We’re happy to announce that Jitsi will be participating in Google Summer of Code 2024!
We have some very cool project ideas in the list for this year, and we’re still open to discussing new ones.
You can also check out the official program website, the list of accepted organizations and the full program timeline.
The next important date is March 18 when the contributor application period opens. In the meantime, please join me in welcoming the new contributors to our community!
The post Google Summer of Code 2024 appeared first on Jitsi.
In today’s healthcare landscape, the patient experience hinges on seamless communication. This is where Sangoma Technologies makes an indelible mark. With their unified communications as a service (UCaaS) portfolio, end-to-end solutions are crafted that enhance patient care, streamline processes, and reduce costs.
Sangoma CX stands as a testament to this commitment, magnifying call-handling capabilities and more than doubling call volumes for healthcare providers, as evidenced by the transformation of the Healthcare Physicians Group. The robust reporting suite of Sangoma CX, coupled with its callback features, optimizes patient touchpoints, ensuring no call – and no patient – is left unanswered.
Furthermore, Sangoma’s integrated suite of value-based Communications as a Service solutions allows care organizations of all sizes to maximize productivity. This means healthcare institutions can focus on what they do best – providing top-notch patient care – while Sangoma takes care of the rest.
With the help of Sangoma Apps, outreach initiatives are taken to new heights. From online scheduling to automated reminders, every interaction is personalized, enhancing the patient experience at every turn. Video conferencing is a must for telemedicine, and Sangoma delivers a consistent and feature-rich experience for virtual consultations, becoming a partner to deliver exceptional patient care.
The results speak for themselves. Hospitals, pharmacies, and labs report improved patient care and significant time savings in emergency handling – up to 50% in some cases. The future of healthcare communication is here, and it’s powered by Sangoma.
Learn more about our solutions in the Sangoma Healthcare eBook.
The post Powering Patient Touchpoints: Sangoma’s Cure for Communication Roadblocks appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
Building on the new, powerful AI features introduced to Sangoma CX already in 2024, our cloud contact center solution now expands its automation capabilities and adds other significant enhancements with our 7.5 release. The new version is even more capable, empowering agents, supervisors, and administrators in their day-to-day operations.
Release 7.5 also brings several other minor improvements, like the capability to export the Queue Annual report to a spreadsheet format, and a new simplified implementation for logging agent call flow for phone-only Agents, in simple call center setups. These improvements enhance the overall functionality and user experience for contact center administrators.
If you have any questions, need a quote, or require assistance with these new features, please reach out to us.
Stay tuned for updates on upcoming enhancements and exciting new features in Sangoma CX!
Sincerely,
The Sangoma Product Team
The post More AI Features for Your Contact Center With Sangoma CX 7.5 appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
It’s hard to believe that Asterisk has been around for 25 years. It started in humble beginnings as a phone system for a fledgling company, only to grow and expand to become the purpose of that company itself eventually. While I was not there from the beginning, I was there from the fairly early days.
Back then, it was the wild west. VoIP was still new. SIP was still new, and its problems had yet to be discovered. STIR/SHAKEN was in the minds of no one. The cost of calling people was still high (in comparison to what we pay today). Asterisk swiftly emerged onto the scene and became THE open source phone system. It disrupted the traditional phone system market and gave the power back to the users and deployers to do things the way they wanted at a price they could handle.
As the industry evolved and expanded, Asterisk continued to do so as well. Thanks to the numerous contributions and the community around the project, it expanded in functionality and scope beyond what anyone could have envisioned. Its usage grew and grew in more clever and interesting ways. Every week, by helping individuals and talking to them, I find new ways that Asterisk is used. The flexibility of Asterisk means you are always surprised by what people are doing.
This evolution and expansion continue to happen to this day. While Asterisk started as a phone system, it has also become a telephony toolkit. This has given users even more power and control, especially developers, allowing them to manifest ideas more rapidly in the communications space by providing easy-to-use and understandable interfaces. This is where a lot of the power in Asterisk is these days. This aspect is filled with endless possibilities and untapped potential.
I want to thank everyone who has helped Asterisk get to this point. Those who have contributed code or ideas, filed issues, helped others on forums and other places, and spread the word of Asterisk itself. It’s been a wild 25 years, and we still have more to go. It’s not too late to join me and others on the journey through participating in the Asterisk project and community. You can find us on GitHub or the Community Forums. All help is welcome!
As always, I enjoy sharing extra resources. If you’re intrigued by the history of Asterisk and other related topics, I invite you to check out the webinar I gave on the fascinating “Evolution of Asterisk”.
The post 25 Years of Asterisk appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
The healthcare industry is characterized by a relentless pursuit for excellence. The quality of care service directly translates into a substantial impact in people’s lives. In the quest to deliver superior patient experiences, Sangoma solutions are at the forefront of this goal.
Connectivity, the lifeblood of seamless operations, is the top priority for the IT team. No more dropped calls or network reach loss. Instead, budget-friendly 5G broadband and satellite options can handle your internet connections, no matter when or where. Sangoma offers SD-WAN too, which boosts your network’s performance by tying together all your connections, making sure they’re always up and running, and offering top-notch security against threats. Make your backbone embody reliability and efficiency thanks to a fully-monitored network infrastructure that meets PCI compliance standards.
Sangoma’s UCaaS features elevate this connectivity to embrace diversity and dynamism. Video conferencing, instant messaging, mobile applications, and team collaboration tools ensure that communication is not just continuous, but also multifaceted and hybrid-work friendly.
The integrated contact center features of Sangoma serve as a catalyst for change. With true omnichannel features, you can deliver an exceptional customer experience and hear out your patients from their preferred method of speaking to you. Every interaction will help your patients feel valued and cared for.
HIPAA compliance is vital to preserve the sanctity of patient data. Trust in the safety of information is no longer a hope, but a guarantee.
Sangoma’s Managed Internet Services and Mobility Solutions offer superior communications at lower costs while expanding the talent pool. Secure internal collaboration, compliant documentation, cost-effective operations, and flexible solutions are no longer exceptions, but the norm.
Keep the pulse of your healthcare institution steady and healthy with Sangoma, your one-stop-shop for modern technology solutions. Learn more in our Healthcare eBook.
The post The Pulse Behind Modern Healthcare Communication appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
We are thrilled to share the latest improvements to our Sangoma CX platform in its newly released version 7.4. Focusing on customer service and reporting capabilities enhancements, these updates will make your contact center experience more efficient, intelligent, and data-driven. Let’s dive in!
Omnichannel
AI
Reports
Automated Data Export
The Automated Data Export now includes detailed information on Agent Hold times, Blind Transfer times and destinations, and an extended Queue Details container with a “Max Wait Time” setting for each queue.
Agent
We are committed to continually improving your experience with Sangoma CX, and we know you will find these latest enhancements invaluable to your business operations.
For quotes, questions, or assistance with these new features, please reach out to us.
Thank you again for choosing Sangoma CX for your Contact Center needs!
Sincerely,
The Sangoma Product Team
Sangoma CX and Google Dialogflow Configuration Guide
Sangoma CX and WhatsApp Channel Configuration Guide
Sangoma CX and Telegram Channel Configuration Guide
Partners Only: CX 7.4 Release Kit
The post Exciting Updates for Your Contact Center with Sangoma CX 7.4 appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
MARKHAM, ONTARIO – January 8, 2024 – Sangoma Technologies Corporation (TSX: STC; Nasdaq: SANG), a trusted leader in delivering cloud-based Communications as a Service solutions for companies of all sizes, announced today that the company was named in the 2023 Gartner® Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications as a Service, Worldwide report for the ninth straight year.
The Gartner Magic Quadrant assesses Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS) providers worldwide. Sangoma is one of the 11 vendors placed in the 2023 report. Sangoma was recognized in the report based on its completeness of vision and ability to execute.
“We are proud to be recognized again in this year’s Gartner UCaaS Magic Quadrant,” said Sangoma Chief Operating and Marketing Officer Jeremy Wubs.
“We believe nine years of continuous recognition is a testament to Sangoma’s innovation and trust in the cloud communications market. UCaaS is the core of our single-source, cloud-native communications portfolio, which also includes CCaaS, CPaaS and SD-WAN solutions designed to meet evolving business network and collaboration needs. We’re committed to continuous innovation and delivering best-in-class UCaaS solutions for our partners and customers.”
Gartner Disclaimer:
Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
GARTNER is a registered trademark and service mark of Gartner and Magic Quadrant is a registered trademark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and are used herein with permission. All rights reserved.
Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications as a Service, Worldwide, Rafael Benitez, Megan Fernandez, November 28, 2023.
Sangoma is recognized in Gartner Magic Quadrant UCaaS as:
About Sangoma
Sangoma is a trusted leader in delivering value-based Communications as a Service (CaaS) solutions for businesses of all sizes. Sangoma simplifies communications by providing businesses with the industry’s most comprehensive cloud-native communications solutions, seamlessly streamlining business processes. Sangoma provides businesses with a complete solution, including cloud software, endpoints, and connectivity – all delivered and supported by Sangoma’s expert team. One provider and one contact ease vendor management and save time. For more information, visit www.sangoma.com.
The post Sangoma Named In The 2023 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ For Unified Communications As A Service Report For Ninth Year appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
With the holidays just around the corner we thought it would be a cool to show a perhaps non-conventional use of the Elgato StreamDeck, a gadget I recently acquired that would make a great gift!
The Elgato Stream Deck is a programmable hardware device that allows users to automate virtually any task with the press of a button. It has been around for a while but not too long ago I was at the RTC.ON conference chatting with my buddy Dan Jenkins when he told me there was a library to control these devices using WebHID. I instantly bought one (no, this is not a sponsored post).
The idea here is to use the Jitsi iframe API (you can start using it right away with a free JaaS account!) to map custom meeting controls on your own Stream Deck. Our iframe API provides a bunch of events and commands to interact with the meeting and the WebHID library allows us to program each key individually, inluding the icon on each of the buttons, which is actually a tiny display!
Here is a video demonstrating the integration:
Cool, right! The potential for contextual controls for specific applications right from your browser is virtually boundless, what a time to be working on the Web Platform.
The source code can be found here. It works with 6 buttons by default (the Stream Deck Mini) but it’s easy to adapt to other models.
Have fun and happy holidays!
Your personal meetings team.
The post Custom meeting controls with Elgato Stream Deck and WebHID appeared first on Jitsi.
In today’s business climate, a company’s network is the heart and soul of its operations. As organizations grow and develop over time, their technology needs will also evolve. Given the rapid pace of change and the need for evolution, it’s no surprise that IT leaders are finding new ways to get the computing resources they require.
In many cases, traditional wide-area networking practices have been making way for software-defined wide-area networking (SD-WAN). Companies that would have previously turned to private network connections and multiprotocol label switching (MPLS) networking are discovering that SD-WAN can save them money while also bringing their capabilities to a new level.
The first thing to understand about SD-WAN is that it is both an alternative way to get the same type of WAN performance you’re accustomed to and a method of increasing your company’s capabilities. The following are some of the more notable benefits companies have realized as they have started adding SD-WAN resources.
Save money while still increasing bandwidth.
With IT budgets always needing to stretch further, it’s natural for the first question about this new technology to be, “How can SD-WAN save me money?” Fortunately, the answer is simple.
A managed SD-WAN network can aggregate internet connections of all kinds, from private layer 2 to public internet and even wireless and satellite bandwidth. By using VPN tunnels, firewalls, and encryption, you can assemble these lower-cost connections to get the type of security and reliability previously only available with private networking.
Companies don’t have to commit fully to SD-WAN to start getting these advantages. By embracing a hybrid WAN model, organizations can bring together locations on SD-WAN and those still using traditional MPLS networking into one unified environment.
Deploy new locations or services quickly and easily.
Expansion tends to come with growing pains for companies exclusively using a traditional MPLS network. The equipment needed to add a new data center or office location is expensive and can be difficult to source in a timely manner, introducing capital expenditures and delays into a process that needs to be smooth and fast.
Working with the circuits for a traditional MPLS system, it can take between one and four months to set up a new location. By dramatically cutting into this time, SD-WAN allows organizations to pursue more aggressive expansion plans and helps new companies get up to speed quickly with their competitors.
Adding a new cloud service to the network is similarly fast and easy on SD-WAN. Considering that businesses are turning to Software-as-a-Service tools for their most mission-critical capabilities today, accelerating this process can have an immediate positive effect.
Manage everything centrally and simply.
The “single pane of glass” management of an entire SD-WAN network allows your IT team a greater degree of control over your network, as well as more visibility than ever before. It also requires a smaller group of stakeholders to control the network than would be needed for a traditional WAN.
With this visibility, personnel working with the centralized control console can take a close look at any:
This view allows them to detect the causes of problems and opportunities for improvement, no matter how granular those root issues are. They also have access to remote diagnostic tools, allowing them to:
Stakeholders don’t even have to rely on their own hands-on efforts to achieve this level of control. With customizable automatic alerts, they can receive immediate notifications when a network event occurs, such as a VPN tunnel failing or an edge device going offline. This helps reduce response time drastically.
Maximize the performance of mission-critical applications.
The centralized console allows your IT personnel to do more than simply observe the network. Through intelligent link steering and priority rules, an SD-WAN network delivers a level of control that goes beyond a simple MPLS deployment, letting users match connections and applications for performance benefits. These include:
Organizations pondering SD-WAN as an alternative to traditional WAN can consider its capabilities side by side with the conventional model:
In most cases, SD-WAN will not be an immediate replacement for MPLS networks. Rather, companies add SD-WAN capacity, potentially first as supplemental connectivity for smaller branch locations.
This hybrid WAN option can remain in place as the overall balance of circuits within the company changes. After contracts with traditional network partners expire, businesses can increase their SD-WAN investments, gradually moving toward a more heavily cloud-based model.
If you’re setting up network connections at a new brand location or getting ready to overhaul networking equipment at an existing office, you can commit to SD-WAN at that location, selecting primary and secondary devices from the Edge range that will provide a level of throughput that fits your needs.
The post SD-WAN Benefits: Affordable Networking & Control appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
In an increasingly digital world, chatrooms and online communities have become essential spaces for communication and connection. Whether you’re engaging in casual conversations, seeking information, or participating in a niche interest group, it’s crucial to maintain proper chatroom etiquette. Just as we observe manners in face-to-face interactions, online spaces deserve the same level of respect and consideration. In this blog post, we’ll explore the dos and don’ts of chatroom etiquette to help you communicate effectively and foster positive online relationships.
