Over the past 25 years, our lives have been dramatically changed by the influx of new technology, and it has spread to the enterprise telecommunications arena in the form of IP. The combination of voice and data is a logical and natural progression of communications technology. However, there are two schools of thought relating to taking a traditional telephone system into the world of IP – the revolutionary method, also known as the “fork lift” approach, and the evolutionary method, which focuses on migrating to new technology as it becomes available and protecting the current investment. These two schools of thought are the basis for the two main types of system solutions available – the revolutionary IP-only solution and the evolutionary IP-enabled/converged solution.

Your business telephony system is your most important technology investment. Get it right and your organisation's window to the outside world becomes an automated marketing tool, a financial controller and a security system. Get it wrong and you could be losing customers before they even talk to someone and not even know it.

In the new global economy with global reach and tough competition and operations, organisations have to adapt and change in order to compete effectively. In order to compete with the global giants, companies have to concentrate on core competencies, and learn to work and collaborate with other organisations that compliment their skills and core activities.

This white paper is part of a series on Voice over IP and Voice over Wireless produced by Samsung. This document seeks to explore the development of new IP based communications applications and the evolution of the standards that support them. Presence and collaboration are key enablers of the Virtual Enterprise and have a direct impact on the take up of VoIP and Voice over wireless.

This white paper looks at the changes within the communication industry from the late 1990s to the present day, discussing the potential threats posed by hackers when migrating from traditional voice systems to IP-based systems. The paper also discusses the latest generation of voice switches from Samsung - the OfficeServ 7000 series which incorporate sophisticated data security features which effectively protect the voice switch from hacker attacks:

Samsung’s Email Gateway: An answer to High-Priced Unified Messaging
Effective transmission of information is the essence of communication. Effective transmission includes breaking down barriers such as distance and time. From carrier pigeons to the basic telephone, people have been able to communicate across distances and time with increased efficiency. Now, as technology continues to evolve, people can use more advanced and innovative technology-based tools to communicate in many different ways – email, voicemail, fax mail, text messages and pagers are just a few.

There are several stages to consider with purchasing an ACD system. This paper looks at the each of the following considerations in turn

1. The system architecture and how calls are handled by the system and controlling software
2. The decision processes of the controlling software
3. The real time management of the system
4. The management reporting system.
5. Making the system failsafe