Bob Hafner, Chief Researcher at Gartner Inc, authored the most comprehensive Position Paper on IP Telephony and VoIP I have read.

True. Insightful, clear and quite logical. Thanks Bob.

The report is entitled "Positions 2005: Voice and Data Will Converge onto a Single Network via IP Telephony and Voice over IP." It is Gartner report # G00126433 and is dated February 17, 2005.

Key highlights:

  1. Voice over IP is a transport while IP telephony is an application that delivers telephony functionality such as call control and services such as conferencing and messaging.
  2. By 2010, 40% of enterprises will have completed their convergence transition, while 95% will have started it.
  3. The carrier market (Network Service Provider) will be transformed as new service providers and new technologies make the carriers we know, their technologies and regulatory regimes obsolete.
  4. Enterprises should start now.
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