Small businesses adopting VoIP faster than larger firms

According to Maren Bennette of the Communications Management Association, small businesses are now adopting VoIP services at a faster rate than that seen for larger firms.

Bennette believes that this could be because the first users of VoIP, around seven years ago, were mainly medium-sized enterprises which quickly outgrew their existing telephony systems.

Larger companies then followed suite, when it became obvious that VoIP was an established and technology.

Now smaller companies and organisations have become the final group to adopt VoIP, because they previously had little reason to change their existing telephone systems.

SMEs were previously deterred by the perceived cost of internet telephony and its technical complexity. The cost of internet telephony has fallen recently, making it more accessible for small and medium enterprises.

The introduction of unified communications systems has also attracted SMEs, who can benefit from increased worker efficiency and productivity when workers can operate securely away from the office.

Recent research from In-Stat predicts that worldwide VoIP subscribers could surpass the 55 million mark in 2009.