Interview: VoIP and Open Source Telephony Pioneer, Mark Spencer

News Type: Other — Wed Apr 12, 2006 9:57 AM EDT

business, linux, computer, phone, open-source, intel, alabama, voip, telecom, cisco, ronald-lewis, nortel, avaya, digium, mark-spencer

Ronald Lewis

In 1999, an organic revolution in telecommuncations was launched in Huntsville, Alabama: Asterisk. Combining the power of Linux, low-cost "vanilla" PC hardware, and expert development know-how, Mark Spencer took on a behemoth of an industry. Highly flexible and configurable beyond any PBX administrator's wildest dream, the hybrid VoIP / TDM soft PBX has attracted a large following within the telecom and open source spaces.

Today, Asterisk boasts more than 500,000 downloads, countless corporate installations, a partnership with Intel, Zimbra, text-to-speech expert Cepstral, Ranch Networks, and more.

In this interview, Digium's President discusses:

* The early days of Linux Support
* Developing Asterisk as a personal solution
* Realizing the opportunity for a low-cost PBX system
* The Asterisk development community
* The competition: Cisco, Avaya, and Nortel
* VoIP protocols SIP, and IAX - Asterisk's native solution to the inefficiencies of SIP
* And much more!

Listen now! | More interviews at Interviews with Ronald Lewis

Industry: Telecom / VoIP / PBX
Length: 34 minutes
Related interviews: Industry Perspective: VoIP

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RONALD LEWIS

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Interview: VoIP and Open Source Telephony Pioneer, Mark Spencer

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