and colleagues – all removing the barriers distance has traditionally erected to effective communications.

“The opportunities for productivity enhancements are endless, once the SIP implementation is done,” notes Johnson.

One of the key factors allowing providers to effectively implement SIP Trunks for any business is that there are few differences between enterprise and SMB deployments. Essentially, the fundamental elements are the same: businesses must have a sound network infrastructure, reliable connectivity from their service providers, a PBX (News - Alert) that manages the call control features and telephony hardware. 

The difference is where those components reside and who is responsible for them. Traditionally, enterprises have tended towards maintaining control of their environments, largely due to privacy and security concerns. They typically own and manage their own PBX and E-SBC, which governs the network edge where their own networks interface with service provider networks.

On the other hand, SMBs often lean towards a hosted model, where providers manage the PBX and deliver SIP traffic to the LAN. They might even place an E-SBC at the edge of the SMB network in many cases as well.

As could computing continues to grow, businesses will find a managed communications environment increasingly compelling – even many larger enterprises. But, according to Johnson, regardless of the model – hosted or on-premises – the SIP Trunk deployment remains consistent. 

The key lies in preparation. Any time businesses look to make a change to their network infrastructures or service delivery models, planning is the most important factor. Typically, problems that arise with SIP Trunk deployments result from businesses not having taken appropriate measures to ensure their projects can be implemented flawlessly.

“The biggest mistake is to assume that everything in their network is compatible or up to speed with what is required to implement SIP Trunking,” notes Johnson.

On Tuesday, May 10, at 11:00am ET/8:00am PT, Johnson will be presenting a live Webinar on the most common mistakes made when deploying SIP Trunks, and how businesses of all sized can successfully navigate the deployment, from planning to implementation to getting the most out of their investments.

In addition, Ingate will once again be hosting its popular SIP Trunk – UC Summit, collocated with ITEXPO West in its new home in Austin, Texas, September 13-15, 2011. The three-day event will dig deeper into the issues Johnson will discuss in his Webinar and includes full days dedicated to Unified Communications, SIP Trunking education and development, and a SIP Trunk-UC Boot Camp.

Register for the Webinar, Successfully Deploying SIP Trunking: Tools and Techniques for Overcoming Common Roadblocks, here.

Erik Linask (News - Alert) is Group Editorial Director of TMC, which brings news and compelling feature articles, podcasts, and videos to 2,000,000 visitors each month. To see more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.

Edited by Erik Linask