Progress on Voice-over-Broadband

Having seen six years of VoBB, it is not clear yet whether VoBB will replace POTS. In VoDSL format it has not. It remains to be seen what the scenario will be when fiber is laid out by the operators. Motivations for fiber, however, do not include voice. FTTX is being deployed for broadband and IPTV. The prospects of VoBB are in a way tied to the future of wireline voice as well. It is no secret that voice minutes are progressively moving towards mobile networks. While in the enterprise segment we are likely to see desktop phones for the foreseeable future, on the residential side, there seems to be a continued phenomenon of substitution – in terms of traffic as well as the actual subscriber accounts.
 
The other major observation with VoBB has to be the fact that it is not being used as a primary line in majority of the cases if you analyse the situation on a worldwide basis. The use of VoBB lines at service providers like France Telecom and AT&T are certainly for primary line use.
 
Less than 10 percent of subscriber lines are VoBB right now. At most we can expect it to reach just 25 percent over the next 5 years. There are some carrier driven dynamics though. Carriers are continuing to invest in DSL and as such it makes sense to leverage the network for over-the-top voice. In addition VoBB also lets carriers do some switch consolidation and hence save some money.
 
From a consumer’s perspective there is not much that has practically been added via VoBB. The service is almost the same as compared to previous POTs line. The writing is on the wall now. If you plan to offer VoIP, you need to offer additional compelling applications. Now there are mashups and FMC type applications that can be offered in theory but we have so far not seen any appreciable pick up of those applications. And then you have to also consider the monetization factor i.e. monetization of those applications.