Before delving into chatroom etiquette, it’s essential to find a chatroom that suits your interests and communication style. Ensure the chatroom’s purpose aligns with your goals, and be aware of any specific rules and guidelines set by the community.
In many chatrooms and messaging platforms, you’ll have the option to respond to messages in two primary ways: as a new message or as a reply within a thread. Knowing when to use each method can greatly enhance the clarity and flow of the conversation.
Using New Messages:
Pros:
Cons:
Using Threaded Replies:
Pros:
Cons:
When to Use Each:
Tips for Effective Use:
Language is a powerful tool, and the way you communicate can significantly impact the atmosphere of the chatroom. Some key points to consider:
Online communities often involve people from diverse backgrounds. Respect their privacy by not asking for personal information such as addresses, phone numbers, or financial details. Similarly, avoid sharing your personal information unless necessary for the conversation and the context of the chatroom.
Many chatrooms have specific themes or purposes. Stay on topic, and avoid derailing conversations with unrelated discussions or excessive self-promotion. If you want to discuss a different subject, consider finding or creating a more appropriate chatroom.
Emojis and emoticons can add nuance to text-based conversations, but use them sparingly. Overusing them can make your messages appear unprofessional or insincere. Be mindful of their tone and appropriateness in the context of your chatroom.
Effective communication is a two-way street. Listen to others, acknowledge their perspectives, and be patient when waiting for responses. Avoid interrupting or dominating the conversation.
In online discussions, disagreements can arise. When they do, handle them respectfully. Avoid personal attacks, name-calling, or aggressive behavior. Instead, focus on discussing the issues or differing viewpoints calmly and rationally.
If you encounter disruptive or offensive behavior in a chatroom, report it to the chatroom moderators or administrators. They can take appropriate action to maintain a healthy environment for all participants.
Moderators play a crucial role in maintaining order and ensuring chatroom guidelines are followed. Respect their authority and follow their instructions when necessary.
Chatroom etiquette is an essential aspect of maintaining positive and constructive online interactions. By following these guidelines, you can create a welcoming and respectful environment in chatrooms, fostering meaningful connections, learning, and sharing experiences with others. Remember, online etiquette is an extension of common courtesy, and by being mindful of your behavior, you contribute to a more enjoyable online experience for all.
Understanding when to use new messages and threaded replies in a chatroom is a crucial aspect of chatroom etiquette. It helps keep conversations organized, ensures clarity, and allows for more efficient communication within the digital space. By making informed choices about how you respond to messages, you contribute to a smoother and more enjoyable chatroom experience for yourself and others.
The post Chatroom Etiquette: Navigating Online Conversations with Grace appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
In a Sangoma study it was found that; by adopting UC tools, companies can achieve an average 52% increase in workplace productivity, 45% better efficiency, and a 25% higher profit. Here are another dozen reasons to adopt a UC strategy!
1. Enhanced Productivity:
Unified communications consolidate various communication channels (voice, video, messaging, email, etc.) into a single platform, making it easier for employees to connect and collaborate. This streamlines communication and saves time, ultimately boosting productivity.
2. Cost Savings:
UC solutions often reduce operational costs. By using a single platform for voice, video conferencing, and messaging, businesses can reduce the expenses associated with managing multiple communication systems.
3. Improved Collaboration:
UC tools facilitate real-time collaboration by enabling employees to communicate seamlessly, regardless of their location. Video conferencing, screen sharing, and document collaboration tools enhance teamwork, even for remote or distributed teams.
4. Flexibility & Mobility:
With UC, employees can access communication tools on various devices (computers, smartphones, tablets), allowing them to work from anywhere. This flexibility is essential in today’s mobile and remote work environments.
5. Customer Service & Engagement:
UC solutions can enhance customer service by providing features like call routing, queuing, and integrated customer relationship management (CRM) systems. This enables businesses to offer better support and engage with customers more effectively.
6. Scalability:
UC solutions can scale with the growth of a business. Whether a company is small, mid-sized, or large, UC platforms can adapt to meet changing communication needs.
7. Integration with Other Tools:
UC systems can integrate with other business applications, such as CRM, email, and project management tools. This streamlines workflows and ensures data consistency across various applications.
8. Competitive Advantage:
Deploying UC can give businesses a competitive advantage by enabling efficient communication and collaboration. It allows companies to respond to market changes and customer demands more quickly.
9. Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity:
UC solutions often have built-in redundancy and failover capabilities, making them more resilient in the face of disasters or network outages. This ensures that critical communications can continue even in adverse situations.
10. Improved Customer & Employee Satisfaction:
With better communication and collaboration tools, businesses can improve both customer satisfaction (through improved support and engagement) and employee satisfaction (by enabling flexible work options and simplifying communication).
11. Security & Compliance:
Many UC platforms offer robust security features, including encryption and authentication protocols. This is especially important in industries with strict compliance requirements, such as healthcare and finance.
12. Environmental Benefits:
Reducing the need for physical meetings, travel, and paperwork through UC can have a positive impact on a business’s carbon footprint, contributing to environmental sustainability.
In today’s fast-paced, interconnected business world, a unified communications strategy is a valuable asset and offer a range of benefits for companies from streamlining operations, increased productivity, cost savings and improved customer satisfaction. By deploying a UC strategy, businesses can stay ahead of the curve and maintain a competitive edge in the market.
The post 12 Reasons Businesses Should Deploy a Unified Communications (UC) Strategy Today appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
In the dynamic realm of retail, the power of seamless communication is paramount. CPaaS (Communication Platform as a Service) stands out as a game-changer, arming retail staff with the tools they need to excel in real-time, contextual customer interactions. The absence of such a platform can leave businesses trailing in the dust:
Retail businesses that neglect the transformative potential of CPaaS risk operational inefficiencies and missed opportunities for enhancing customer relationships. Explore why CPaaS is not just an advantage but an essential cornerstone for retail triumph.
Communication Platform as a Service (CPaaS) offers a cloud-based platform that enables businesses, including those in the retail sector, to embed real-time communication features into their own applications without the need to build backend infrastructure and interfaces. Here’s how CPaaS can be a game-changer for retail businesses.
Enhanced Customer Interactions:
Retail businesses can embed chat, voice, and video functionalities directly into their e-commerce platforms. This allows customers to seek immediate assistance while shopping online, simulating the in-store experience.
Omnichannel Experience:
With CPaaS, retailers can maintain consistent communication across different channels – be it SMS, email, app notifications, or others. This ensures that customers receive a unified shopping experience regardless of their touchpoint with the brand.
Improved Marketing Campaigns:
Retailers can use CPaaS to send customers targeted and personalized messages, promotions, or alerts based on their shopping behavior, preferences, and demographics.
Order and Delivery Notifications:
CPaaS allows for real-time notifications. Customers can be updated instantly about order confirmations, shipping details, delivery times, and any changes or delays.
Enhanced Security:
For online transactions, CPaaS can facilitate two-factor authentication processes via SMS or voice calls, ensuring that customer transactions are secure.
Scalability:
As the business grows, the communication needs also expand. With CPaaS, retail businesses can easily scale up or down based on demand without major changes to infrastructure.
Customer Feedback and Surveys:
Retailers can utilize CPaaS to solicit feedback post-purchase or after an online interaction. Immediate feedback helps in improving services and addressing concerns promptly.
Cost Savings:
By utilizing cloud-based communication tools offered by CPaaS providers, retailers can often reduce costs associated with traditional communication channels and infrastructure.
Virtual Shopping Assistance:
Retailers can offer a more personalized shopping experience by embedding video calls or chats where sales representatives can assist online customers, offer advice, answer questions, or even give live product demonstrations.
Streamlined Operations:
Internally, CPaaS can facilitate improved communication among staff, whether it’s coordinating between warehouses, communicating about stock levels, or arranging shift schedules.
Integrations with Existing Systems:
Many CPaaS solutions can seamlessly integrate with a retailer’s existing CRM, sales, or e-commerce platforms, ensuring that data flows smoothly across systems.
Sangoma’s suite of CPaas-based applications is the perfect choice for businesses looking to streamline customer interaction and solve gaps within their business processes.
Sangoma’s suite of CPaaS-based applications empowers retail businesses to evolve with the changing dynamics of the industry, especially as online shopping and digital interactions become the norm. By embedding real-time communication tools directly into their applications and platforms, retailers can offer improved customer experiences, streamline operations, and make agile business decisions.
Want to learn more?
Download our eBook to get an in-depth look at Sangoma’s product suite for retail businesses.
The post From Cart to Completion: CPaaS’s Role in Streamlining Retail Operations appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
For years, the primary method of building a network architecture for business use has involved wide-area networks built with private connections and multiprotocol layer switching (MPLS). While this methodology is still prevalent, it finally has a serious challenger: software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN).
By allowing companies to route traffic through multiple public internet connections with VPN tunnels, encryption, and firewalls, SD-WAN delivers a level of security and resources on par with traditional WAN, at a drastically reduced cost, especially when considering the expense and time needed to install a new edge device or application.
Now, it’s time to take a serious look at SD-WAN and MPLS side by side and determine how your organization should proceed.
The key feature that SD-WAN brings to the table is the aggregation of multiple circuits — private, public or even wireless— to run applications and services on a reliable, secure connection.
MPLS is the industry standard for maintaining and overseeing network resources. In this digital age, companies need strong and reliable connections to run their applications, including those hosted on-premise and in the cloud. IT teams that use MPLS networking to manage the configurations of the apps and devices that make up their networks are realizing they can take similar functionality from SD-WAN.
They are making this discovery because they are driven by the constant need to add bandwidth and capacity. MPLS delivers the application performance they need, but it can be slow and expensive to procure the necessary technology. Furthermore, with businesses operating from many locations, some potentially out of range for high-speed private network connections, there is a drastic need for a way to get MPLS-level performance faster and more affordably. SD-WAN fills this niche.
In some cases, SD-WAN does not replace MPLS — at least not all at once. Companies can get involved with SD-WAN deployment by adding the resources to serve as supplemental connectivity for smaller branch locations. Over time, they can increase their investment in SD-WAN, slowly adding more SD-WAN circuits so the balance of the overall environment tips toward the cloud.
App-aware routing allows organizations to control which circuit they are using for traffic, even with some sites on SD-WAN and others on traditional WAN. Both types of circuits contribute to the overall network. In addition to choosing SD-WAN for new offices, personnel can convert older locations when it’s time for a network refresh at those sites.
The addition of SD-WAN to business networks would not occur without delivering important benefits. If you’re considering making changes to your configuration, it’s important to determine whether these advantages apply to your unique use case. Fortunately, the improvements associated with SD-WAN solutions are wide-ranging and largely in keeping with the way companies today use their networks. They include:
Cost & Time Advantages:
You cannot underestimate just how much easier it is to bring new edge devices and cloud applications into your network when using SD-WAN. Without the hardware scarcity and expense issues that trouble traditional WAN, there is a much clearer path to expansion.
Centralized Network Control:
Once you’ve brought a variety of new resources into your network, you can take control of them more easily with SD-WAN. No matter how many locations your business operates from, your IT team can manage every application, connection, and piece of hardware from a single pane of glass.
App Performance Improvements:
Whether using customizable app priority settings to give mission-critical software more bandwidth or setting up stronger fail-over capabilities, IT departments with SD-WAN can keep the company’s most important software online. The meshed architecture of public internet connections can also offer a lower-latency way to use SaaS apps.
Greater Oversight of Data Use:
Administrators who want to take a closer look at data usage within their companies can immensely benefit from SD-WAN. Better traffic visibility allows them to isolate locations, connections, devices, and users and analyze data usage. By disallowing certain types of traffic, IT pros can run a more secure, controlled network.
Businesses have to constantly be thinking about the future and looking one step ahead to stay competitive. When it comes to networking, this may mean increasingly investing in SD-WAN. The ability to add new services and locations in an agile and affordable manner lays the groundwork for growth, and the fact that SD-WAN is compatible with SaaS deployments is in keeping with the rising importance of the cloud across industries and regions.
Since SD-WAN deployment requires significantly lower operating expenditures than investing in more private network connections for a standard MPLS network, the risk is low and the potential reward is great. You need to ensure your applications will be stable, reliable, and secure going forward — working with the right SD-WAN partner is a way to move toward this goal.
Not every SD-WAN provider can deliver the same level of service, so it’s important to do your homework and go with the top source in the industry. The fully managed SD-WAN network solution from Sangoma is designed to aggregate and maximize all your connections and applications, not only saving you time and money but also making your network serve your needs more effectively.
If you want to learn more, contact our SD-WAN experts — we can help!
The post SD-WAN vs. MPLS: Comparing WAN Architectures and Solutions appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
In today’s digital age, the retail landscape is undergoing a seismic shift, and UCaaS is the unsung hero leading the charge. Imagine a world where seamless communication drives customer satisfaction and business growth. Here’s a glimpse into that reality:
Dive in with us as we explore how UCaaS is not just bridging but obliterating the communication gap in retail, crafting a harmonious blend of in-store and online experiences.
Are you, your staff, or your business suffering from the following?
When we delve into the advantages of Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS) for retail businesses, it’s important to highlight how these benefits translate directly to retail staff. After all, the employees are on the front lines, interacting with customers, managing products, and maintaining the overall shopping experience. Here’s how UCaaS benefits retail staff directly:
Seamless Integration Across Devices:
Retail staff can use tablets, smartphones, or store computers interchangeably to access information, communicate with colleagues, or assist customers, enhancing their flexibility and efficiency.
Real-Time Information Access:
With UCaaS, employees can access inventory data, customer profiles, and sales information instantly, enabling them to provide accurate and prompt assistance to shoppers.
Improved Communication Among Teams:
Whether it’s coordinating with the stock room, connecting with customer service reps at another location, or discussing daily targets, UCaaS enables instantaneous communication, reducing wait times and misunderstandings.
Flexible Work Options:
For staff roles that don’t require a constant in-store presence, UCaaS allows for remote work possibilities. This is especially beneficial for online customer support, inventory management, and digital marketing roles.
Enhanced Training Opportunities:
New hires or staff transitioning to different roles can benefit from video training sessions, webinars, and online workshops that are easily accessible through UCaaS platforms.
Instant Customer Feedback:
Staff can receive real-time feedback from online customers, helping them address concerns, answer questions, or even make product recommendations immediately.
