VoIP on the rise

The number of broadband, but especially ADSL, connections has grown strongly in Australia over the past 12 months, greatly enhancing communications between businesses to create a proper platform for next-generation services such as VoIP to flourish.

According to industry research, around 25% of all people online in Australia are now connected over high-speed broadband connections, most of which are ADSL.

While the technology remains at an early stage of development in Australia, overseas it is already nearing mainstream levels with traditional carriers and smaller, more nimble VoIP providers competing aggressively within a large and fast-expanding pool of broadband users.

The current success of several new VoIP entrants is an endorsement of both VoIP's technical viability and its market potential in the consumer space. Research groups have predicted that around $300 million will be spent annually on VoIP services within the next few years, suggesting a strong market for VoIP-related equipment. Much of the earlier VoIP traffic in Australia was generated by sales of phone calling cards, the providers of which were quick to seize the better margins offered by internet telephony and this area of the market is expected to remain a strong driver of overall growth.

VoIP is also receiving strong support at a regulatory level with both the Australian Communications Authority (ACA) and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) in the process of developing a practical framework for the technology. In announcing a series of industry workshops for VoIP late last year the ACA acknowledged the importance of identifying where "a change in thinking might be necessary to accommodate a new era in voice and data networking."