In the final analysis, VoIP is about new value-added services that delight the customers and create innovative, revenue-generating opportunities for the vendors.

These services will be either:

• Offered by Telcos (fixed, mobile and next generation operators) with the help of their optimized networks for residential customers and for businesses. These will allow carriers to brand their dial tones and differentiate themselves from others that simply battle to provide the cheapest voice. The new services, enabled by the new (IP based) devices include all the current PSTN features such as conferencing, call forwarding, caller id etc. as well as new applications that existing PSTN simply can not do , among them presence management, multimedia conferencing and collaboration services, voice enabled email, directory services etc. Adoption of these services will be compelled by their competitive value and ease of use.

• Or implemented by enterprises on premises or in the hosted environment to make their work force more productive, collaborating efficiently with their partners and suppliers, and for marketing and supporting their customers with all available means. These applications - ranging from company directory to unified messaging to IP-enabled contact centers will be no longer shackled by traditional voice/data/video boundaries. They are not simple extensions of existing business models, they are a new breed and require a thoughtful and creative business case to implement.

• Or personal productivity applications on the consumers desktop that work cooperatively with and leverage network based services provided by Telcos and others.

Note that a standard called voice xml can play a very important role in the development of these applications.

The resources above discuss further details of value added VoIP applications and services in the brave new world of converged networks.