The VAR Guy

Digium, one of Asterisk’s strongest proponents, plans to announce a global distribution partnership within two weeks, The VAR Guy has learned. The announcement, expected to be made at VoiceCon Orlando, could accelerate customer interest in open source PBXs and IP telephony systems.

The VAR Guy expects plenty of readers to flame him for the headline. Sure, Steve Jobs has owned the innovation spotlight in recent years. And Dell Inc. has never been known as a resource and development (R&D) center. But instead of making the easy moves, Michael Dell is making some challenging ones — pushing deep into the managed services and software-as-a-service (SaaS) industries. With a little luck and a lot of execution, The VAR Guy expects those moves to pay off handsomely by 2009 or so. Here’s why.

Some critics dismiss Asterisk as a “toy.” The open source VoIP platform, skeptics say, lacks a service and support network for big enterprise and university deployments. Apparently, the folks at Digium are aware of their critics. The Asterisk market leader has launched a new warranty program that could give skeptical partners and customers more faith in the open source PBX.