Hosted VoIP gets a lot of press these days—and for good reason. This type of VoIP solution can save a business a significant amount of money while enhancing its ability to communicate, both with customers and internally.

 

One company that definitely sees potential in the market is Qwest (News - Alert) Communications, a provider of hosted VoIP solutions. Qwest recently upgraded two of its offerings, and TMCnet asked Thuy Ha (News - Alert), director of product management for Qwest’s enterprise local voice, VoIP and hosting solutions divisions to provide some additional information and perspective.

 

 

TH: Qwest offers a powerful combination of award-winning broadband, video and voice solutions for residential customers, businesses and government agencies. Customers coast to coast turn to Qwest's industry-leading national fiber optic network to meet their evolving communications and entertainment needs. Qwest employees are the driving force behind the company’s nationally recognized Spirit of Service. Qwest is also a participant in Networx, the largest communications services contract in the world, to provide innovative voice, data and video services. 

 

 

TH: Voice over IP (VoIP) is a revolutionary technology bringing more effective and efficient communications to business customers. Businesses today see the value in enhancing real-time communications via advanced VoIP technologies to make them more competitive, increase efficiency, reduce costs and save time. With the Qwest OneFlex VoIP solution set, customers can come to a single provider to maximize the potential of today's convergence movement.

 

Customers see the value in enhancing their real-time communications with advanced VoIP technologies that make them more competitive, increase efficiency, reduce costs and save time. With our new VoIP upgrades, customers using Qwest OneFlex are maximizing the potential of today’s convergence movement.

 

 

TH: Qwest has made VoIP upgrades that enhance our OneFlex product suite and benefit customers by offering simplified and integrated solutions. Business customers can get more out of their converged solution by being able run more concurrent voice calls over the same bandwidth using compression. In addition, enhanced features and tools made available via our Office Administrator portals allow customers to take advantage of applications that allow them to manage their communications to fit their business needs.

 

 

TH: Hosted VoIP is typically defined as a service whereby the call routing and/or the call features are hosted by a provider via their network. As such, a customer implementation can be simplified as they will no longer need to deploy equipment such as a PBX on their premises. It is similar to the Centrex model in the traditional voice service world and in some cases can be thought of an “in the cloud” VoIP solution.

 

 

TH: Qwest’s OneFlex Hosted VoIP provides real-time, two-way voice capability in IP over a broadband connection.  Qwest OneFlex Hosted VoIP offers a new fully-hosted service that replaces a premises-based PBX (News - Alert) system and the multiple vendors required to provide popular applications like voice mail and integrated messaging.  The features and applications are delivered to your handset via a single dedicated Internet access connection (purchased separately). These features can be individually customized by the user through a personalized Web portal. For the business, the solution provides centralized management and control, allowing the business to perform their moves, adds and changes via an administrative Web portal and from an Internet connection.

 

 

TH: OneFlex Hosted VoIP can now benefit from compression support which allows customers to maximize their existing bandwidth to place more calls and send data. It also includes the new escape to operator feature that enables inbound callers to access an operator from their voice mail simply by pressing ‘0’ for assistance and that can be configured via the administrative portal. In addition, it is now equipped with a sub office administrator portal that provides more flexibility for office administrators to manage their systems whether employees are in the office or working remotely. 

 

 

TH: OneFlex Integrated Access is an Internet Protocol (IP)-based solution that integrates local and long-distance voice and data traffic on a single connection. It uses VoIP technology to give you the advantage of using more bandwidth for data traffic when phones are not in use. Voice traffic has priority over data. When phones are in use, bandwidth is dynamically allocated from data to voice.

 

The benefits are that OneFlex Integrated Access provides a simple solution for local, long distance, international voice, and IP/data services from one provider with all product components included on a single invoice. There are also cost savings advantages because it allows single and multiple business locations to benefit from this technology and reduce overall communication costs.

 

By leveraging current investments in existing private branch exchange (PBX) and key system equipment, Qwest customers have the flexibility to spend in other essential areas of your business. This is a pivotal product for advanced technologies and Qwest can provide an integrated solution that meets specific needs using a flexible IP network. The service also provides a foundation to move business to higher-end products. Customers also benefit from increased efficiency by bundling all telecommunications needs in to one technology.

 

 

TH: As with OneFlex Hosted VoIP, OneFlex Integrated Access customers can now benefit from compression support, escape to operator feature, sub office administrator portal. The upgraded solution offers flexibility for office administrators.

 

 

TH: Jeff Randolph, president of Randolph Associates, a consulting firm dedicated to engineering services for government, institutional, commercial and industrial clients, had this to say: “With Qwest OneFlex, we feel like we are at the front edge of technology and able to compete more efficiently. The product seamlessly integrates our computer and phone networks and is both expandable and reliable.”

 

 

TH: We believe the hosted VoIP market will continue to gain traction over the next several years and Qwest with its network infrastructure designed for convergence is in a position to meet that demand.

 

 

TH: Qwest’s network infrastructure is designed with convergence in mind and hosted VoIP is one service in a suite of VoIP solutions that is available to businesses to help them simplify their communications needs.

 

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