SerVonic's UC Software Integrates with Asterisk Open Source PBXs

Along with VoIP, hosted IP-PBX solutions and mobility, open source PBXs – with their cost-savings potential and flexibility – are emerging as clear winners in this down economy, as businesses look to communications technology to reduce expenses and boost production.

 

One recent study found that open source now accounts for a larger slice of the PBX (News - Alert) market than any single manufacturer (and 8 percent more than Nortel, the longtime leading vendor that’s now facing a likely break-up). That rising market share now represents 40 percent growth of open source PBXs in the last year alone, as traditional telephone system makers now compete for a bigger slice of a shrinking market – often without knowing it, experts say.

 

This week, we hear that one software developer – serVonic, which is headquartered near Munich and focuses on UC solutions – is announcing that its flagship products now integrate with Asterisk, the popular open source telephony platform that was created and is developed by Huntsville, Alabama-based Digium Inc.

 

Officials at serVonic say their unified messaging solution, “IXI-UMS,” can be connected to Asterisk (News - Alert) PBXs via SIP or ISDN.

 

“IXI-UMS usually is integrated in messaging systems such as Microsoft Exchange or IBM (News - Alert) Lotus Domino,” company officials say. “Due to the flexible architecture, an installation in mixed environments with different PBX’s, messaging- or ERP-systems is possible without any problems.”

 

Saying the server-based solution is highly scalable, serVonic notes that IXI-UMS hastens deployments in multiple PBX and IT environments, with up to 10,000 users.

 

“The software manufacturer also meets the complex requirements concerning high availability and security with specially developed concepts,” the German company says.

 

Specifically, the IXI-UMS Unified Messaging Server adds features such as fax, voice, SMS and “remote inquiry” (translation: mobility) and provides access through ISDN/Q.SIG, SIP or H.323 connections.

 

Those are the kinds of features and functionality that – delivered through an open source environment, which avails itself of an ever-increasing number of developers – are leading market analysts from the Eastern Management Group to call for a major shift in the PBX segment.

 

That firm’s chief executive officer, John Malone, went so far as to say: “When the fog lifts, we find open source is the PBX of choice for a large and growing share of the commercial marketplace.”

According to Eastern Management Group, open source PBXs are used in every industry and, counter-intuitively, 40 percent of those businesses that installed an open source PBX in 2008 were not technology companies.