Unified Customer View:
Employees can access a unified view of a customer’s interaction history, be it online chats, purchase history, or previous in-store interactions, allowing them to provide more personalized service.
Efficient Task Management:
Many UCaaS solutions come integrated with task management features, enabling employees to prioritize tasks, set reminders, and collaborate on projects more effectively.
Reduced Infrastructure Hassle:
With cloud-based UCaaS solutions, employees don’t have to deal with the complexities of maintaining hardware infrastructure, ensuring smoother day-to-day operations.
Emergency Communications:
In the event of unforeseen circumstances or emergencies, UCaaS enables swift communication to all staff members, ensuring everyone is informed and can take necessary precautions or actions.
In essence, UCaaS empowers retail staff with tools that streamline their daily tasks, improve customer interactions, and foster a collaborative work environment. By adopting UCaaS, retailers not only invest in better customer experiences but also in the well-being and efficiency of their employees.
Sangoma assists retail businesses in adopting these features. Our affordable, scalable solutions enable gradual integration as your business expands. We offer:
Comprehensive Communication and Collaboration:
Sangoma offers a single communication tool where your staff can enjoy voice, fax, video conferencing, messaging, and more from any device or browser of their choosing. This integrated approach ensures employees have all the tools they need at their fingertips.
Scalability:
As businesses grow or their needs change, Sangoma’s UCaaS scales accordingly. This is particularly beneficial for businesses that experience seasonal demand fluctuations, such as retail.
Mobility and Remote Work:
Sangoma’s collaboration tools are offered on desktop and mobile so that employees can communicate and collaborate from anywhere, using any wireless connection of their choice, catering to the growing need for remote and flexible work options.
Integration Capabilities:
With APIs and integration capabilities, Sangoma’s UCaaS can be integrated with other business systems like CRM platforms, enhancing workflow efficiencies and improving customer interactions.
Enhanced Customer Experience:
Features like Contact Center, Interactive Voice Response (IVR), call queues, and call recording can help businesses provide professional and efficient customer service.
Security and Reliability:
Sangoma places emphasis on security, ensuring that communications are encrypted and protected. Additionally, their cloud infrastructure often promises high uptime, ensuring business continuity.
Cost-Effective:
Migrating to UCaaS often results in cost savings for businesses. By consolidating communication tools and reducing the need for on-premise hardware, businesses can realize both direct and indirect cost savings.
Analytics and Insights:
Sangoma’s UCaaS comes with analytics capabilities, helping businesses understand communication patterns, call volumes, and more. This can be invaluable for decision-making and optimization.
Dedicated Support:
A reputable company like Sangoma means businesses can rely on dedicated support when they face challenges or need assistance with their UCaaS solutions.
While you and your team have been struggling with your own set of unique challenges, your IT team has been stretched thin – especially as you transition to an online storefront model. Network downtime could severely impact your reputation and profits.
Considering a UCaaS solution but concerned about your IT resources? That’s where Sangoma’s managed network infrastructure can help. Using cost-effective broadband, we can manage your internet connections across all locations and ensure 24/7/365 monitoring. This includes 5G Broadband and satellite options for remote sites.
Our Managed service options also include SD-WAN, enhancing network performance by consolidating connections, ensuring maximum uptime, and unified threat management security. This is all over our PCI-compliant, fully-monitored network backbone.
As the retail landscape shifts online, it’s crucial to support both physical and online shopping channels. Sangoma can assist in this transition. Our plug-and-play tools and services adapt to your growth needs. Trust in our expertise to ensure consistent connectivity and an optimal customer experience.
Want to learn more?
Download our eBook to get an in-depth look at Sangoma’s product suite for retail businesses.
The post From In-Store to Online: How UCaaS is Bridging the Retail Communication Gap appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
On my Asterisk server, I happen to have two on-board ethernet boards. Since I only used one of these, I decided to move my VoIP phone from the local network switch to being connected directly to the Asterisk server.
The main advantage is that this phone, running proprietary software of unknown quality, is no longer available on my general home network. Most importantly though, it no longer has access to the Internet, without my having to firewall it manually.
Here's how I configured everything.
On the server, I started by giving the second network interface a static IP
address in /etc/network/interfaces
:
auto eth1
iface eth1 inet static
address 192.168.2.2
netmask 255.255.255.0
On the VoIP phone itself, I set the static IP address to 192.168.2.3
and
the DNS server to 192.168.2.2
. I then updated the SIP registrar IP address
to 192.168.2.2
.
The DNS server actually refers to an unbound daemon running on the Asterisk server. The only configuration change I had to make was to listen on the second interface and allow the VoIP phone in:
server:
interface: 127.0.0.1
interface: 192.168.2.2
access-control: 0.0.0.0/0 refuse
access-control: 127.0.0.1/32 allow
access-control: 192.168.2.3/32 allow
Finally, I opened the right ports on the server's firewall in
/etc/network/iptables.up.rules
:
-A INPUT -s 192.168.2.3/32 -p udp --dport 5060 -j ACCEPT
-A INPUT -s 192.168.2.3/32 -p tcp --dport 5060 -j ACCEPT
-A INPUT -s 192.168.2.3/32 -p udp --dport 10000:20000 -j ACCEPT
In order for the phone to update its clock automatically using NTP, I installed chrony on the Asterisk server:
apt install chrony
then I configured it to listen on the private network interface and allow access from the VoIP phone by adding the following to /etc/chrony/conf.d/asterisk-local.conf
:
bindaddress 192.168.2.2
allow 192.168.2.3
Finally, I opened the right firewall port by adding a new rule to /etc/network/iptables.up.rules
:
-A INPUT -s 192.168.2.3 -p udp --dport 123 -j ACCEPT
Now that the VoIP phone is no longer available on the local network, it's not possible to access its admin page. That's a good thing from a security point of view, but it's somewhat inconvenient.
Therefore I put the following in my ~/.ssh/config
to make the admin page
available on http://localhost:8081
after I connect to the Asterisk server
via ssh:
Host asterisk
LocalForward localhost:8081 192.168.2.3:80
Because this local device is not connected to the local network
(192.168.1.0/24
), it's unable to negotiate a direct media connection to
any other local (i.e. one connected to the same Asterisk server) SIP device.
What this means is that while calls might get connected successfully, by
default, there will not be any audio in a call.
In order for the two local SIP devices to be able to hear one another, we
must enforce that all media be routed via Asterisk instead of going directly
from one device to the other. This can be done using the directmedia
directive (formerly
canreinvite
) in
sip.conf
:
[1234]
directmedia=no
where 1234
is the extension of the phone.
Can you believe it? It’s been 25 years since Asterisk burst onto the scene and forever changed the communication landscape. This open-source software has revolutionized how we make phone calls, paving the way for voice-over IP (VoIP), unified communication, and more.
In 1999, Mark Spencer, the founder of Digium, created Asterisk as a personal project to develop a PBX (Private Branch Exchange) system for his business. Little did he know that this humble beginning would spark a technological revolution. Check out “The Evolution of Asterisk� hosted by Joshua Colp, which takes you through the history of Asterisk.
At its core, Asterisk is a robust communications platform enabling individuals and organizations to build phone systems. It empowers businesses to create feature-rich, scalable, cost-effective solutions tailored to their needs. Asterisk has become the go-to choice for companies worldwide, from small startups to large enterprises.
One of the great things about Asterisk is its flexibility. It’s open-source, so developers can customize and extend its functionality to suit their needs. Asterisk can handle it all, whether you need call routing, voicemail, conference calling, or integration with other software systems!
In the last 25 years, Asterisk has been evolving steadily. It’s seen countless updates, enhancements, and the introduction of excellent new features. The Asterisk community is incredibly vibrant and active, constantly pushing the boundaries of what we can do. Collaboration and sharing knowledge are at the heart of this community, inspiring innovation and propelling the platform forward.
But Asterisk’s impact goes far beyond business communication. It has played a crucial role in bridging the digital divide, making affordable and easily accessible communication solutions available in underserved areas worldwide. In times of crisis, it has been a complete lifesaver, enabling quick deployment of communication infrastructure for effective disaster response.
As we celebrate the 25th anniversary of Asterisk, it’s important to shout out to all the amazing people and organizations who’ve made it such a success! From developers and community members to businesses and users, each and every one of them has played a major role in shaping this incredible platform. Cheers to everyone involved!
Looking ahead, the future of Asterisk is looking really bright. With all the advancements in technology, the possibilities are endless! We can expect to see even more incredible and innovative applications and integrations, which will solidify Asterisk as a top solution in the world of communication. Exciting times ahead!
So, here’s to 25 years of Asterisk! Join us at AstriCon on February 15th for a day of networking, collaborating, and celebrating! Register now to attend!
Let’s toast this incredible software’s past, present, and future. Cheers to the countless connections made, the problems solved, and the lives impacted.
Happy anniversary, Asterisk! May your journey continue to inspire and transform the way we communicate.
The post Revolutionizing Communications for 25 Years – Asterisk appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
The traditional means of setting up a business network have remained fairly static over the years — this has been a problem, limiting companies’ options. Businesses hoping to get up to speed with their computing needs have been forced to choose between expensive and difficult to obtain private connections and a loose collection of public internet resources. The emergence of software-defined wide-area networking (SD-WAN) represents new possibilities.
By leveraging multiple connections, whether private, public, or even wireless, SD-WAN represents an affordable and secure way to get the bandwidth your organization needs to run its systems and applications. With a centralized control layer in the cloud, SD-WAN provides a way to build a better business network that matches modern use cases.
If you’re wondering about the best way to expand your network, it pays to learn the basics about SD-WAN: how it works, how it’s different from other types of networking, and what makes it so suitable for meeting organizations’ computing needs today. SD-WAN is largely defined by its ability to deliver the same capabilities companies have long taken from more traditional WAN options, but on a new technological and economic model, one with considerable upside.
SD-WAN is a wide-area network that is managed in the cloud instead of at the hardware level. Private networks, public broadband internet connections, mobile networks such as 4G, 5G, and satellite connections — all of these can become part of SD-WAN, with bandwidth aggregated through control systems in the cloud.
Traffic over SD-WAN is wrapped in an encrypted VPN tunnel. This ensures that even when using a public internet connection, functionality is as secure as it would be on a traditional private connection employing multiprotocol label switching (MPLS). Combining multiple connections in a technology-agnostic SD-WAN network allows organizations to increase bandwidth to levels that rival those of private connections, without the time-consuming and costly installation.
Every physical brand and digital service operated by a company are managed as part of a centralized SD-WAN network. This means offices, data centers, and critical cloud applications are all overseen through the same cloud-based software. This changes the way controls work — where previously, each site would have its own administrators, it is now possible to handle everything via the same IT personnel.
The key features of SD-WAN are designed to allow businesses to take greater control over their networks. These include the following capabilities:
The net effect of these features is to create a solid and reliable business network solution that combines aspects of private connections — high bandwidth and data security—with advantages of public internet resources, namely low costs and flexibility regarding deployment. This is in keeping with the general trend of information technology today, with business users leaning toward cloud hosting rather than relying entirely on traditional hosting.
It’s possible to break the comparison between WAN models down into a few categories. By defining SD-WAN against a model that only uses MPLS networking, you can determine which one fits your enterprise computing strategy most closely:
Location specific vs. centralized: A traditional WAN network is often made up of disparate edge devices and managed via this hardware. The control for each office and data center resides locally. In SD-WAN, this management layer is entirely based on public cloud software and managed from a single location.
The switch to using SaaS applications for critical business functions is a product of recent years, and it’s likely that longstanding enterprise leaders already have data center and office IT layouts in place on a traditional MPLS model. On the other hand, organizations going through rapid expansion could be wondering how to reach this level of tech maturity quickly. One answer may be SD-WAN.
Separate vs. aggregated connections: Managing an MPLS network means working with individual private network connections. Your company can also opt to use the public internet, although reliability will decrease. Using SD-WAN, bandwidth from all sources is aggregated, with data packets sent via dynamic path selection.
MPLS networks consisting of exclusively private internet resources have long been the gold standard for business networks, among companies that can afford them. These systems will not typically go away overnight when an organization begins using SD-WAN. The solutions may be used to complement one another, with the SD-WAN acting as a backup or extra bandwidth to support the MPLS network.
Secure access to reliable, high-bandwidth connections has become an essential part of business today; companies have come to rely on mission-critical applications such as VoIP and video chat to coordinate their day-to-day activities. Furthermore, with common enterprise applications such as Salesforce, Hubspot, and more sold on a Software-as-a-Service model, it’s valuable to have access to a cloud-based solution that can deliver lower-latency connectivity to those apps.
What are the top 5 trends in SD-WAN today?
Growth is a universal goal, and it is another reason why SD-WAN has become so popular. Adding anything to a network — whether that is a new location, a cloud service, or piece of hardware — is simpler and more intuitive with an SD-WAN network, especially one that supports zero-touch provisioning from plug-and-play edge appliances.
The challenges traditionally associated with provisioning a new private network connection, from the scarcity of necessary hardware to the high capital expenditures necessary to get the data center up to speed, are all eliminated when an organization uses SD-WAN. Therefore, when a business is interested in rapid growth, the math becomes simple: Use SD-WAN and get the capabilities now for less, or stay with a traditional MPLS-only model and wait 30 to 120 days.
While we have broken down the key selling points of our managed SD-WAN solution in detail elsewhere, a quick overview of how SD-WAN capabilities translate into business value can be instructive. In brief, the most compelling sources of SD-WAN value include:
Cost management: There are a few distinct cost advantages to using SD-WAN. In one of the most direct examples, this method reduces capital expenditures associated with adding new resources to your network. Standing up a new enterprise-grade private network connection is costly, with scarce hardware and lengthy installation driving up the expense even further. SD-WAN’s agnostic approach to bandwidth enables you to turn to affordable commercial internet resources without sacrificing capacity or security.
There are also operational expense reductions associated with the technology: Controlling all network resources from a centralized location is a more affordable approach to IT administration. The personnel operating these control panels can use their increased visibility to eliminate inefficiencies and get more performance from network resources.
Ease of control: Controlling the whole network through a single pane of glass isn’t just a boon to cost-efficiency; it’s also a forward-thinking and effective way to operate. Your administrators can set policies that affect an application across every one of your offices, then zoom in and make exceptions where needed, ensuring perfectly tuned performance for the most important applications at each location.
Why is Managed SD-WAN better than a DIY approach?
