As we look at the Evolution of Communications here in the final days of the PSTN, it is important to look out to the horizon and where things are headed.
The large telcos are shutting down traditional communications, POTS (Plain Old Telecommunications Service) lines and PRI. There is a big push underway to move business customers to Hosted VoIP Services. Most business executives and owners are still unaware of the pending change, but will be made aware as it becomes more public. We are in the process of educating the business community of what is changing and what they need to do to not get caught in a bad situation.
This massive move from the PSTN to Hosted VoIP will go on for the next 5 years, then the next wave, will start to take hold and dominate our communications. This next wave, removes the phone on your desk. Communications will truly just be an application.
This past week, Amazon announced entrance into the Communications game with Chime. Chime is “unified communications service” which is likely to compete with services like Microsoft’s Skype and Cisco’s Spark. All of these and others Facebook, Google, Slack etc….. are all players coming into communications creating this next new wave.
The phone company of the future, or better said, the app that will replace the service provider, is being by “two guys in a garage”. It will be a new company or multiple new companies that will probably get acquired by the larger players just mentioned. It is important to watch the land scape for these services as they pop up in the business community. Our Exec team at OTG is working closely with service providers and partners to stay ahead of this curve.
One thing we can count on is change, as The Evolution of Communications continues. Change has been good here. It makes our lives easier and allows us to communicate more freely and efficiently!
I can’t wait to see what’s next!