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Integrated T1 Progress Report
Friday February 03, 2012,
07:40 am ET
GTE HAWAIIAN TELEPHONE, Hawaii, Feb. 03 /Don Romburgh/ --
The way business connect to the digital universe is changing. More and more enterprises are
discovering the new broadband options made available to them through a series of cost cutting
measures by telecommunication providers. With the recent rush to consolidate, more and more
features are being crammed into the current service offerings, which continue to fall in price
bringing products like integrated T1 service into the price range of the vast majority of
small to medium-size businesses.
"When we moved into our new location here in Los Angeles" commented John Baker, a
small business owner in San Diego, California, "we feared having to sign up for
commercial telephone and internet service. Until about a year ago, the services
being offered to us were TDM, which doesn't come cheap. Thankfully our Telarus
commercial telecom broker recommended that we give TelePacific a try, and we did.
One year later, we've never had an erroneous bill, our phone and data are all on
one single dynamic T1, and we can focus on what we do best - brokering mortgages."
Given the fact that many companies still to this day have yet to make the change to digital
SIP-trunking enabled dynamic T1s, one must ask why the delay? The value proposition that
dynamic adds and the economic benefits are there, however, the technology is slow to be
adopted by mainstream corporations. One reason for this lag is the bad reputation that
telecom companies have built for themselves through the meltdown of the industry from
2000 to 2003, when many companies either went out of business, merged with other larger
companies, or just hunkered down and weathered the storm. Now that the industry has made
great strides to stabilize by offering better rates, better products, and better customer
service, small business owners are gradually starting to listen to the presentations being
made by consultants and inside sales agents. With that increase in confidence, and with
the growing number of testimonials being offered by happy customers, businesses are becoming
less reluctant to make the jump.
The irony of the new small business communications revolution is that it took so long
to gain traction. The whole idea of reclaiming inactive voice channels for data applications
is not new, and was introduced by many CLEC operators over five years ago. So why did
it take so long for SMB's to adopt the technology and make the change? One might argue
that the Internet bubble burst in 2000 shook many people's confidence in telecommunications,
one of the hardest hit industries. With so many telecoms going out of business, or merging
with other small players just to stay solvent, many customers took the "wait and see"
approach before making the decision to entrust their communications with a company not
associated with Ma Bell. Now that economic Darwinism has taken hold, the remaining companies
are attracting new customers who see the benefits of the new technology without the downside
risk of loosing service or not being able to get through to customer service in the pinch.
The recent progress made by CLECs leaves us thinking in hypotheticals. "What if the
Clinton administration wouldn't have passed the Telecommunications Act of 1996, requiring
RBOCs to lease their lines at reduces rates to the CLECs?" "Will the FCC continue to
enforce this law, or will it be overturned by the powerful AT&T and Verizon lobbyists?"
It is impossible to know either way, but for the time being we can just be grateful
that the industry has evolved to the point were small businesses can actually benefit
from telecommunications at an affordable rate.
Recent advances in technology, fostered by competition from growing CLECs, is bringing
integrated T1 services to small business everywhere. And the trend doesn't look like
it will change anytime soon. CLECs continue to grow their networks, offering more
advanced services like metro ethernet, MPLS, and more.
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