With access to a deep analytic engine, personnel can detect possible sources of issues, then make minute changes to keep every service at peak performance. This level of oversight also enables better security, with the ability to choose which traffic to block on the network. While some apps receive priority access, others can be shut down altogether, all through a single centralized console.
Quality of service: Your most mission-critical applications can perform better and with greater uptime when you’re using the managed SD-WAN solution from Sangoma. By setting QoS policies targeting VoIP, videoconferencing, and other essential cloud-based tools, you can make sure those solutions get priority, creating a better experience with less latency.
When connections do fail, the SD-WAN solution offers many ways to compensate. Seamless failover via link aggregation is their key feature. Using automatic load balancing, application priority setting, and forward error correction, you can ensure that sessions do not drop when one of the connections making up your meshed architecture goes down.
Increased reach and ease of deployment: Adding new offices or data centers to a business network is a common activity today, and implementing new SaaS applications is an important part of expanding your capabilities. These actions are simple and more cost-effective when you have a managed SD-WAN network instead of a pure MPLS solution. Bringing a new location online takes far less time when there is no need to set up a private connection — this process goes from months to minutes.
When edge appliances support zero-touch provisioning, you don’t go through a complex configuration process for each new resource. Everything your organization needs to build a global network is easily available. Overseen by a combination of our network experts and your personnel, this new configuration will be available to grow alongside your business, regardless of the demands placed on your computing resources in the years ahead.
Beginning the journey to SD-WAN deployment involves a few key components as you set up new connections and create your network. This will likely take the form of a hybrid WAN, with some locations on SD-WAN and existing locations still on MPLS. Working with your provider of choice, you can assemble the following.
It’s important to remember that your first SD-WAN deployment will likely not take the form of a full rip-and-replace of your current infrastructure. SD-WAN and traditional MPLS networks function effectively side by side, and it’s common to begin with SD-WAN circuits acting as affordable options for smaller branch locations.
Over time, as contracts with your conventional network resources expire, your organization can move more capacity to the SD-WAN. In the years to come, as SaaS applications form an ever-larger part of companies’ IT deployments, this strategy could pay off in performance benefits alongside the cost advantages of using broadband internet circuits.
Learning about SD-WAN is the first step in making it work for you. Next, it’s time to work with experts to assess your current infrastructure in detail and make a plan that fits your organization. If you’re interested in investigating further, contact our SD-WAN experts.
The post SD-WAN, Explained appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
We’re thrilled to announce that Sangoma CX has been honored with the 2023 Customer Experience Innovation Award by CUSTOMER Magazine. It’s a testament to Sangoma’s commitment to providing exceptional value, innovation, and customer support.
The Sangoma CX solution is a full suite of products designed to level up customer interactions, offer speedy support, and foster brand loyalty for businesses of all sizes. And guess what? It comes with some pretty cool features, too!
Multi-channel Support: Sangoma CX lets businesses communicate with customers through various channels like phone, SMS, email, and web chat, giving them a seamless experience.
Analytics: With Sangoma CX, businesses gain helpful insights into customer behavior and preferences, enabling them to tailor products and services accordingly.
Call Queuing & Routing: The CX solution offers advanced call queuing and routing capabilities, ensuring calls are directed to the right agents, reducing wait times, and improving customer satisfaction.
The Sangoma CX solution takes customer experiences to the next level – shorter wait times, happier customers, and increased satisfaction guaranteed! It equips businesses with powerful tools for success, like multi-channel support. This award proves our dedication to customer-centric products and services. Check out Sangoma CX today for top-notch customer experiences and a competitive edge. Get in touch now to see how we can help you reach your goals.
The post Celebrating Our 2023 Customer Experience Innovation Award appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
Cloud communications is a relatively new concept emerged in recent years as a key player in the world of telecommunications. It involves using cloud technology to facilitate real-time communication and collaboration between individuals and organizations, regardless of their location or device.
With the healthcare industry evolving and embracing new technologies, cloud communications are poised to play an increasingly important role in facilitating communication and collaboration between healthcare providers, researchers, and patients. So, without further ado, let’s discuss how cloud communication benefits the healthcare industry.
Cloud communications technology has become increasingly popular in recent years, with the market expected to reach $1240 billion by 2027. Businesses can save up to 50% on communication costs by switching to cloud-based solutions.
Additionally, cloud communications can improve employee productivity and collaboration, with 78% of employees reporting improved communication and collaboration after adopting cloud-based solutions.
With the healthcare industry constantly evolving, it is crucial for healthcare providers to find innovative ways to improve efficiency and patient care. Cloud communications offer three key advantages:
Improved Patient Experience
An enhanced patient experience is a key benefit of cloud communication in the healthcare industry. Here are two examples of how cloud communication drives value for healthcare by improving the patient experience:
Remote Patient Consultations. Telemedicine is a rapidly growing trend in healthcare, and cloud communication is vital in making it possible. Cloud communication technologies like video conferencing, instant messaging, and secure file sharing allow doctors to consult with patients remotely. It is particularly beneficial for patients who live in rural or remote areas where access to medical is quite limited.
Appointment Scheduling. Cloud communication platforms can also schedule appointments. Patients can use an online scheduling system rather than calling a doctor’s office to schedule an appointment. It saves the patient’s time and streamlines the scheduling process for healthcare providers.
Enhanced Communication with Cloud Technology
A doctor can use cloud-based communication tools to access a patient’s medical records from the past, collaborate with other doctors or specialists in real-time, and provide immediate updates to the patient’s family members. This kind of communication can prevent errors, reduce wait times, and ultimately improve the quality of care.
Increased Efficiency and Cost Effectiveness
Cloud-based unified communication has brought about a revolution in the medical industry. Here are some ways it has transformed the industry:
Improved Accessibility and Security of Healthcare Data. Cloud-based data storage and management ensure that healthcare data is secure and accessible only to authorized personnel. It uses security protocols such as encryption, firewalls, and two-factor authentication to safeguard patient data.
Reduced Communication Costs. Cloud-based communication eliminates the need for traditional communication methods such as phone calls, faxes, and emails, which are time-consuming and costly. Cloud-based communication platforms such as video conferencing and messaging apps have significantly reduced communication costs in the medical industry.
To sum up, cloud communications offer significant benefits for the healthcare industry, including increased efficiency, improved patient care, and enhanced security for sensitive information. By leveraging cloud-based solutions, healthcare organizations can streamline communication processes, reduce costs, and provide better patient outcomes.
The post 3 Ways Cloud Communications Drive Value for the Healthcare Industry appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
Unified Threat Management (UTM) is a collection of functions that capture threats at various stages of infiltration. This suite of tools works to protect customers against attacks and losses from cyberthreats including spam, viruses, ransomware, botnets and more.
A UTM firewall is a comprehensive software solution that combines multiple security features into a single unified system with out-of-the-box policies, simplifying management and reducing the complexity of deploying multiple security solutions. Most UTM firewalls have functionalities like Intrusion Detection and Prevention System (IDPS), antivirus, antimalware, web filtering, Data Loss Prevention (DLP) and basic firewall features like packet filtering, stateful inspection and access control.
Businesses of all sizes use UTM solutions to provide these key benefits:
A UTM solution identifies threats to an organizations’ network by using two inspection methods that address different types of threats:
UTM solution features typically include:
Sangoma’s UTM service is designed to protect single and multi-location businesses from unwanted and malicious traffic coming into their environment. It includes advanced security features like antispam, web filtering, antivirus, app control, intrusion prevention and botnet blocking. The best part is that our service is a fully managed firewall solution, so that businesses offload all their security measures onto the Sangoma cloud network operations team, putting the responsibility and effort on us to ensure your networks are secured.
To learn more about Sangoma’s Managed Unified Threat Management Services, please visit https://www.sangoma.com/managed-services/managed-network-services/managed-security/
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to get in touch with our team. We’re here to help guide you through the decision-making process and ensure you find the best solution for your business.
The post What is Unified Threat Management (UTM)? appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
Unified Communications (UC) has revolutionized businesses by consolidating multiple communication technologies and tools into a user-friendly platform. This integration has made collaboration and communication among employees more efficient and effective.
UC enables employees to connect seamlessly, irrespective of their physical location. This seamless connectivity increases productivity, reduces costs, and improves customer service. Additionally, with all communication channels consolidated in one place, keeping track of conversations and ensuring everyone is on the same page has become effortless.
Don’t wait to streamline your business communication. Invest in UC today and take your business to the next level!
Studies have shown that companies using UC solutions can boost productivity by an average of 52%. Moreover, research indicates that, on average, businesses make between 35,000 decisions per day.
Additionally, businesses that have adopted UC solutions have a faster decision-making process and a 25% revenue increase compared to those that haven’t. A UC strategy can offer businesses several benefits, including the following:
Increased Efficiency with AI
Businesses can automate several tasks by deploying a Unified Communications strategy integrating AI, allowing employees to focus on more valuable work. For instance, AI-powered chatbots can help businesses handle customer inquiries more efficiently, freeing customer service teams to handle more complex issues.
Improve Customer Service
A Unified Communications strategy helps businesses provide better customer service by allowing employees to access customer information quickly and easily. For instance, when a customer calls, the employee can instantly access the customer’s order history, preferences, and other relevant information to provide personalized service.
Connect Remote Employees
A Unified Communications strategy allows remote employees to stay connected and collaborate with their colleagues. For instance, video conferencing can help conduct meetings, and virtual collaboration tools to enable workflow management.
Streamline IT Operations
A Unified Communications strategy can simplify IT operations by centralizing communication channels and reducing the need for multiple systems. It can reduce IT costs and make it easier for IT teams to manage and maintain communication systems.
Increase Employee Productivity
A Unified Communications strategy can help employees work more efficiently by streamlining communication channels and automating routine tasks. It can increase productivity and allow employees to focus on more valuable work. For instance, a salesperson can spend more time selling and less on administrative tasks.
A Unified Communications strategy is necessary for today’s digital-age businesses. UC solutions offer a range of benefits, from increased productivity to cost savings and improved customer satisfaction. By deploying a UC strategy, businesses can stay ahead of the curve and maintain a competitive edge in the market.
The post Why Should Businesses Deploy a Unified Communications Strategy Today? appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
Starting on August 24th, we will no longer support the anonymous creation of rooms on meet.jit.si, and will require the use of an account (we will be supporting Google, GitHub and Facebook for starters but may modify the list later on). This is a first for us, so users may encounter a few bumps here and there as we are tweaking the experience to make sure there is as little friction as possible on the way into a meeting.
When we started the service back in 2013, our goal was to offer a meeting experience with as little friction and as much privacy as possible. We felt and still feel that both of these goals are very important and one of the main reasons that justified the existence of “yet another meeting service.” We wanted people to be able to converse easily and freely, without fear of expressing their views and opinions.
Our “one tap and you’re in” experience was a big part of our strategy to eliminate friction. We didn’t want people to have to worry about “creating” meetings in advance, remembering passwords, codes or long complicated sequences of numbers for a meeting ID. We wanted users to be able to think of a name and just go there. Through the years we’ve had to compromise on this a little bit. We ended up introducing a pre-meeting device check screen. We felt that checking your camera and microphone before you entered a room could save everyone some hassle so it was worth the pause.
As for privacy, we previously made sure all communication was always encrypted and we retained no data beyond what is necessary to actually provide a decent meeting service.
Offering the possibility to anonymously use the service felt like a good way to help with both its privacy and the usability.
Our commitment to both goals remains as strong as ever but anonymity is no longer going to be one of the tools we use to achieve them.
Earlier this year we saw an increase in the number of reports we received about some people using our service in ways that we cannot tolerate. To be more clear, this was not about some people merely saying things that others disliked.
Over the past several months we tried multiple strategies in order to end the violations of our terms of service. However in the end, we determined that requiring authentication was a necessary step to continue operating meet.jit.si.
It is a good time to have a look at our privacy terms. 8×8 will now store the account responsible for creating rooms. Aside from the changes to our privacy terms referenced above, there is no other change to our meetings. We are still very much committed to holding user privacy in the highest regard and we still have no tools that would allow us to compromise the privacy of the actual audio or video content of a meeting, nor do we intend to create any.
That said, it is completely understandable that some users may feel uncomfortable using an account to access the service. For such cases we strongly recommend hosting your own deployment of Jitsi Meet. We spend a lot of effort to keep that a very simple process and this has always been the mode of use that gives people the highest degree of privacy.
If you see content that violates the jit.si terms of service you can always report it.
That’s all we’ve got for now!
The Jitsi Team
The post Authentication on meet.jit.si appeared first on Jitsi.
Flutter‘s initial release occurred in 2017, the same year as the introduction of our mobile apps and mobile SDKs. For those who are unfamiliar with it, Flutter is one of the most popular frameworks for developing cross-platform applications.
Now a few years after their first release, we are thrilled to announce that our mobile SDKs and Flutter cross paths as the Jitsi Meet Flutter SDK. Yes that’s right, after multiple requests, an official Jitsi Meet Plugin for Flutter is now available.
As of now, our family of mobile SDKs is more complete than ever.
Android and iOS are supported, of course. The plugin serves as a wrapper for the iOS and Android SDKs, on top of which a Flutter API was created with functionality similar to those found in native APIs.
The plugin is available on pub.dev under the jitsi_meet_flutter_sdk name. Discover it there, follow the instructions, and you’ll be able to utilize the API to the fullest extent.
Here is a sneak peek of how simple it is to add a meeting to a fresh page.
Here is how that looks like:
In your own Flutter app, you’ll have the same view as the one from the Jitsi Meet mobile apps, with just a few additional lines of code, amazing, right?
We developed two apps using the Jitsi Meet Flutter SDK, one of which is the example app in the plugin repository and primarily acts as a tester app by displaying the majority of the plugin’s features in the user interface, and the other of which is an official sample app in the repository that contains all of our samples for all mobile SDKs and is just a straightforward example of integrating Jitsi Meet.
Flutter is new to us, and we hope this new SDK will make it easier for our users and JaaS customers to embed video meetings into their existing Flutter apps we agerly await your feedback!
Your personal meetings team.
Author: Gabriel Borlea
The post Introducing the Jitsi Meet Flutter SDK appeared first on Jitsi.
Ever since we introduced our mobile apps to the world back in 2017 they have been backed by React Native.
Using React Native allowed us to reach feature parity quickly since all logic is shared between our web and mobile codebases, because they are not 2 different things, it’s a single codebase
Later that year, we released our native mobile SDKs to the world. These SDKs werer a thin wrapper over our React Native application, so our users could embed the entire meeting experience into their own mobile apps, with little effort.
