Hi everyone and welcome back to another edition of the VoIP News Update.  I am not Jeff Quinn, I am Mary Cheney, Marketing Supervisor here at VoIP Supply, and here are a couple things we want to go over this week.

Today we are going to talk about the newly released Asterisk 14, and then we are going to talk about Mitel unveiling World Cloud.  Lastly, we will discuss the Jabra – VXi acquisition.

Don’t forget to stay tuned, because at the end of the segment we’re actually going to be announcing the winner of the Jabra Speak.

So let’s start off with Digium announcing the release of Asterisk 14 at their AstriCon Conference in September.  So this update continues on the heels of version 13, which was mainly a developer, and administrative focused update.

One if the biggest updates in version 14 is the remote media playback capability, and the fully featured media cache.  This is really huge because previous versions required you to store your media locally, but now, the media can be retrieved on a remote web server at any time. How cool is that?

To read more about this update, and all the other updates that came with this version upgrade, check out the description below.

So this next update was just released a couple days ago, and this is Mitel’s World Cloud.  This new platform will actually target multinational businesses, lowering international calling costs and eliminating barriers to international communication.

This launch will put Mitel’s cloud presence in more than 40 countries around the world.  So, it looks like that failed merger with Polycom didn’t slow Mitel down at all.

Hey, if you want to learn more about Mitel World Cloud, check out the links in the description below.

So, lastly, we are going to talk about the Jabra – VXi acquisition.  For those of you who don’t know, VXi was actually founded back in 1989.  Since then, they have been the go-to choice for people who work in high-noise environments.

So, with this acquisition, Jabra instantly increases its portfolio of professional audio solutions.  As a result, we expect to see an increase of size and reach of their sales team.

And now, for the moment you’ve all been waiting for.  We are going to announce the winner for the Jabra Speak, which was Brandon Weber.  Congratulations Brandon, way to go!  We will be contacting you via YouTube to claim your prize.  Good job, and thanks for commenting!

So, that’s it for this week’s VoIP News Update.  As always, click the orange arrow in the corner to subscribe to our videos, and don’t forget to check out all the links in our description below about any of the things that we talked about today.

I’m Mary Cheney, Marketing Supervisor here at VoIP Supply, and thanks for watching.

News broke yesterday that the long since shut down VoIP service company TelexFree is finally being brought to justice.  All of this coming after James Merrill, who was a principal operator of TelexFree, admitted to the whole organization being a 1.8 billion dollar Ponzi scheme.

After I looked into this more, I could immediately see that this would be extremely far-fetched to happen to anyone of the millions and millions people and businesses that use VoIP.

I mean, there essentially wasn’t even a VoIP service here.  It was just people depositing their cash as “investors” to become “sales affiliates” to get more people to hand over their cash also become “sales affiliates”

The original investors were paid with the cash that was gained by new investors, and so on and so on; and so on.

This Ponzi scheme was targeting immigrant communities in the US who were looking to save money on international calls back home.  The only problem here is that TelexFree was seeing little to no revenue coming from actual VoIP service.  This includes the accounts that the investors themselves were forced to purchase.

In the end, Merrill will face up to 10 years in prison when he is sentenced next year which will remove at least one bad egg from the VoIP community.

This is a good chance to make sure that, whoever it is you are using as your VoIP service provider, is really who they say they are, and has a reputable background.

If you are unsure, or if you are just getting into the VoIP game and need some more knowledge on trusted providers, then please feel free to use us!  We can certainly lend some knowledge to help make your decision.  After all, we are the experts in VoIP!

VTech is already the world’s leading manufacturer of cordless phones, and now they would like to expand their presence in the VoIP industry.

On October 20th, both VTech and Snom Technology AG announced that the two companies have made an agreement which will allow VTech to acquire 100% share capital of Snom.

Snom, which is a German based company founded in 1996, is recognized as the world’s first brand of professional and enterprise VoIP phones.

The combination of the two company’s is expected to focus on both VoIP hardware and software development.

The acquisition is still pending based on the approval of the relevant regulatory authorities.

Mitel made the announcement at their Mitel Next event in Paris yesterday.  The VoIP communications company is offering a new platform that will target multinational businesses by simplifying the management of cloud communications.

With the launch of World Cloud, Mitel will now have a cloud presence in more than 40 countries worldwide and will virtually bridge offices to eliminate barriers to international communications.

This new service will save businesses on international calling costs, and also offer a true local experience for their customers.

Mitel is able to deliver such services by using its 14 data centers that are strategically located across the globe. This will ensure highly reliable service and makes it easy to adhere to country-specific data requirements.

Is this something that your business can benefit from? How much do you think this will impact the VoIP world?

Leave your comments below!