Hosted PBX is now happening in Europe

Forget about the days when hosted PBX was alien to Europe. The enterprise customers on the continent are reportedly opening up their networks for hosted voice. And it is not because security of VoIP networks has all of a sudden improved, or that the hosted PBX features are swaying the users.

The pull factor is the mobility. To be precise, it is the mobile centrex within the converged enterprise offering that is driving the demand for hosted PBX in Europe. That is what the feature server vendors in Europe tell us.

2007 is supposed to be the year of IP Centrex/Hosted PBX and mobile centrex in Europe. Most of the recent European wins secured by feature server vendors involve mobile centrex. Mobile centrex is extension of PBX like features on your mobile phones.

Converged enterprise offering is finally possible in Europe because “the value chain is now working; the business model is working; and revenue sharing is working.”