Bake-Off: Small Business VoIP Contenders

Avaya Quick Edition
Avaya secured the first-place crown by simplifying deployment. The vendor submitted its Quick Edition bundle, which comes with two 4610 phones, one 4621 phone and a G11 gateway. Avaya Quick Edition supports up to 40 users and is a more targeted solution than its other SMB product, the Avaya IP Office, which supports up to 360 users. Avaya also included two additional 4610 phones.

The Avaya system requires a Power-over-Ethernet switch; any PoE switch will do. In case one is not available, Avaya also ships 1151D1 power supplies that can be used with a regular network switch. The system's ability to use existing network infrastructure is a key selling point.

Reviewers connected a 4610 phone to the power brick and to a regular network switch. The phone automatically detected the network and on the display asked for a name to assign to the phone network. After entering the name, it verified a few networking settings. A second phone connected to the switch automatically detected and joined the phone network. Just like that, the phones were deployed. Additional phones followed the same procedure.

The simplicity of the solution lies in the fact that telephony features are built into the phones. Peer-to-peer technology makes it easy to install or replace. Adding users is as simple as connecting a new phone.

After the phones were connected, reviewers installed the Avaya Quick Edition software, release 3.0, for maintenance and advanced configuration. This version is shipped as a "vanilla" load—solution providers later download the latest software (currently at release 3.2.5) from the Web.

Because most of the features and configurations are stored on the phone, there's not a lot that needs to be done through the Web interface. The interface can be used to log calls, route calls using auto-attendant and create call groups. The system can also be programmed remotely over an Internet connection, a plus for customers with multiple sites or for solution providers with maintenance contracts.

Priced at $2,618, Avaya Quick Edition comes with a one-year warranty on phones. Post-warranty maintenance is available directly from Avaya Global Services. Pricing does not include the cost of network infrastructure, such as switches.

Partners can expect 10 percent to 30 percent margins. Avaya has two levels in its partner program—Authorized and SMB Expert. All partners have access to training. SMB Experts also receive joint marketing funds.

Fonality PBXtra
Open source-based IP-PBX provider Fonality, Los Angeles, sells a system called PBXtra and a channel-specific software solution called trixbox Pro. The software, based on Asterisk, is actually the same for both solutions. The PBXtra comes with a server and phones for easy deployment while trixbox Pro enables the solution provider to source its own hardware. Reviewers examined PBXtra.

The software came installed on a minitower PC with Intel Celeron processors, 256 Mbytes of memory and a 80-Gbyte RAID array. The server also had an analog card with two FXO and two FXS ports installed. Fonality sent a Polycom IP 601 phone and two Astara (9133i and 9112i) phones with the server. Like Avaya Quick Edition, Fonality's solution works with any network switch.

The first step in deployment was to get the server on the network. On startup, the server loads CentOS Linux before presenting a menu of networking options. At this point, the server is assigned a static IP address and other networking information. While the server can work on Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), it is not recommended. Once the server is configured for the network, it can be administered from any PC with Internet access. After configuring the network's DHCP server to distribute the PBXtra server's IP address as the primary DNS server, the phones are connected to the network switch. By default, Fonality preconfigures all phones to obtain an IP address via DHCP. Fonality offers a hybrid-hosted architecture, with configuration settings stored at the Fonality Data Center as well as on the local server. Since management occurs through Fonality's site, the system is proactively monitored, maintained and backed up. Having all the configuration settings saved with Fonality ensures the system will always be available for disaster recovery.

The management interface offers several options in a clean, tabbed interface. Options include setting up VoIP accounts with a third-party vendor, creating call menus, configuring the conference bridge and defining blast groups, where multiple phones ring until someone answers.

The PBXtra system shipped to reviewers was priced at $4,546, including HUD, Fonality's unified communications application and the analog card. HUD runs on the personal desktop and does many things, including acting as an operator, managing presence information, and supporting drag-and-drop calling.

The Fonality Reseller Program has two levels of membership with no minimum sales requirements. All partners, regardless of level, qualify for up to 50 percent discounts, support discounts and access to Level 2 support engineers. The company offers low-cost training and sales Webinars.

Margins cap out at 26 percent for PBXtra and at 50 percent for trixbox Pro, a pure software solution. Partners can also opt to co-brand or rebrand trixbox Pro.

NEXT: Cisco Smart Business Communications System