This has been our guiding priciple since the inception of the iframe API: to privide a high-level and fully-featured component that can be integrated into other apps.
Today we are taking another step in our mobile jouney by releasing a React Native SDK.
What does this mean? Before today if you had a React Native application we provided you with no way for embedding Jitsi Meet. Now we do!
As mentioned above, our mobile apps are built using React Native and over time we received a number of requests from our community and customers to have an actual React Native SDK. We finally managed to expose it as a React Native library. It’s not that we didn’t have it in the back of our minds, but we focused on native first to cater the needs of our internal consumers.
Exposing a React Native app as a component seems easy on the surface, but being so complex and having so many dependencies made it a lot harder han we had thought. Fortunately, this all changed thanks to Google Summer of Code. We were fortunate to have Filip Rejmus take on the project and kickstart it. After his amazing work, we took over and added the final touches and now it’s available on npm.
First go and grab our package from npm and follow the setup instructions.
In the screenshot below you can see how easy it is to integrate and enable different meeting options into your app, by simply importing the JitsiMeeting component and adding it to your code:
You will have access to the same features as the Jitsi Meet app.
We created a sample app which integrates our brand new SDK together with react-native-navigation, check it out!
This new SDK will make it easier for our users and JaaS customers to embed video meetings into their existing React Native apps, we agerly await your feedback!
Your personal meetings team.
Author: Calin Chitu
The post Introducing the Jitsi Meet React Native SDK appeared first on Jitsi.
10DLC (10 Digit Long Code) has evolved into a potent tool for application-to-person (A2P) corporate messaging, but new registration mandates from carriers have emerged. What’s the reason for registration? How does it work?
Just like your commitment to delivering stellar service to your customers, carriers like AT&T and T-Mobile are keen on ensuring their customers’ satisfaction. This means they’re intent on curbing spam and unwanted messages from businesses – a protective measure for their brand.
With the application of these A2P 10DLC rules, carriers are proactively identifying the senders and the content of the messages. The process begins with the one-off registration of your organization, referred to as the brand. Following this, you’ll need to register for a campaign – your use case that demonstrates your intended use of SMS.
While the decline in spam is positive, customers might not see much difference in the A2P messages they receive from businesses. A crucial aspect of the 10DLC Campaign Registry is to build trust. You register your brand, detailing your business and its intent, which gives carriers an understanding of whether they can trust you or not.
Multiple elements contribute to a brand’s trust score, including the brand’s industry, the intended use of SMS, and the brand’s compliance history. Carriers are keen to understand the nature of your business and the intent behind your messages before you start sending A2P messages.
Registering for a 10DLC campaign can be a significant first step in proving to carriers that you are not a spammer and can be trusted. Carriers use a 1 to 5 scale to rate brands, which is then stored in their database. Here’s a simple guideline for understanding this score:
Being in the process of registering your brand and campaign, there are a few things you need to be aware of. You can’t just start sending out messages – there are steps to follow that will determine the success of your campaign or your messaging ability.
The process of getting a trust score is designed to ensure that you’re not seen as a risk. Once you’ve registered your brand and campaign, you’ll have to wait to receive your trust score. Once you do, your messages will be sent.
In case you have restrictions, you might want to consider talking with your carrier to get approved. But if you decide to apply for the highest trust score, you’ll have no restrictions on your messaging, provided you’re not seen as a high risk.
The main advantage of 10DLC is that it provides a better balance between high throughput rates and more reliable delivery. However, it’s important to note that your trust score can directly influence your carrier fees and your message throughput ability.
To comply with 10DLC, every organization sending text messages is required to register their brand (the legal entity responsible for the content of the messages) with The Campaign Registry. If you are using one of Sangoma’s UCaaS platforms, we’ve taken care of this registration process for you with a simple form you can complete online.
If you are a voice or communication service provider using Sangoma’s wholesale carrier services (formerly known as VI Communication Services), we’ve integrated the registration process directly into our BackOffice portal. This allows you to quickly collect information from your customers and get their numbers registered on their behalf. If you’d like more information on 10DLC and how Sangoma can help you and your customers, feel free to reach out to us!
The post Demystifying 10DLC: Unpacking Trust Scores and Campaign Registration appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
I’ve done several video and voice podcasts over my career, and I wanted to single out a fun one I did recently with Steve Farmiloe on “The Top Gun Show” / #topgunshow.
This show is the most widely viewed and followed video podcast on LinkedIn in the telecommunications, VAR, and MSP industries. So it gets a good following, and I can see why. If you have 6 or 7 minutes, listen. It takes little time. And one thing Steve does differently is asking some non-business questions, which, to me anyway, makes it all interesting.
Steve understands the channel quite well and asked us relevant questions. A central theme, and why we decided to go on this show in the first place, was that Sangoma is getting a “buzz” in the channel.
What and why? So you can hear myself, Jamie Minner (CRO), Aaron Kanahale (VP of Strategic Relationships), Dan DeLozier (VP of Sales), and David Hardy / Chris Holloway (SVP Sales and SVP Channel Sales, respectively) talk about why we think this is so.
To go to the video podcasts, please go here and scroll down.
The post The Top Gun Video Podcasts appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
Tick, tock, tick, tock…time is running out for your outdated business telephony.
In 2017 BT announced it intended to Switch Off ISDN and PSTN in the UK; from 2025, traditional phone lines will stop working, and all calls will be made over the Internet.
It’s the biggest and most important modernisation of the public phone network ever, and your business needs to ACT NOW to ensure a smooth transition.
Thankfully, there’s no need to worry about how it will all work, as we can get you to where you need to be.
There are four options, all suitable for businesses ranging in size from as few as three employees to many thousands of employees. All you have to do is decide which is the best fit for you, and we’ll help you do the rest…
Extend the life of your current phone system by connecting it to the internet. This is done by adding hardware known as a VoIP Gateway and a link known as a SIP Trunk, which uses your existing Internet connection. It’s easy, and affordable, and users notice no difference – no new cables, handsets, or training.
Replace your installed on-premise system with the latest feature-rich digital technology known as a Unified Communications (UC) Platform; this can be installed as hardware or software. All your telephony is now on the internet and seamlessly aligned with your email, messaging, and chat applications via an easy-to-use, easily accessible user interface. Plus, it can all be replicated on employees’ desktop computers, laptops, and mobile devices for super-convenience.
Follow hundreds of millions of organisations worldwide by replacing your on-premise system with a powerful, cloud-powered Unified Communications (UC) solution. All your calls, email, chat, and messaging now via the internet; zero line rental; limitless ability to add the latest new features at will; and pay monthly only for the services you use.
Mix options 1, 2, and 3 to suit your needs—for example, an on-premise system at your head office and a cloud-based system serving your remote sites. Or connect a cloud-based unified communications platform to an on-premise VoIP Gateway or SIP Trunk-powered system. Whatever the blend, enjoy the same seamlessly-integrated user experience.
Click here for more background information about the Switch Off!
The post Hold the line, caller…you’re about to be switched off! appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
A2P, or application-to-person texting, involves using an SMS service provider to send and receive messages. This used to be limited to automated messaging but has now expanded to resemble more personal conversations as more customers respond to business texts through 10DLC. This progression has led carriers like AT&T and T-mobile to step in to regulate these use cases.
The primary reason carriers are implementing 10DLC regulations is to prevent spammers from exploiting this medium. By requiring you to specify the A2P use cases for which you’re using texting, carriers aim to maintain text messaging as a quality channel for both customers and businesses. Complying with these regulations involves registering your organization and the texting use cases. Failure to do so may result in your messages being filtered and not delivered to customers.
Registering your brand under 10DLC will improve the throughput of your messages, leading to faster delivery. This initiative by carriers is designed to ensure that SMS remains a reliable communication channel as more businesses start texting customers. The registration process helps to reduce spam and improve deliverability, thus enhancing the credibility of your messages with customers.
The 10DLC registration process requires you to provide the following details:
While this may seem extensive, the information will be gathered via a form and submitted to The Campaign Registry, ensuring minimal work for you and contributing to your texting success.
The Campaign Registry is a central platform for registering A2P 10DLC messaging campaigns. They help verify your business to prevent your messages from being filtered by carriers. They act as a liaison between your business and mobile carriers, and we work closely with them to represent your business and ensure your texts are delivered.
We’ve compiled a comprehensive guide to help you craft professional text messages that don’t get flagged as spam. Here are a few key tips:
You can sell your SMS service as wholesale just like you can with SIP trunking. However, you should be aware of a few key considerations:
If you are a voice or communication service provider using Sangoma’s wholesale carrier services (formerly known as VI Communication Services), we’ve integrated the registration process directly into our BackOffice portal. This allows you to quickly collect information from your customers and get their numbers registered on their behalf. If you’d like more information on 10DLC and how Sangoma can help you and your customers, feel free to reach out to us!
The post Exploring 10DLC: A Comprehensive Insight Into Its Significance In Application-to-Person Texting appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
I used to wonder why phones were in hotel rooms anymore. You don’t need to call out or receive phone calls from outside the building anymore, given we all have cell phones now. But I started learning more about this market, and guess what – you need a phone in the room. People call for room service, and people call for more towels; you never know when you might need to call 911, etc. Just because I haven’t used the hotel room phone in a while doesn’t mean no one else does. So you need a phone
Last month, you might have noticed that Sangoma announced a partnership with GrayMatter Networks. They have built a specific hospitality module that works in conjunction with Sangoma’s UCaaS platforms PBXact and FreePBX.
GrayMatter’s BrainBox interfaces with hospitality property management systems to enable a comprehensive suite of hospitality-centric features, including enhanced wake-up calls, call accounting, voicemail, housekeeping room status, next-generation 911 compliance, and more.
Sangoma historically has supported different vertical communication markets, and we’re happy to work with GrayMatter Networks to provide best-in-class solutions that enable hospitality businesses to improve operational efficiency, enhance guest services, and streamline communication workflows.
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In the increasingly digital landscape of business and communication, staying ahead of the curve is paramount. As communication service providers, we’ve seen firsthand the evolution of our industry. From the humble beginnings of the telephone to the booming era of mobile devices, the change has been rapid and relentless. Today, we find ourselves at the precipice of another transformation – wholesale SIP trunking. But what does it mean, and more importantly, how can it drive growth for communication service providers and voice service providers? This article will illuminate the path to understanding and harnessing the power of wholesale SIP trunking.
The Evolution of Telecommunications
Our journey begins decades ago, in a time when the concept of instant communication was just a dream. Over the years, we’ve seen the advent of the telephone, the proliferation of mobile devices, and the rise of internet-based communication. In each of these phases, the core objective remained the same – to make communication quicker, clearer, and more efficient. As we stand in the era of digital communication, SIP trunking has emerged as a technology that encapsulates these objectives. Born out of the need for more efficient voice communication, SIP trunking bridges the gap between traditional telephony and digital communication, offering a hybrid solution that combines the best of both worlds.
The Predictable Revenue Stream: A Business Dream
As seasoned communication service providers, we understand the importance of stable, predictable revenue. It serves as a backbone for our operations, helping us plan better and strategize more effectively. By providing low-cost SIP services, we can tap into a burgeoning market, providing a service that is in high demand. This creates a recurring, predictable revenue stream, giving us the stability and confidence to grow our operations.
Loyal Customers: The Heart of a Successful Business
Customer loyalty is not just about retaining customers, it’s about strengthening relationships and establishing trust. By introducing customers to SIP and VoIP, we can offer them a more cost-effective, efficient solution to their communication needs. This not only enhances our value proposition but also helps us earn a more significant portion of their telecommunications expenditure. This strengthens the customer relationship and engenders loyalty, an invaluable asset in today’s competitive business landscape.
The Ease of Deployment & Administration
In a world where speed and efficiency are of the essence, the quick deployment and easy administration of wholesale SIP trunking come as a boon. Unlike traditional telephone systems, which involve physical lines and lengthy installation processes, SIP trunks and channels can be provisioned in real-time and configured on-demand. This agility enables us to serve our customers better, getting them up and running in no time.
The Profitability Potential
Wholesale SIP trunking isn’t just about providing a service; it’s also about maximizing profitability. By offering value-added services along with SIP trunking, such as call recording, automated attendant, and disaster recovery, we can increase the profitability of each account. This allows us to diversify our revenue streams and leverage cross-selling opportunities, thereby bolstering our bottom line.
Flexibility: The Key to Customer Satisfaction
Every customer is unique, with their own specific needs and wants. The most successful service providers are those that can cater to this diversity. With wholesale SIP trunking, we can offer multiple pricing models, including unlimited minutes per channel, unlimited number of channels with a set number of minutes, and a per-minute rate for an unlimited number of channels. This flexibility ensures that we can meet the needs of all our customers, providing a personalized and tailored solution that leaves no one out.
The Importance of a Reliable Network
In the world of telecommunications, quality and reliability are non-negotiable. Customers expect, and rightly so, a service that is high-quality and dependable. As such, it’s crucial to work with a wholesale SIP provider that leverages a Tier-1, SAE 16 Type II certified network with real-time replication and total redundancy. This ensures that we can offer our customers a reliable service, enhancing our reputation and credibility in the market.
The Power of Versatility: Compatibility Across Platforms
One of the greatest advantages of wholesale SIP trunking is its compatibility with a variety of PBX solutions. This enables us to serve customers across multiple platforms, increasing our potential customer base. And with the popularity of open-source PBX platforms like Asterisk and FreePBX, it’s crucial to choose a wholesale SIP trunk solution that is compatible with these platforms.
Branding: More Than Just a Logo
In today’s digital world, branding is more important than ever. It’s not just about a logo; it’s about creating a consistent, recognizable identity that resonates with customers. With wholesale SIP trunking, we can reinforce our brand by white labeling our services. This means adding our logo and branding to the SIP system we offer, creating a consistent customer experience that builds brand recognition and loyalty.
The Significance of Support in SIP Trunking
In any business, support is a crucial element that can’t be overlooked. This is particularly true in the world of SIP trunking, where technical issues can arise. Understanding the level of support offered by wholesale SIP trunking platform providers is essential to ensure that you can tackle any challenges that may come up.
Tax & Billing Handling: The Unsung Hero of Business Operations
Tax and billing might not be the most glamorous part of business, but it’s certainly one of the most important. Managing telecommunications-related taxes and fees can be a complex and tedious process. Luckily, some wholesale SIP partners take care of this for you, handling the nitty-gritty of taxation and billing so you can focus on growing your business.
