DO WE NEED AN IP VPN?              

                    Will it help our business?   

Before these questions could be answered we need to fully understand what a VPN is – it’s advantages and disadvantages.   VPN stands for Virtual Private Network.  It is a secure and a private medium for data communications between multiple entities across the public Internet.   But don’t be too quick to hand it over to your  IT department – it is now widely used for voice services as well.  Convergence refers specifically to the integration of voice, video and data services onto a single data network.

Early solutions for routing voice traffic over a packet data network, such as IP, fell short of expectations.  Users could not count on getting a dial tone 99% of the time. Clipping, echoes and delays that virtually deleted the VoIP technology from business vocabulary plagued their conversations.  Today, service providers and equipment manufacturers have solved two of the greatest problems of VoIP: availability and performance.  So do you run out and exchange your current telecommunication system for a brand new VoIP platform?  The answer depends on your current equipment and future requirements and above all, the allocated budget.

Given the complexity and possible unreliability of a data network we wonder why customers are so quick to move their reliable business critical phone service to it.  The answer lies in savings.  The advent of VoIP promises equipment lowers long-distance costs, lowers equipment costs (in the future) and affords related maintenance and administration coupled with new productivity enhancing applications.   A VoIP solution can be accomplished by connecting the customers existing PBX (via T1 PRI service) to a router capable of packetizing the voice traffic and implementing quality of service (QoS) standards.

             The packetized long-distance traffic, in an ideal environment not yet at hand for the users, will transverse the Internet for the majority of the route.  Where the Internet route is not available the carrier provided gateways will allow calls to be routed onto the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network), enabling the calls to reach anywhere in the world and to any telecommunications devise.   

 What we see in practice today is still a ways off from the above-mentioned scenario.  Currently to conduct an IP call that transverses the Internet medium both ends must be IP enabled.  The only way we have  to provide true QoS to users is by maintaining the VoIP calling within a private network of the enterprise.  Interoffice calling via the VoIP private network can extend the features of a single PBX to remote offices and users.  This functionality is achieved by adding off-premises extensions (OPXs) capability to an already present data network.  Private line automatic ring-down (PLAR) is a technology that will allow a customer to supply small remote offices and users connectivity to the centrally located PBX via existing data circuits.  The PBX supplies dial tone to the remote location and interoffice calling proceeds as if the remote sites were co-located with users directly connected to the PBX.  This provides customers with an inexpensive way to achieve low-cost centralized long-distance calling and virtually free interoffice conversations.  Private DSL services utilizing the appropriate routing and telephone equipment can also allow a home user to access their internal voice network for long-distance and intraoffice calling by simply connecting the DSL to an IP enabled phone/devise on one end and an IP enabled router of PBX at the main location.

 VoIP does offer long-term savings and increased productivity.  This scenario is not limited to the size of the customer, though currently it is used for interconnecting several locations or home-office users.  Moving to a single IP-base network allows a business to consolidate expenditures and support resources for both voice and data networks.   Customers must remember that it is important to migrate with proper planning for redundancy, power backup and performance (QoS and throughput). Only then can you achieve the same level of reliability and availability as a traditional PBX.