Broadvox Plans Free SIP Calling Exchange

By Khali Henderson

Broadvox plans to launch the Enterprise Voice Exchange (EVX), a peering community for free SIP calling, in 2010.

In an interview at the Broadvox Partner Summit in Dallas this week, Broadvox CEO Andre Temnorod said Broadvox plans to offer free SIP calling to subscribers within the EVX community and through federations, such as Xconnect and others that are yet to be determined.

The free SIP trunking service is only available to IP PBX users. In addition, Temnorod said “the scope of calls is different in the ‘free zone,’” noting, for example, that DIDs are not provided so subscribers cannot receive calls from the PSTN.

Why would the SIP provider offer free services? Temnorod said one reason is to expand the number of SIP trunks in the Broadvox community. In addition, he is confident that a majority of free subscribers will buy full-featured commercial SIP service once they see the value of being part of a peering group.

Peering SIP-to-SIP and bypassing the PSTN is necessary to get the benefits of calling, such as high-definition voice, he said.

Based on its agreements with certain mobile operators, Temnorod said Broadvox might also be able to offer free mobile calling within the “free zone” over select networks.

The SIP trunking provider would not commit to a specific launch date, but said the service would be available this year.