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It is a good idea to ask yourself if you are really buying hardware or just software when you implement VoIP. Think of your desktop PC and your laptop that have become commodities just like your printer. VoIP hardware is moving in the same direction. Vendors are beginning to support other vendor's IP phones and gateways, so the commodity server is already here. 3Com and Siemens both use IBM servers, not servers of their own manufacture. Cisco and Asterisk use Windows servers. Many SMB products use common servers and operating systems. Siemens execs have even said that they are really in the software business, less so the hardware business. It appears this trend will continue.
The Advanced Telecommunication Computing Architecture is a series of industry standards for the next generation of carrier grade communications equipment. The standards were created to support features such NEBS, ETSI and 99.999% availability. The standards cover boards, shelves, mezzanines and management. They deliver a standards-based modular applications platform. The developers of the standards focused on core network technologies, call processing, soft switches, voice gateways, router and edge switches, network processors and signal processors. Recently, an addition to this standards movement was developed. This was the creation of the Micro Telecommunication Computing Architecture. This set of standards is complimentary to ATCA and is designed for smaller implementations.
A smaller footprint and focuses on edge devices. The influence of the ATCA and MicroTCA standards will become more apparent in the near future. The more standardized the hardware, the more competition, and the lower the cost. This will boost software standardization as well. Start-up companies need not devote a lot of capital to hardware development. They can focus on the software, making it easier for them to enter the market. Profits will come from software because the vendor will not be able to mark up the hardware as much as they do today.
The software will become the differentiator among the IP-PBX vendors. The dependence on software profits will probably produce increased license fees and more software components to acquire.
