SIP Trunking

What is SIP Trunking?

A SIP Trunk is a connection from a PBX using SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) to an ITSP (Internet Telephony Service Provider). Channel partners will offer SIP Trunk to small businesses that want to deploy a telephony phone service while utilizing their existing PBX phone system. If not PBX, an IP gateway is installed on the premise on to the PBX and converts all calls from traditional phone service to VoIP.

Advantages of SIP Trunking

In terms of the current market, too many companies promote SIP Trunking as a cheaper alternative to ISDN, this isn’t the right approach. It’s true that SIP Trunk IP Telephony can save money – free site to site calling within large deployments is just one good example of this.

SIP Trunking IP Telephony needs to be promoted according to its particular strengths – number portability and disaster recovery are significant selling points. SIP Trunk telephone systems can also be expanded much more easily and cheaply than ISDN systems.

Number portability is one of the advantages of SIP Trunk which allows the user’s telephone numbers to exist independently of their phone’s location. SIP Trunking allows a user, for example, working in Bristol to have a London telephone number and wherever the worker plugs in, the number will stay the same. This is very valuable to businesses wanting to bring a workforce under one geographical location.

Disaster recovery is another major reason why people regard SIP Trunking telephony as a next generation technology, it lends itself to superb disaster recovery and business continuity provisioning. UK Businesses have to spend a large amount of time on the security of their voice / data communication as the weather is now a hot topic of conversation.

SIP Trunking for the customers

Companies looking to take a SIP based telephony package to market, however, need to bear in mind that many users prefer to opt for a solution that provides all of the necessary documentation, compatibility-testing, equipment and support in one easy package. Such a package needs to provide the IPPBX or SIP Gateway for the customer’s site, the router, and the ISP or IP Network, as well as the relationship with the SIP Trunking services provider.

Read more about SIP Trunking – 10 thing that Channel Partner should know about SIP Trunks.