Businesses can now use Skype directly, without needing to go through a PC.
A new version of Skystone, from Stonevoice, a Unified Communications Application Developer and Cisco Technology Developer Partner, enables employees to use Skype directly from their desk phones.
Skystone centralises corporate Skype accounts, so employees don't have to install Skype on their PC.
By simply adding a prefix to a phone number, employees can now reach international numbers at low rates. Businesses benefit from both reducing the telephone costs and freeing-up PSTN lines.
“Today, the market is becoming more and more globalised” says Christian Bongiovanni, CEO of Stonevoice, “and small and medium businesses require tools that can make VoIP communications more efficient, reliable and cost-effective. Skype, the leader in Internet Telephony and the VoIP market for consumers, with hundreds of millions of registered users, is widely used for providing those tools. Skype was born for the consumer world, but a large percentage of its users deploy it for business purposes.”
Skystone says it provides all the advantages of access to the Skype community (which can include customers, partners, suppliers and remote employees) through a simple speed-dial, eliminating any possible security gaps, as all the Skype communications only pass through the central Skystone server, not the corporate network.
By using Skystone, they add, companies can now also benefit from other advantages of convergence via their websites. T
hey also assert that communications with online companies or e-commerce businesses can be greatly enhanced by receiving phone calls directly from a website (via the skype-me button), which is directly integrated with the existing telephony infrastructure.
Stonevoice says Skystone is a software-only product and thus has all the advantages of software-only solutions: no stock handling, no shipment delays and plug & play.
It also offers an embedded try and buy evaluation, free of charge.
Licensing is based on the number of simultaneous calls (today up to 12 channels on the same box), but several servers can be used for horizontal scalability.
Skystone has been tested with all the major PBX platforms including the Cisco Unified Communications Solution and is now available for download.
