Infonetics: SIP Trunking in Three out of Four Businesses by 2016

By Steve Anderson
Contributing TMCnet Writer

While there are still as yet businesses not turning to session initiation protocol (SIP) trunking, or to enterprise session border controller (E-SBC) systems for everyday operations, the idea of doing just that is starting to gain popularity on several fronts. A new study from Infonetics Research (News - Alert), meanwhile, details how the business community is responding to SIP trunking and the like, and increasingly coming to accept this new tool as a valuable part of current operations.

The Infonetics Research report—titled the 2014 SIP Trunking and E-SBC Strategies: North American Enterprise Survey—took a look at the full range of plans for SIP trunking and E-SBC systems, ranging from the expenditures planned to the providers intended for use and even deployment plans for bringing the systems into play. The biggest point in the survey is that, by 2016, better than three out of four firms in the study—78 percent--plan to bring SIP trunking into operations in some way, or continue to use it, making it a very big part of the modern enterprise landscape.

Naturally, that wasn't the only point that the study had to bring up. T1 use is set to decrease, according to the study, but it won't be going away completely. Additionally, the survey respondents had a set of reasons to put SIP trunking to work, ranging from centralized trunking and improved overall reliability to speed of both deployment and any necessary changes to the service itself. But even with so much benefit afoot, there are still some barriers to bringing SIP trunking into play. Among these include simple inertia—the current service is doing the job well—as well as legal matters, like contracts not currently up for renewal. Additionally, some respondents didn't even have the option to go with SIP trunking in the first place, as such services simply weren't offered. For the most part, the reasons not to go with SIP trunking had very little to do with the actual benefits or shortcomings of SIP trunking itself. Finally, when it comes to currently installed private branch exchange (PBX) and unified communications (UC) manufacturers at organizations participating in the survey, it's Cisco (News - Alert) out in front, followed by—not necessarily in order of leadership—Microsoft, IBM, AT&T (News - Alert) and Avaya.

What's particularly interesting here is that the objections to bringing in SIP trunking have almost nothing to do with SIP trunking. That suggests that, if it were available, if it were feasible, to bring into current operations, there wouldn't even be a question of whether or not it would happen for many organizations; it would actually be in place. That's a good sign for the SIP trunking market in general which, if it can bring such services to bear in regions where it's not currently available, is likely to be rewarded with installation agreements. That's not going to be universal, of course, but the current information does at least somewhat suggest an underserved market ready for SIP trunking.

Only time will tell just what comes of this information, and if we see a rush of new SIP trunking providers opening up in regions that don't have access to such services. There are certainly plenty of reasons to go with SIP trunking, and very few to pass it up based on the service itself. That may be the golden opportunity some businesses were waiting for to put SIP trunking to work.

Edited by Maurice Nagle