Wholesale SIP trunking represents a promising opportunity for communication service providers and voice service providers to grow their brand and scale their operations. By offering predictable revenue, fostering customer loyalty, simplifying deployment, increasing profitability, and providing a flexible and reliable service, wholesale SIP trunking can be a game-changer in the world of telecommunications.
To learn more about our wholesale sip trunking services please visit: https://carrierservices.sangoma.com/
1. What is wholesale SIP trunking?
Wholesale SIP trunking is a technology that allows communication service providers to offer SIP services at a lower cost. It bridges the gap between traditional telephony and digital communication, providing a hybrid solution that offers the best of both worlds.
2. How can wholesale SIP trunking create a predictable revenue stream?
Wholesale SIP trunking creates a predictable revenue stream through its subscription-based model. By offering low-cost SIP services, communication service providers can tap into a growing market and generate recurring, stable income.
3. What role does wholesale SIP trunking play in customer loyalty?
Wholesale SIP trunking enhances customer loyalty by providing a cost-effective and efficient solution to their communication needs. This strengthens the customer-provider relationship and engenders trust, thereby fostering customer loyalty.
4. How does wholesale SIP trunking enhance profitability?
Wholesale SIP trunking enhances profitability by allowing providers to offer value-added services alongside SIP trunking. These additional services provide cross-selling opportunities, diversifying revenue streams and increasing the profitability of each account.
5. What makes a high-quality, reliable wholesale SIP trunking service?
A high-quality, reliable wholesale SIP trunking service is one that leverages a Tier-1, SAE 16 Type II certified network with real-time replication and total redundancy. It should also offer a high level of support to handle any technical issues that may arise.
6. What role does branding play in wholesale SIP trunking?
Branding in wholesale SIP trunking is about creating a consistent, recognizable identity that resonates with customers. Through white labeling, providers can add their branding to the SIP system they offer, reinforcing their brand and building customer loyalty.
7. How does wholesale SIP trunking handle tax and billing?
Some wholesale SIP partners take care of tax and billing for providers, handling the complex and tedious process of managing telecommunications-related taxes and fees. This allows providers to focus on growing their business.
The post Harnessing the Power of Wholesale SIP Trunking: A Guide for Communication Service Providers appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
You may have noticed back in April; we announced our bundles. And I’ve gotten a few questions about what’s that all about and why we did it.
First, let me address what it is all about. For some time in Sangoma, we have been trying to address the complexity a business has in buying multiple cloud communication solutions. From UCaaS to video meetings to collaboration to fax to internet access to SD-WAN to security, organizations have to sift through different vendors, contracts, user types and options, pricing structures, etc., when purchasing services. We’ve heard this from both partners and end-users. Yes, we understand it is not easy. And it’s confusing. And it takes time. It takes time.
So at the heart of the Sangoma Suite is making it easy to buy and understand what you are getting. The Suite is centered around purchasing UCaaS and adding on top of other services you might need in an easy-to-understand manner. So I hope if you are evaluating us, this comes through.
And why did we do it? In many ways, we are unique in that we offer all of what an SMB might need for communications – UCaaS (phone calls, collaboration, video meetings), add-on services such as fax and contact center, and also offer MSP type services such as internet access options, security, and SD-WAN. We are unique in providing all of these services. So our bundles take this into account – easy to understand what you are getting, with easy-to-understand pricing if you take the optional services.
Please go here to learn more about how our bundles might help you.
The post Making it Easy for SMBs Looking for Communications Solutions appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
We’re all familiar with SIP Trunking – it’s reliable, cost-effective, and a staple in the business communication landscape. But have you heard of its more advanced counterpart, Wholesale SIP trunking?
Wholesale SIP trunking is like SIP trunking but on steroids. It promises greater savings, improved scalability, and an opportunity to resell services. It’s the next step in telecommunication evolution that could catapult your business efficiency to new heights.
Now, you may be asking, “When should my business consider this switch?” Well, strap in, because we’re about to embark on a journey to answer that very question. Let’s explore when it’s time to hang up on regular SIP trunking and switch to wholesale SIP trunking. The future of your business communications might just be a ‘switch’ away!
Before we explore the shiny new world of wholesale SIP trunking, let’s take a moment to appreciate our dependable staple – SIP trunking. Acting as the backbone of business communications, SIP trunking has been transmitting voice and other unified communications data across the internet with remarkable efficiency.
Worldwide, SIP trunking accounts for almost 60% of all network traffic. And it’s not just because it’s popular; it’s because it delivers. Over 90% of SIP users report being satisfied with the audio quality.
But its pièce de résistance? The incredible cost savings. Businesses that have switched to VoIP via SIP trunking have seen the cost of their local calls drop by up to 40%, and international calls? They’ve saved up to a staggering 90%. That’s the kind of economics any business can get behind.
So, with its strong track record and undeniable financial benefits, SIP trunking has firmly established itself in the business communications landscape. But as we all know, even the trustiest workhorse can face competition from a more powerful contender. Enter wholesale SIP trunking. Let’s see what this new player brings to the table.
In the dynamic landscape of business communication, knowing when to embrace change can be a decisive factor for growth and efficiency. Not every business may need to transition to Wholesale SIP trunking, but for some, it could be an essential step forward. So, how do you discern when it’s the right time for this strategic move? Here are several key indicators to consider:
Business Expansion
If your business is experiencing rapid growth, it may necessitate a communication solution that can adeptly keep pace. Just as an expanding team requires more resources, a burgeoning business might outgrow the capacities of regular SIP trunking. In such scenarios, Wholesale SIP trunking, with its inherent scalability, can cater to evolving needs more effectively.
Demand for High Uptime
Downtime can be detrimental to any business, causing disruptions that lead to loss of productivity and revenue. If your business operations demand high uptime, Wholesale SIP trunking could be a strategic choice. With the potential to achieve an uptime of up to 99.96% using cloud-based VoIP, it offers a robust solution for maintaining business continuity.
Cost Efficiency
SIP trunking is already more cost-efficient than traditional telephone lines, but wholesale SIP trunking can take these savings even further. This is especially true for businesses with a high volume of calls, as the cost per call can decrease significantly with a wholesale model. Moreover, there’s no need to invest in high-priced equipment, and installation costs are minimal.
Increasing Call Volume
If your business is consistently handling a high volume of calls and you’ve noticed that your costs are rising with this demand, it might be time to look at wholesale SIP trunking. The scalability of this model can provide significant cost savings for businesses that have a large volume of calls, reducing the cost per call.
Growing Your Business
If your business is rapidly expanding and you’re adding new locations or employees. You can even add regional and international office numbers, allowing your customers to avoid long-distance charges.
Deciding to switch to wholesale SIP trunking is a significant decision that requires careful evaluation. However, if your business aligns with one or more of the above scenarios, it may be time to transition from regular SIP trunking to its more advanced and versatile counterpart, wholesale SIP trunking. Recognizing the turning point can pave the way for greater business efficiency and growth.
These signs can help you recognize when it’s time to switch from SIP trunking to wholesale SIP trunking. Remember, every business is unique, so it’s important to weigh the pros and cons based on your specific needs and circumstances.
So, you’re sold on SIP trunking but now you’re considering stepping up your game and diving into the wholesale pool. Good on you! But what’s in it for your business? Let’s unbox the benefits of moving from regular SIP trunking to wholesale SIP trunking:
Scalability
Wholesale SIP trunking offers unparalleled scalability. Whether your business is growing faster than a weed in spring or you experience seasonal spikes in call volumes, you can easily add or remove channels as needed with wholesale SIP trunking. You’re not stuck with a fixed number of channels that either leave you paying for capacity you don’t need or constantly bumping up against the limits of your lines.
Reselling Opportunities
With wholesale SIP trunking, you’re not just a consumer—you’re also a potential provider. If you’ve ever dreamt of becoming a telecom tycoon, here’s your chance! As a wholesale SIP trunking user, you can offer SIP services to your own clients, providing them with phone numbers and lines at competitive rates. Now, that’s what we call a win-win.
View this infographic to learn why you need to sell wholesale SIP trunking.
Redundancy & Reliability
Wholesale sip trunking providers often have redundant infrastructure, ensuring that your communication remains uninterrupted even in the face of network outages or disasters. It’s like having a backup generator for your voice services!
So, if you’re looking to level up your SIP game, wholesale SIP trunking offers a host of benefits that regular SIP trunking just can’t match. Whether it’s the scalability, reselling opportunities, improved uptime, cost efficiency, or the ease of geographic mobility, wholesale SIP trunking is a force to be reckoned with in the business communications arena.
How do you make the transition without breaking a sweat? Here’s a simple roadmap:
Find a Reliable Provider
Do your research and choose a wholesale sip trunking provider with a stellar reputation and a track record of exceptional service. Look for features like 24/7 customer support, network redundancy, and a global footprint.
Evaluate Your Needs
Determine your call volume, international requirements, and growth projections. Communicate these details to your chosen provider so they can tailor a solution to meet your specific needs.
Plan the Switch
Coordinate with your provider to ensure a smooth transition. Create a deployment plan, test the new setup, and train your team on any new features or processes.
In the world of SIP trunking, it’s not just about making calls—it’s about making connections. And with wholesale SIP trunking, those connections could be clearer, more reliable, and more cost-effective than ever before.
Remember, the goal isn’t to just follow the crowd—it’s about choosing the right path for your business. It’s about recognizing when your business is ready for a change, understanding the benefits, and making a well-informed decision.
Whether you’re dealing with an increasing call volume, planning to expand your business, eyeing the potential of reselling SIP services, seeking improved uptime, or just looking for more cost efficiency, wholesale SIP trunking could be the next big leap for your business communications strategy.
If you’re considering whether wholesale SIP trunking is right for your business, or if you just have more questions, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us. We’re here to help guide you through the decision-making process and ensure that you find the best solution for your business.
The post Retail SIP Trunking vs. Wholesale SIP Trunking: Time to Take the Big Sip? appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
Last month, Sangoma partnered with Frost and Sullivan to offer a leading-edge webinar regarding the state of SD-WAN.
SD-WAN is growing quite well, primarily because of all the cloud applications requiring resources and the need for a business to ensure that it has sufficient internet access at an affordable price. But SD-WAN is relatively complex to operate, so 91% of all SD-WAN installations are either of the fully-managed or co-managed variety. If you are looking for a solution to help your business, Sangoma can help you.
One new learning that makes sense but I hadn’t thought much about before is that all these new “smart” IoT applications will require even more bandwidth, smart scaling, and intelligent routing, making SD-WAN even more important. So if you haven’t deployed SD-WAN yet, at some point, soon you will want to for the continued health of your business.
If you want to listen to a webinar replay, please go here.
The post More Reasons to Utilize SD-WAN appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
With a lot involved in deploying SD-WAN, leveraging a managed service provider (MSP) can help businesses keep their IT staff forward-thinking. There are many to choose from, and knowing the criteria to get the best fit is essential.
In searching for an MSP to align with, the size and focus are important so that businesses receive service based on their needs and style. For instance, if an SMB pairs up with an MSP designed for enterprise networking, MSP may not provide the personalized touch the business requires. They are simply too large. On the other hand, selecting a start-up MSP may not be mature with respect to its service offerings. However, they might be able to deliver SD-WAN, which may not meet overarching needs.
Once a business chooses an MSP for SD-WAN, they’ll want them to provide more than just services. For instance, businesses may want to add:
Businesses should want to partner with an MSP that can consolidate these services more holistically. They will want a partner that can help with their overall technology roadmap. For instance, integrating the network security of SD-WAN with endpoint security.
This relates to how the MSP is protecting themselves which effectively protects the customer. If their network is not reliable and secure, that will mean downtime and security issues for their customers. An easy way to investigate this is to know what type of certifications they have. A typical one to look for is SOCII (service operation center), where they have their processes not only well established but are independently tested by third-party auditors. These auditors will verify the following:
As they look for an MSP, businesses may find that many lack WAN service diversity and are not carrier agnostic. Businesses will want to ask questions such as:
That’s the benefit of picking an MSP that has those relationships to bring in a complete solution set and deliver it over one single bill instead of receiving bills from all the individual locations.
Let’s take a look at how Sangoma’s Managed SD-WAN service delivers this solution-set to customers and look at some key strengths.
Dedicated Implementation Team
When an SD-WAN solution is deployed, our dedicated implementation team begins to establish a relationship with the customer; they bring the customer through the entire implementation lifecycle, including post-implementation, monitoring, and support. This dedicated project management style approach is a crucial differentiator of Sangoma’s.
Owned & Operated Robust Core Network Backbone
Sangoma has pioneered the SD-WAN landscape with its own privately owned and operated PCI-Certified and HIPAA-compliant backbone. We have a diverse set of WAN transport options that brings all those transport options into a single network backbone that enables our clients to have the carrier and transport diversity that enables them to be successful.
Managed, Maintained & Monitoring 24/7/365
A major strength of Sangoma’s SD-WAN service is that customers can completely offload their IT resources from the burden of managing, monitoring, and maintaining the SD-WAN service. Sangoma’s dedicated network operations center (NOC) does all this for them remotely. If any issues arise, the NOC team is automatically notified and resolves the issue, even before it has any chance of reaching the customer’s network. Since Sangoma has a homegrown SD-WAN solution, customers have true experts on their side, assuring total satisfaction.
Simplified Billing
There is a lot of value in having customized invoices that simplify a customer’s back office approach to processing bills and allow the back office staff to be more strategic in their efforts.
Sangoma’s Managed SD-WAN solution ensures customers securely connect any user, any device, anywhere, anytime, over any transport. It provides connectivity uptime for users in the most secure way.
In summarizing the need for SD-WAN, there are 3 main objectives:
Uptime & Application Availability
Users need to be able to reach their application whenever needed, so network uptime is vital. Included in uptime is also a security component. For instance, if there is a security attack that takes down the network, the user applications become unavailable. So, ensuring security incidents don’t occur is also key.
Visibility & Management of WAN Workloads
With the resiliency of an SD-WAN network, a failure could occur without users ever noticing and without impact. Still, visibility and management of those individual components are important to ensure the trouble has been identified and remediated in order to get back to primary services.
Simplifying the Complexity of Telco Billing
Consolidating all the individual bills from each carrier in their respective regions offers a nice white-glove approach and saves customers time and resources.
