Comments on: Cisco Discovers Open Source IP PBX Threat, Opportunity

By: The VAR Guy

The VAR Guy — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 02:53:24 +0000

Hahah: Cisco is the market leader… but Asterisk is growing… and growing…

By: HAHAH

HAHAH — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 17:14:06 +0000

Good Luck Asterisk…. Good Luck….. Cisco is not the leader by chance….

Cisco provides the BEST solutions…. bow down

By: The VAR Guy

The VAR Guy — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 02:08:01 +0000

Garrett: The VAR Guy has always been a big fan of your blog, SmithOnVoIP. Thanks for sharing your analysis with The VAR Guy's readers.

By: Garrett Smith

Garrett Smith — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 20:18:22 +0000

I’m not a Digium employee either, but as someone who has been a part of their channel, the Asterisk community and have seen millions in Cisco phones go out the doors since 2003, I’d agree with John and Ward that Cisco SIP, is not SIP.

First off with Cisco IP phones, you need to pay to use SIP. Then you need to go through the hassle of upgrading them to SIP. So while it is true that SOME of their phones are compatible with open source SIP phone systems, they don’t make it easy (or affordable).

Secondly Asterisk, while still the largest open source telephony platform, is one of 100 plus platforms out there. I read somewhere that open source phone systems now comprise 28% of all new phone system deployments in North America – maybe Asterisk is a small threat, but open source telephony is a huge threat to Cisco.

Lastly the product in question, the Cisco SPA8800 (which is a solid product having tested it), comes from the “Linksys” side of the Cisco house. It’s a product developed by most of the team from Sipura Technologies who was acquired by Linksys a few years back.

Sipura has roots in the open source world as that is who the bulk of their first customers where from their VoIP adapters and the SPA841 VoIP phone. But this new offering is far from being a huge step towards “embracing open source” or even a way to “embrace and replace.”

People aren’t going to go from Asterisk to Cisco because of a Cisco gateway.

In reality what I think you’re starting to see is Cisco trying to quietly figure out how to approach open source telephony as they are likely getting their behinds handed to them in competitive bid situations due to the economic environment.

By: Peter Knezevich

Peter Knezevich — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 18:47:56 +0000

Good points. Pick the right solution for the right environment and client.

By: The VAR Guy

The VAR Guy — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 17:31:31 +0000

Peter: No doubt Asterisk is proving to be a money-saving solution in some key markets. But The VAR Guy does want to play devil’s advocate: Sometimes Asterisk can suffer from a lack of local support (too few trained resellers/VARs). And certainly many large enterprises trust the established brands (Cisco, etc.) based on a history of reliability, support, etc.

Yes, The VAR Guy sees Asterisk continuing to gaining momentum. Fast. But a lot of journalists spend too much time either favoring open source or favoring closed source. The VAR Guy tries to point out some of the realities around both approaches… …

By: Peter Knezevich

Peter Knezevich — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 12:50:11 +0000

We’ve been successful recently in winning a few deals where we competed with Avaya and Cisco using an asterisk based solution. Essentially, 70% of the features at 50% (or less) of the cost. Also, the training component for the integrator was interesting in terms of building up and configuring the system.

By: The VAR Guy

The VAR Guy — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 23:42:35 +0000

Hi Ward: Thanks for offering your two cents on SIP. The VAR Guy must concede he’s never used Cisco SIP phones with Asterisk … so our resident blogger can’t offer any personal perspective on CSCO’s claims.

By: Ward Mundy

Ward Mundy — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 20:41:56 +0000

I don’t work for Digium, and I second everything Mr. Todd said. Suggesting that Cisco has long supported SIP phones for open source telephony is grossly misleading. A better choice of words might be “reluctantly supported” and, even then, the code has been plagued with bugs to the point that some have suggested that Cisco goes out of its way to assure that its SIP offering doesn’t work “too well.”

By: The VAR Guy

The VAR Guy — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 18:24:05 +0000

JT: Thank you for sharing your perspectives. But more importantly, thank you for disclosing your affiliation with Digium.

The VAR Guy works hard to ensure readers understand who is posting comments, and why.

By: John Todd

John Todd — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 18:14:42 +0000

Cisco is right to worry about Asterisk, and it’s not as small a threat as they portray. Asterisk is being used at both ends of the spectrum now – SMB and enterprise, and that should be fairly terrifying as both ends of the market are consumed by open-source solutions. The costs of proprietary solutions are staggering when compared to the costs of Asterisk, even when one includes integration and custom development. More importantly, flexibility allows any implementation of Asterisk to do almost anything that the user wishes it to – the code is open, and there are hundreds of thousands of sites out there with an active community, and thousands of aggressive and smart third-party companies doing niche and custom solutions for customers.

A few quotes in here were kind of amusing – “Cisco’s SIP phones have long supported open source IP PBX systems” – I think that’s the wrong direction. Asterisk has supported Cisco’s SIP phones for a long time, and even Cisco’s proprietary SCCP phones. And with Nortel’s proprietary IP phones. Along with various other not-so-standard SIP implementations. I think it’s pretty clear who is the champion for the end-user: Asterisk.

Asterisk Community Director – Digium, Inc.
jtodd@digium.com