Business owners to rethink telecoms in 2011?

Over the last five years, South African businesses have put a lot of effort into setting up telephony systems that deliver cost savings in an expensive, mobile dominated marketplace. This work may well have to be re-examined, however, as key structural change impact on market dynamics.

The drop in interconnect rates

“The most significant short-term change is the drop in interconnect rates,” says George Smalberger, MD of specialist telephony company SS Telecoms. “Least cost routing solutions have been essential for most businesses seeking to mitigate against the cost of cross-network calls, but this will change quite significantly now. In fact, there is obvious evidence of this shift around already - the market is evolving fast.”

SS Telecoms has been designing, manufacturing and supporting telephony products across the telecoms spectrum for over 21 years. Its products are utilised in businesses of all sizes across the South African economy, and its extensive distributor partnerships give it interesting insight into the ongoing evolution of the local telecoms sector.

“A lot of companies are excited by Africa's investment in ICT infrastructure, and for good reason,” says Smalberger. “We've got the big WACS cable coming online next year, and another one in 2012. With bandwidth quality improving and costs dropping, we're likely to see the market seriously investigating VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) solutions. So not only is LCR in some instances no longer essential, but VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) is starting to appear on the horizon as a real option for any business.”

“Well, in theory, but in each instance it generally depends on the boss,” Smalberger says. “Getting the phone bill down is about understanding how your business works, and what solution will meet its needs best, and quality is vital, of course. A VOIP solution must actually deliver the right quality. The same goes for performance management. It's no good slashing your phone bill if you have to abandon the ability to control staff behaviour on the phone. So the potential to reduce the bill is there, but it will take good leaders to turn that potential into reality.”

Lot of options out there now

“There are a lot of options out there now. Fixed-line, wireless, VOIP and so on,” he says. “This means genuine choice and flexibility for enterprises and organisations, and service providers will be compelled to innovate in their offerings, which is very positive for businesses and consumers. As a result, we expect to see quite a big shift in the way South African businesses approach their telecommunications set-up in 2011, continuing through 2012.”

SS Telecoms has been designing and manufacturing telephony solutions in the South African market for over 21 years. The company develops a complete range of telecoms products and solutions via an extensive national distributor network. SS Telecoms products are utilised in businesses across the country, from major corporations to home offices.