SD-WAN technology is advantageous to incorporate into business networks. Still, it can worsen the complexities of network management for organizations that lack the IT resources to deploy and maintain an SD-WAN solution. They may look to MSPs to deliver managed SD-WAN to replace their traditional WAN architecture. MSPs can provide simplified SD-WAN operations by leveraging a multi-vendor strategy enabling them to augment their offering to provide agility and a differentiated service tailored to business requirements.
Get in touch with one of our Managed SD-WAN specialists.
The post Leaving DIY Behind appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
No commercial off-the-shelf software meeting your needs? Tired of wasting time juggling multiple, disparate communications tools to get the job done?
Tie together Voice, Video, and SMS, for example, and integrate customized solutions into your existing user interface or business processes with our pre-built APIs in our communications platform/SDK environment.
APIdaze is our CPaaS platform for programmable telephony that clients have used to develop custom IVRs, create webhooks for WebRTC, and even develop AI Bot responders. Build your own call center, integrate SMS in your softphone client, automate call tracking applications, and more; the applications are nearly endless.
APIdaze enables you to create the perfect communication solution platform, or augment your existing one, without the time and money building it all by yourself.
Check out this customer testimonial for more details.
APIdaze can integrate with your existing platform to enhance your development efforts. APIdaze is highly customizable and uses our pre-built communications API’s to enable your developers to add real-time voice, video, and messaging elements into VoIP, web, and mobile applications.
Download our paper on the CPaaS Revolution to learn more about how APIdaze can streamline your communication platform development efforts.
Sangoma Wholesale Carrier Services, formerly known as VI, provides value-added resellers access to industry-best Sip Trunking products and carrier services, over our own nation-wide network at discounted rates to service aggregators. We offer wholesale Trunking as a Service (TaaS), provide telecom compliance and regulatory solutions, SPAM/Fraud protections, and reseller-focused features such as Hosted Billing. Sangoma Wholesale Carrier Services continues a legacy of innovations in product development, the expansion of our core networks and to advance technological capabilities, such as CPaaS, to help value-added resellers thrive as communications service providers.
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Cybersecurity is essential for SMBs. This Business Tech Weekly article explains why in more detail, but some of the obvious ones include a relative lack of resources, inadequate training, and the desire to spend only what the business considers to be “needed.”
But this is proving risky. According to the IBM Security, Cost of Data Breach 2022 Report, data breaches cost businesses a lot of money. “Reaching an all-time high, the cost of a data breach averaged $4.35M in 2022, and 83% of organizations studied have experienced more than one data breach.”
As such, today, many companies are making this their number one IT priority – to ensure they do not contribute to the next report!
But what to do about it? While the Business Tech Weekly article explains a few essential areas to cover (like training employees about phishing emails, instituting solid passwords, etc.), that still won’t cover everything.
The IT department may have a big load they can’t handle. One good way to address that is to go to a Managed Service Provider who can offer these services. One you already go to for your UCaaS or Access—someone like Sangoma.
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In our last blog we started a conversation around the advantages of Managed SD-WAN vs DIY. In this post we are continuing that discussion by outlining some of the pitfalls to avoid when attempting a DIY SD-WAN.
Depending on the size of the business, monopolizing IT staff resources for SD-WAN deployment may not be the best use of their time when they could be focusing on more strategic efforts. Enterprise businesses may be fine as they may have an entire floor dedicated to IT/ project management resources, but for an SMB, the IT resources are much thinner. So, keeping IT resources as strategic as possible is most important here.
As already discussed, there are a lot of things that need to be discovered when it comes to the implementation and post-implementation of an SD-WAN solution. When it comes to budget, there is a need to expand the focus not just on dollars but take a look at the human capital and timeline to be able to complete a deployment.
For small to medium-sized businesses, it’s beneficial to align with an experienced MSP who can deploy a dedicated team of certified and specialized network engineers that not only can set realistic expectations but can help them remain mindful of all the steps for an on-time delivery.
The first question an executive team should ask themselves is, “Should we continue to manage our networks within?” It’s a meaningful and impactful question, especially if the business is starting to embrace hosted solutions, SaaS, or public cloud services, where the network’s complexity will change drastically.
A major benefit of SD-WAN is that it can automatically detect link failures and seamlessly failover to a backup connection. So, if there is a failure in the primary link, a business will not notice any service disruption because it will continue to function over the failover connections. What this means is that the actual problem is never detected and resolved. For example, if the primary connection is a broadcast connection and the failover is over LTE, if the primary link fails, everything routes over to LTE and will continue to do so until the primary link failure is resolved. In this scenario, the business would be paying for increased charges since the connection remains on LTE. So SMBs may not have the capacity to maintain SD-WAN services efficiently.
Can the business supply helpdesk staff with 24/7/365 monitoring & support?
Many businesses run from 9-5 but want their networks to run smoothly around the clock without straining their staff.
Can the public cloud be leveraged?
Which deployment model will best support the use of SaaS and public cloud services? It’s essential to understand the different workloads and how that traffic will traverse the network for an end-user experience.
Timeline for implementation & can we meet the desired dates?
The best thing to do here is to define the desired completion dates, then work backward and develop milestones that need to be completed then be able to understand if those milestones can be completed by those desired dates.
There are 6 key outcomes for a business deploying SD-WAN:
Hard Cost Savings
SD-WAN vendors on the market typically promote the hard cost savings of their industry solution. SD-WAN saves substantial circuit costs for businesses relying on legacy circuits for their locations.
When it comes to growth enablement, how can companies rapidly deploy for new locations or new applications? Ideally, they want to reduce provisioning time and turn up services for their end users in days, not weeks or months.
Reduction of Risk & Meeting Compliance
How can a company have advanced service features to identify and respond to security threats that may become prevalent in its environment?
Business Continuity
How can companies have continuity and be able to failover to secondary and tertiary connections services in the event that their primary provider suffers an outage?
Efficiency & Productivity
This relates to the end-user experience, and they want to know that when they turn on their applications-that, they will work. It’s about understanding how a network can be designed to prioritize and shape bandwidth to support those business-critical applications.
Simplified Billing
This is an impactful value but not necessarily known upfront. There is value here in handling multiple carriers and being able to consolidate billing. For example, for nationwide businesses and all their locations, what is realized is that their back office becomes inundated. The workload sometimes becomes out of control with individual bills from many different carriers, which may require an increase in the accounting departments to handle this. So, you can consolidate the circuits, hardware, and licenses into a simple bill with SD-WAN or a managed SD-WAN solution.
So, while there are front-end needs for SD-WAN, things like simplified billing is a nice white-glove approach to SD-WAN to look out for.
Stay tuned for our next and final blog post on DIY vs a Managed approach for SD-WAN.
Get in touch with one of our Managed SD-WAN specialists.
The post The Pitfalls To Avoid In DIY SD-WAN appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
In today’s fast-paced business environment, customer expectations are higher than ever before. Customers demand seamless experiences across all channels, including voice, email, chat, social media, etc. To meet these expectations, contact centers must be able to provide an omnichannel experience.
An omnichannel contact center is a customer service strategy that integrates all communication channels and allows customers to switch between channels while maintaining the context of their interactions. This approach enables businesses to provide a consistent and personalized experience across all channels, increasing customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Omnichannel means you can reach out and touch your audience wherever they are, which means you have more opportunities to get them interested in what you’ve got going on. You can do this by using channels like email, phone calls, text messaging, and even social media platforms.
An omnichannel contact center is the next step in customer service for companies that want to provide a better customer experience but maintain efficiency and effectiveness.
Here are some reasons why an omnichannel contact center is necessary:
Customers expect it: As mentioned earlier, customers expect a seamless experience across all channels. They want to be able to contact a business through their preferred channel and have their inquiries resolved quickly and efficiently.
Improved customer retention: Customers are more likely to stay loyal to a business that provides a seamless and personalized experience across all channels. An omnichannel contact center can help businesses retain customers by providing a consistent and efficient customer experience. Switching communication channels can improve hold/wait times, fostering a better customer experience.
Better Reporting and insights: An omnichannel contact center can give businesses better insights into customer behavior and preferences. By tracking customer interactions across all channels, businesses can better understand their customer’s needs and preferences.
Ultimately, an omnichannel contact center is all about providing a better customer experience. It’s not just about technology or how you deliver your services; it’s about understanding what customers want and how they want to interact with your brand. By combining all of these things into one seamless process, organizations can create a contact center that meets their customers where they are and, thus, create loyal customers who will continue to do business with them in the future.
For additional information on Sangoma CX and omnichannel, click here.
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In today’s digital age, businesses rely heavily on fast and reliable internet connectivity to stay competitive and succeed. With the advent of 5G wireless internet, businesses can experience a new level of internet connectivity which is faster, more reliable, and more secure than ever before. Here are some of the growing benefits of 5G wireless internet for businesses:
One of the most significant benefits of 5G wireless internet is its lightning-fast internet speeds. With download speeds up to 100 times faster than 4G, businesses can enjoy seamless connectivity and faster data transfer rates. This means businesses can upload and download large files in seconds, host virtual meetings without lag, and stream high-quality video content without buffering.
Another benefit of 5G wireless internet is its seamless connectivity. Unlike traditional wired internet connections limited to certain areas, 5G wireless internet is accessible almost anywhere. This means businesses can stay connected on the go or in remote locations.
With faster internet speeds and seamless connectivity, businesses can experience increased productivity. Employees can complete tasks faster, communicate with each other seamlessly, and collaborate on projects more effectively. This can lead to increased efficiency and better performance.
5G wireless internet is designed to be more secure than previous generations of wireless technology. With its enhanced security features, businesses can protect their data and communications from cyber threats more effectively. This can help businesses avoid costly data breaches and protect their sensitive information.
5G wireless internet is a future-proof technology supporting the latest applications and devices. As businesses embrace new technologies, such as the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI), they will require faster and more reliable internet connectivity. 5G wireless internet is designed to meet these demands, making it a valuable investment for businesses looking to stay ahead of the curve.
Sangoma has launched its 5G wireless Broadband internet service as part of its Managed Internet connectivity product suite. Our new wireless service leverages our relationships with the major US wireless carriers to deliver customers the best 5G plan based on their geographical location and from the provider of their choice! It consists of:
Since it’s part of Sangoma’s Managed Internet services, customers benefit from 24/7/365 maintenance and monitoring from our in-house NOC.
If you want to take your business to the next level, consider upgrading to our 5G wireless internet today!
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About 6 months ago, it was announced that Sangoma was positioned by Gartner, Inc. in the 2022 Gartner® Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications as a Service. Sangoma is one of only twelve other companies placed in 2022 and one of just six companies to appear consecutively for the last eight years.
So why am I writing about it again, now? This is on my mind since at last week’s Channel Partners conference, I was asked about this multiple times. Sangoma’s brand is getting out there more, to people who may not know us that well. This becomes part of the 60 second Sangoma story
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Why do businesses look for SD-WAN solutions? What kind of challenges are they experiencing? Why do businesses want to change how their business locations and end users connect?
This is the first of 3 posts where we discuss the needs for SD-WAN within business networks, the different ways to implement and lastly the benefits of partnering with an MSP for a Managed approach to SD-WAN.
Short and simple, the traffic across networks continues to increase, and so too are business networks. In fact, global network traffic size is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.7% from 2021 to 2028 and even higher for small-to-medium sized businesses of 10.3% during the respective period. Businesses purchase various software and applications and then realize that their network is limiting them from achieving their goals. It’s become very labor-intensive for them to log into many devices to manage their network.
Today’s business environments are seeing a lot of challenges in the following ways:
As trends continue and companies undergo digital transformation, they are embracing more software-as-a-service (SaaS) and public cloud applications. In a prior time, they relied on applications and services running on servers in their office locations. Now they are moving to a business model where they rely on that being provided as a service, where those applications run on hardware located elsewhere. So businesses need to understand how to manage their networks in this new way, how to secure them, and be able to provide a reliable end-user experience so that end-users can achieve what’s needed. They also need to figure out how to connect all their locations, decide what type of internet services are needed at each, and what type of carriers they need to embrace in order to achieve a holistic environment. This all focuses on a company’s network, how it’s set up, and how it’s managed.
This identifies software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN) as a need within business networks. SD-WAN is a virtual WAN architecture that allows businesses to leverage any combination of transport services, such as broadband, MPLS, LTE, to securely connect users to applications. SD-WAN uses a centralized control function to steer traffic securely and intelligently across the WAN and directly to trusted SaaS providers. This increases application performance and delivers a high-quality user experience, which increases business productivity and agility and reduces IT costs. This is why we are seeing businesses of all sizes adopting SD-WAN at an exponential rate. For instance, an in-depth analysis of industry insights shows that the market is expected to have an estimated Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 31.2% between 2022 and 2030. Significant contributors to this growth are small to medium businesses (SMBs). Prior to SD-WAN availability, SMBs were limited to offering goods and services globally and having a distributed workforce across multiple locations because it needed to be more of an operating cost to bear. With SD-WAN and a highly competitive landscape, SMBs can leverage SD-WAN to reduce operating expenses while leveraging multiple links to low-cost local internet lines.
Deploying an SD-WAN solution can be very complex and includes a combination of three key elements when selecting the right components:
Finding the right partner to work with will help businesses achieve their goals here.
After having selected the right components, there’s a list of things to consider on the implementation front.
It’s important to note that the contracts for the hardware licenses and the circuits may not align, so it’s important to keep that in mind for renewal purposes.
So, there are many things to look at during the implementation cycle.
Once everything is all set up from an implementation standpoint, there are things to consider regarding maintenance. Businesses need to document everything and keep the information current in the event their support teams need to reach out to hardware manufacturers or carriers for help. Or if changes are required during the lifecycle of the service. This includes:
Stay tuned for the next post where we continue this discussion and get into the pitfalls to avoid in DIY SD-WAN.
Or get in touch with one of our Managed SD-WAN specialists.
The post Why Managed SD-WAN is Better than a DIY Approach in a Digital Transforming World appeared first on Sangoma Technologies.
More and more businesses are turning to the cloud to run parts of their business – from their phone system to their back office type systems to everything in between. And many of these services are managed services, offloading and optimizing IT resources.
Many of these services run in different public networks, a hodge-podge of whatever the particular service uses, and run on any device. This puts stress on the networks as bottlenecks could occur. I’m sure we’ve all experienced this in our work-from-home experiences using video meetings – sometimes, the video is a bit “wonky” for brief periods. This can happen in business connections as well. As such, the networks businesses use to deliver workloads to their employees need to be responsive, or adaptive, to the applications running on them.
