Doing a little research around the web today, I found a writeup of a tellling report from Integrated Research, developers of the power Prognosis management and monitoring tools. While the rport was published two months ago, the findings are quite relevant.

Annual VoIP survey reveals mass migration Integrated Research Market Survey finds 4 out of 5 organizations moving to IP telephony Nathan Brumby, general manager, IP telephony business for Integrated Research said, “The results of the 2004 survey showed the key factors driving IP telephony adoption was the reduction of operating costs and the perception that IP telephony had come of age due to enhanced features such as video conferencing – I think those comments are justified by the 2005 Survey results, and I believe they continue to be the key factors." IP-based video conferencing was of immediate interest for 70 per cent of those surveyed and shows a clear willingness to exploit the enhanced capabilities that IP telephony provides over traditional telephony.

This report surveyd 1,232 executives globally and noted some important points -

• Seventy-eight per cent of those surveyed were at various stages of voice over IP (VoIP) deployment or adoption. Only 6 per cent were unsure of their plans to adopt the technology.
• One per cent of overall deployments were considered to have failed. Of these, over half failed during testing or pilot phase, with the remainder failing shortly after going ‘live’.
• Cisco’s dominance of the market increased from 43 per cent in 2004 to 62 per cent in 2005. This reconfirms Cisco’s position as the leading provider of VoIP infrastructure technology.(Note: This number seems well supported by Cisco's own published information)

Two really big points here that are easily overlooked. 78% rate of penetration is pretty huge. That's not quite ubiquitous, but clearly indicates that nearly everyone is seriously digging in VoIP services. And a 1% failure rate is pretty indicative of a solid, successful technology that's reached mainstream critical mass. There was one more point that caught my eye -

The survey also shows more organizations now choosing to self deploy by up-skilling staff in the new technology rather than rely on systems integrators.

Do-It-Yourself seems to be gaining momentum in VoIP deployments. That's another indicator that VoIP solutions are gaining in terms of standardized implementation. When companies lean to their own resources for deployment, it usually signals a core technology that's been proven in the market.

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