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March 31, 2006
• Vol.28 Issue 13
Page(s) 1 in print issue
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Making The Move To IP-Based PBX
Outsource Or Build An In-House IP PBX Solution?
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Telephone communications are the lifeblood of many organizations. Sales departments, call centers, and other business groups rely on the telephone to conduct the majority of their business. Recently, IP-based phone systems, or VoIP, solutions have burst onto the information technology scene, offering new functionality at the same or lower expense. Companies are discovering that migrating from traditional phones to an IP-based communications system provides a whole new realm of functionality and the opportunity to more efficiently administer and monitor telephone communications.
The added functionality and control, combined with other efficiency and cost-savings benefits, make IP-based PBX an alluring proposition for many businesses. As with many information technology solutions, one of the first questions that comes up is whether to build a solution in-house or outsource it to a managed or hosted service provider.
 To Build Or Not To Build?
Before deciding whether to build an IP-based PBX system in-house or outsource the project, data center administrators need to consider a few key factors. Ted Wallingford, author of O’Reilly Media’s “Switching to VoIP” and “VoIP Hacks,” says, “The current networking infrastructure is the first concern for an IT manager. What kind of switches and routers exist in the network today? How do they support commonly needed VoIP infrastructure features like QoS and inline power?”
Talking about the issues between building in-house or outsourcing to a hosted service provider, Joshua Stephens, CEO of Switchvox, says, “When you’ve set up your premises equipment well, if your building loses power and/or its Internet connection, your phones will still stay powered, able to make calls through the PSTN.”
Stephens continues, “With a hosted solution, you really don’t have that capability, and no matter how your solution is deployed, if it depends on sending your voice traffic out through the Internet, that system can never be more reliable than the Internet, which will almost always be the weakest link in the system.”
Assuming that the network infrastructure is robust enough to handle the requirements of an IP-based PBX system, knowledgeable staff would be the next major concern. The current generation of PBX systems aimed at small and medium-sized enterprises, such as those from Avaya (www.avaya.com) or Switchvox (www.switchvox.com), is designed with simplified deployment and ease of use in mind. But to successfully implement and manage an in-house IP-based PBX solution, a network administrator with a solid understanding of TCP/IP networking is a must. If you don’t have one, you will need to invest in training or hire an outside consultant to help point you in the right direction.
More Features, Less Money
As with many IT projects, the cost-effectiveness of outsourcing depends on a variety of factors. A hosted solution generally has a lower upfront cost because there is no need to invest in purchasing and deploying the backbone equipment. It is almost purely a matter of signing up and paying the monthly fee to use the service.
Building a solution in-house requires a larger investment up front, but the monthly costs to operate the IP-based PBX are significantly less than the cost to pay a hosting provider. The in-house solution has a finite timeframe after which it will have paid for itself in both reduced costs and increased features, while outsourcing to a hosted solution provider means taking on an indefinite monthly expense.
Switchvox’s Stephens says, “Hosted solutions are almost always a monthly fee dictated by the number of users, features available, and other factors. The hosted IP PBX has a very low capital expenditure but because of lowering costs for IP PBX systems designed to be deployed onsite, those costs could offset themselves in less than a year. Another consideration is that if you are paying, for example, $45 per month per phone for your hosted IP PBX and you need to deploy an infrequently used phone in a closet somewhere, it’s still $45 per month for that phone.”
Making The Move In-House
There is a third option aside from either deploying an in-house IP-based PBX solution or hiring the services of a hosted provider. You can lean on the services of a third-party hosting provider while gathering the necessary equipment and knowledge to migrate to an in-house solution.
Stephens points out that using a hosted service, even for a short period of time, lets the company take various features for a “test drive” to determine what they really want from their PBX solution rather than purchasing a bunch of frivolous features that don’t provide any real value to the company. He also says, “Having a hosted solution to start is a good opportunity to get the internal network and your company’s bandwidth ready for an onsite IP PBX.”
Wallingford also believes that hosting can be a good stepping stone to an in-house solution. “If [a company is] using a hosted IP PBX with in-house IP phones, then in all likelihood, their network is already up to snuff with QoS and power. So then it’s a matter of designing a PBX dial-plan—that is, the instructions for the extension scheme and/or any integration with outside voice services like Skype—and creating the right calling features and telephony features on the in-house system.”
Companies do need to keep in mind that relying on the Internet as the backbone for voice communications puts them at the mercy of the Internet, as well. Having all communications rely on the Internet means that an Internet outage could put the company into a communications blackout. Still, with the proper redundancy and precautions, there are many benefits economically and functionally to making the move to an IP-based PBX system. 
by Tony Bradley
View the chart that accompanies this article.
(NOTE: These pages are PDF (Portable Document Format) files. You will need Adobe Acrobat to view these pages. Download Adobe Acrobat Reader)
View the chart that accompanies this article.
(NOTE: These pages are PDF (Portable Document Format) files. You will need Adobe Acrobat to view these pages. Download Adobe Acrobat Reader)
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