This is one of the benefits of using SD-WAN. An SD-WAN solution has intelligence that can define traffic routes and priority based on the application need and, as such, can inherently find the best route for the traffic. There’s a lot more to it than a single sentence, though, as SD-WAN is complex.
In fact, according to a 2021 Frost and Sullivan SD-WAN survey of North American-based network services decision-makers, 64% said they prefer a fully managed SD-WAN service, and 16% said they like a co-managed approach precisely because of the complexity of setting it up and running it. See what Sangoma has to offer with managed SD-WAN.
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If you are in the customer service business, and your business is growing, it is probably time to add an agent-based contact center to supplement calls queues, etc. that may be part of your basic UC / phone system. While some call center type features are making their way into the base phone system, these are more departmental type of call center features. Which are great if you have a small business, but as that business grows, it may be time to upgrade to an agent-based contact center. Why?
As your business grows, it may be time to augment your UC solution with an agent-based contact center. To find out more about Sangoma’s Contact Center solution, please go here.
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There have been some important developments in SD-WAN technology over the last year. We need to continually assess changes in key technologies so we can make informed decisions and move our businesses forward. Let’s take a look at some of these developments so you can determine whether they might be important to your organization.
SD-WAN, or software defined wide area networking, is now well over a decade old as a technology. The term SD-WAN was coined in 2014 by Cisco well after the technology’s introduction, so SD-WAN is now considered a mature service.
Here’s a quick overview for those unfamiliar with SD-WAN. Traditional site-to-site connectivity models relied upon closed private networks in the past. Typically, we saw MPLS or private lines connecting sites back to a centralized data center. Those data centers had the applications and security stack for the organization. Also, internet access was concentrated at that data center behind that security stack. This provided ease of management and concentration of security tools creating a strong security posture. These networks were expensive, but they guaranteed quality of service and security as well as reliability.
Over the last decade, that model has changed though.
As a result, the datacenter became less important as a central computing hub, and distributed security made the centralized security platform less important as well. This gave rise to SD-WAN.
How does SD-WAN work?
SD-WAN allows users at each enabled location to access cloud applications directly over the public Internet, bypassing the need to route through a data center hub and enhancing performance. So, SD-WAN reduces costs and management effort while improving performance without sacrificing security.
Here’s a brief outline of how SD-WAN works and is used:
SD-WAN is Mature & Reliable
SD-WAN is offered by the most reputable names in the networking industry and has completely replaced MPLS or private line for new network deployments. Most mature technologies enter into a state referred to as the plateau of productivity according to Gartner Hype Cycle, where SD-WAN is well entrenched in at this point. Typically seen in this phase of the technology lifecycle is a stagnation on product development. The industry focuses more on consolidation and adoption, rather than new capabilities. This is because the easy stuff has already been invented and so new capabilities come slower. However, the development within SD-WAN doesn’t seem to be slowing down. SD-WAN remains a dynamic and evolving technology as capabilities are pushed into the cloud rather than residing on a heavy appliance on site. To add, with the computing scale of the cloud, additional services are easy to add, and the industry continues to move forward.
When evaluating an SD-WAN strategy there are some new trends to consider.
Secure Remote Access
One of the biggest developments in SD WAN is the coupling of secure remote access. The work-from-home strategy changed the focus of all IT professionals from secure location to securing the individual or the data itself. Some forward looking SD-WAN providers have already incorporated secure remote access before the pandemic, aligning their strategy with Gartner’s Secure Access Service edge (SASE). Other SD-WAN providers have since paired secure remote access capabilities with their SD-WAN platforms.
In fact, small office locations for some customers are eliminating SD-WAN architecture and just using the secure remote access of their SD-WAN provider. What you lose here is application prioritization and seamless failover. That may be acceptable for a few users who might work from home if necessary, in an SD-WAN for home deployment. For a location with five or fewer people broadband connectivity is probably adequate for applications and redundancy is not absolutely critical, where you might have a wireless redundant option rather than a fixed circuit option for redundancy. What you gain is a lower cost structure.
Co-Managed SD-WAN
Early on, enterprises with considerable staff of network architects purchased SD-WAN devices and deployed and managed those devices themselves. This provided ultimate control similar to what they had in their prior WAN environment. Over time, however, organizations have realized that SD-WAN doesn’t require much care and oversight. The talents of the network architect are better used in strategy, policy and design rather than maintaining the appliances.
One of the key benefits of managed SD-WAN is a co-managed environment between the managed services provider and clients’ IT teams. Co-management is now the most popular strategy where SD-WAN service providers maintain the device and its high-level configurations and the customers manage the application policy within the SD-WAN platform. This gives clients a sense of control that they need to run their network while delegating the non-value-added work to a vendor. Some clients are completely outsourcing the management of the WAN, and this option is frequently paired with a network carrier, creating a true network-as-a-service environment.
Wireless Only SD-WAN
While this option has existed for years now since wireless was integrated into SD-WAN, with the increased mobility of the workforce and supply chain issues affecting the delivery of wired services, wireless SD-WAN has caught on. Typically, with just a single wireless service SD-WAN prioritizes the application, so limited bandwidth is optimally utilized and eliminates non-business activity on the network, saving the aggregate bandwidth costs. Certainly, 5G makes this a very interesting exit strategy, but at least in the United States, it’s only really applicable for certain low utilization use cases because of the cost.
SD Branch
Software Defined branch office technology is an extension of the SD-WAN concept. The monitoring and management of branch LANs, access points, print resources and other branch peripherals reduces the need for on-site support and improves the service to the branch. The SD-WAN architecture is core to SD branch delivery.
Security Tools
Look for SD-WAN providers to continue to expand horizontally into other SASE categories, such as secure web gateway, data loss prevention, remote browser, etc. The industry is very fluid right now and SD-WAN is at the center of most security strategies. Going forward demand continues towards becoming the core interoffice connectivity technology. We’ll see automation and AI begin to make its way into the industry allowing the platforms to make adjustments in real time.
So, SD-WAN is mature, but not idle. There is a lot of growth in the industry and it’s important for users to have a well thought out strategy before making an SD-WAN decision. If you’d like to know more how SD-WAN can help your business and how Sangoma’s Managed SD-WAN services work, click here.
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Today, I’ll touch on the benefits of using a Managed Internet Access service according to the Eastern Management Group. Managed Internet Access is a service where a provider (such as Sangoma) obtains and proactively manages the uptime of internet facilities of each customer location.
Major benefits include:
If you want to read the full report now, please go here.
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Late summer of 2022, there was a major multi-day internet outage that happened in Canada that affected many businesses, small and large. Let’s discuss what happened and some of the steps you can take to protect your business if something similar happens to you.
In July of 2022, Canada’s Rogers Communications suffered a major internet outage. For those of you who haven’t heard of Rogers, it is a very large internet and wireless service provider, on the scale of ~ 20 billion US dollars and 26,000 employees. Rogers suffered an outage due to a packet storm on their network. It was caused by a software upgrade that accidentally removed all the traffic filters to the internet from their network. Without the filters, the Rogers network equipment became quickly overwhelmed and stopped functioning. Rogers serves about 30% of Canada’s internet capacity, so this was a big event and affected many people and businesses. It took about 2-3 days to fully restore services to all customers.
So, as a business delivering services to your customers, what would you have done in this case, if your internet service provider was down for multiple days? Businesses who had invested in SD-WAN and redundant ISPs were generally okay. However, those without redundancy, or without an SD-WAN platform to prioritize internet service, they unfortunately suffered catastrophic downtime. Some of them even had to rely on manual processes to keep their business running. They would never have thought service from a large and reliable vendor like Rogers would come to a halt like this, so the investment didn’t seem needed. Businesses with backup internet access generally made it through, and the ones that had SD-WAN did not experience any degradation in service, at all. This is because SD-WAN prioritizes real-time traffic, by application. Even if your redundant internet connection is based on inexpensive broadband, SD-WAN will automatically prioritize your most important applications, so that things like voice and point-of-sale (POS) have the capacity they need, while other less critical applications are limited to what’s left over. This is a significant benefit of SD-WAN and something to consider if real-time traffic is important to your business, because without it, your typical failover setup means a loss in all active communications which would need to be re-established once the backup connection becomes active.
SD-WAN has a couple of other key features as it relates to protection. For instance if your SD-WAN provider is a gateway or private middle mile service, your inbound traffic is also protected because inbound packets will be routed over the best available circuit. Also, if you’re using an SD-WAN provider with gateways or private middle miles, you’ll have built in DDoS protection. So SD-WAN provides a number of protections aside from just managing network resiliency.
Here’s the interesting takeaway. Even if you had a resilient design, and you had sufficient internet, and you had SD-WAN in place, your vendors and business partners may not. With the Rogers outage, a major credit card transaction system was taken offline, leaving their point of sale customers without the ability to accept credit cards. Another example was cell phone service being disrupted as well. We can imagine that many businesses with critical vendors and applications experienced an impact even if they themselves continue to have strong internet service. It might be far-fetched to try and identify whether or not your key business partners have network redundancy and utilize SD-WAN, but identifying the key providers and confirming with them may actually be a new priority element in your business continuity plan.
Beyond internet access, what other key services might be exposed to vendor interruption. Is voice critical to your business? Are you using Microsoft Teams for voice or collaboration? For example, what would happen if Microsoft had an issue or you had to quarantine Office 365 because of a cyber event?
If you’re curious how to protect your environments and learn more about our maintenance-free SD-WAN service, get in touch with one of our Managed SD-WAN specialists.
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It’s definitely a great time to be a Managed Service Provider (MSP), Communication Service Provider (CSP), and Voice Service Provider (VSP), delivering managed communication services. Whether they be a seasoned provider or just starting out, the work-from-home movement has created a massive change in IT infrastructure, which means managed service providers have become very popular and are enticed to deliver more. For instance, the MSP market was valued at $242.9 billion in 2021 and is projected to reach 354.8 billion by 2026, registering a CAGR of 7.9%! This tremendous growth is pushing MSPs to continue to broaden and diversify their offerings. Still, there is a big surprise waiting for inexperienced or ill-informed providers: the increased set of communications tax complexity, obligations, and risk.
MSPs, CSPs, and VSPs certainly understand that they are required to charge for and remit communications taxes. If you are reselling, charging, and invoicing for telecom services, such as data, voice, video, and messaging, then you’re in that camp. But what’s been happening, which has become more challenging, is that communications services have become the de facto method for delivering services from the cloud, but not only that, they’re being offered via programmable interfaces, or APIs. So now communication services are being embedded into SaaS platforms, essentially reselling data services. So the lines have become blurred, and knowing whether you need to pay communication taxes is a bit unknown. You need to ask yourself, “Is my business selling services that incorporate voice, video, or data?” If the answer is yes, then you’ll need to make sure you’re up to speed on tax compliance; otherwise, you’ll have some penalties to pay, aside from learning how to pay those taxes going forward.
Let’s start with general sales taxes, which apply at the federal, state, county, and city levels. Communication taxes fall under this umbrella too. From there, though, they can be very different, not just in terms of the rate and how it’s applied, but with communications taxes, there are instances of tax on tax in tearing of taxes. In many instances, the jurisdiction for communications taxes will be completely different from what you may have from a sales tax perspective. For instance, there are a lot of communication taxes that are based on school district zones, so even just establishing the jurisdiction that applies can be different. We now have a stacking of communication tax complexity over the existing complexity of sales tax. So, registering with the local jurisdiction, and collecting the tax, is one thing, but then it cascades since communications taxes have different compliance obligations. There are different registration obligations, different filing obligations, and also things like exemption management, where the forms that are needed to be filled out to be exempt from communications taxes are different from what is needed to be collected from a sales and use perspective.
This depends on two criteria: jurisdiction and types of services sold. These combined could mean filing 1,000s of compliance tax returns, especially if the provider is selling services nationwide. Voice itself is taxed heavily, as many different types of taxes are applied. Communication taxes are applied at the federal, state, and jurisdictional levels. E-911 is also similarly taxed.
We talked a bit about the blurred lines around knowing if a business is required to pay communication taxes. On top of that, with the plethora of service providers out there, it would be unsustainably time-consuming for the government to find every business out there with communication services, find out if they are simply consuming or reselling them and dig from there. Businesses could easily fly under the radar from paying their taxes.
The recent robocall mitigation regulations, including the STIR/SHAKEN mandate, has forced VSPs, CSPs, and MSPs to register their telecommunications business by applying for a Federal Registration Number (FRN). Now that their telecommunications business is registered with the FCC, comprehensive compliance is much more important for that business. This includes the rating, collection, and remittance of taxes, fees, and surcharges that are levied by the government in the various states, counties, and cities that they sell in, as well as at the federal level.
With all that there is to consider and the challenges there are to become well informed of tax compliance, it may be a good idea to pair up with experts in the field for consultation or, better yet, with a vendor having a tax engine, who can automate rating and calculations of services, based on local and service feature.
As part of our wholesale carrier services hosted billing service, we have a built-in tax module that automates the calculation and collection of taxes and regulatory fees for our customers who resell our wholesale carrier services. For readers unfamiliar with our wholesale carrier services, read this blog post. What differentiates us is that we offer a complete set of wholesale VoIP services, from termination/origination, DIDs, SMS, E911, Fax, fraud detection/protection, and telecom compliance toolkits, wrapped around an intuitive portal, which includes our hosted billing platform and tax module.
Our tax module is the “single pane of glass,” where our customers save a ton of time in tax rating and calculation for all their customers who may be dispersed nationwide using various services we resell. It consolidates taxes on all levels of government and service types. Also, as our customers expand across regions, the tax modules save them time from figuring out new tax compliance information for those areas as well.
Tax compliance becomes more complex as products become more innovative and are offered in a less traditional fashion. For instance, voice services integrated within APIs were never something tax compliance was designed for. The natural progression is that innovation outpaces tax law but, with time, always catches up. A great example of this is with streaming services, such as Netflix or Amazon Prime, for example. When they came out on the market, communications tax compliance only applied to traditional TV services. So no taxes were applicable for a while, but communication taxes started working their way into these new innovation streaming services as time progressed.
As an MSP, CSP, or VSP, it’s essential to understand the gray areas of communications tax compliance and be informed to avoid risks and possible penalties.
Learn more about Sangoma’s Tax module, built into our hosted billing platform, and have your tax rating and calculations automated for you.
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