SIP trunking usage patterns changed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, creating more challenges and opportunities for SIP trunking providers. And many are stepping up their offerings to gain a competitive advantage.

Companies continue to migrate from legacy PBX and telco services. Moreover, SIP trunking is typically less expensive than legacy circuits.

Our latest CF List focuses on SIP trunking. This is the third annual list focusing on this technology and industry. Analysts with S&P Global Market Intelligence, Frost & Sullivan and Omdia weighed in on SIP trunking market trends and what it takes to be a successful provider.

The global SIP trunking service market is expected to reach $23.6 billion in 2026, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.4%, according to the Business Research Co.

Business Communications Consolidation

Raul Castanon is senior research analyst with 451 Research, part of S&P Global Market Intelligence.

451 Research’s Raul Castanon

“The business communications space has seen market consolidation at different levels in recent years,” he said. “This includes deals involving CPaaS vendors reaching for SIP trunking providers that change the competitive landscape, such as Infobip’s acquisition of Peerless Network and Sinch’s acquisition of Inteliquent – both announced last year – and Bandwidth’s acquisition of Voxbone, which was announced in 2020. These deals signal a shift in the market, with the ability to provide a comprehensive portfolio with end-to-end, flexible and scalable business communications solutions emerging as a key factor defining the most effective SIP trunking solutions. Conversely, these trends should be good news for channel partners, who should be better positioned to provide end-to-end business communications services to their customers.”

Michael Brandenburg is senior industry analyst of connected work at Frost & Sullivan.

Frost and Sullivan’s Michael Brandenburg

“SIP trunking for me, and I’ve followed it for 11 years, is the little engine that could,” he said. “It always finds a spot to to be useful. And what I’m seeing is adoption of Microsoft Teams in particular. You’ve no doubt seen how many Teams users there are. And SIP trunking through direct routing and now Operator Connect is powering that. Most of those are carrier SIP connections going into the Microsoft environment. And there’s a decided shift that I’ve seen probably the last year of even the top tier carriers doubling down on working in that bring your own carrier environment with Microsoft, and to a certain degree WebEx and Zoom as well.”

Interesting Paradox

Brent Kelly is principal analyst of digital workforce at Omdia, which shares a parent company with Channel Futures (Informa).

Omdia’s Brent Kelly

“During the pandemic there was massive adoption of remote collaboration solutions like Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Cisco Webex,” he said. “When people meet using these technologies, they are not connecting to the PSTN, so they don’t need a SIP trunking connection. Numerous carriers have reported an interesting paradox: the number of SIP trunks is rising due to adoption of Microsoft Teams phone and/or Zoom phone, but the utilization of the trunks is decreasing.”

Overall, Omdia is seeing:

We’ve compiled a list, in no particular order, of 20 top SIP trunking providers. It’s based on feedback and recent news reports. The list includes a mix of well-known providers as well as lesser-known ones making strides in SIP trunking. This is by no means a complete list.

See our slideshow above to see who made our latest list of SIP trunking providers.