But while one service provider sounds good in theory, some experts claim that end-user organisations are naturally conservative and cautious when it comes to trusting one provider implicitly. "We feel that fear of the unknown would hold many back when it actually came to it. BT already offers full service fixed, mobile and wireless offerings that can be single billed, yet few people have gone for it," argues Longbottom.
One of the factors here appears to be that, for organisations to sign up to such a service, they want more than just voice to be included in the package. "There has to be a data component as well and a strong perceived value — not just the hygiene factor of fewer contracts and bills. Therefore, the vendors need to come up with compelling offerings and drive these through with strong message. Then uptake would be high," says Longbottom.
At the enterprise level, BT may have to find some tame users as guinea pigs and show them that they can’t afford not to be a part of the migration to IP and convergence. It will also need to position Bluephone carefully in relation to its other potentially rival offerings — standard PBXs,VoIP and IP Centrex — to clarify which option is most appropriate in which situation, experts argue.
For example, Longbottom says: "The advance of IP telephony is bringing with it a full range of functionality such as direct conferencing that is dependent on having a fully-functional large desk phone, which could negate the use of a Bluephone device.”
But there are other issues too. One is how seamless the transferral of calls from fixed to mobile networks is likely to be as the technology is not yet proven. Another is costs, which BT has yet to clarify and which if too high, could inhibit the market. This relates not just to the upfront fee for handsets, which are unlikely to be cheap, but also to call charges.
"Call costs should be based on IP call rates, which can be about a penny a minute to anywhere in the world. Doubtless, however, as there will be large proportions of standard mobile transport being used, and the likes of BT will want to milk the market as much as possible, we can expect to see initial call rates to be closer to mobile rates than IP rates,” says Longbottom.
Billing presents yet another challenge. If people do what they’re being encouraged to do and use their phones for value added services such as e-commerce, then billing for third party Internet services is likely to be very complex. And the situation is only set to get worse as Wi-Fi support is added. “There’ll have to be a lot of work with Wi-Fi billing from a voice point of view. With data, you only have to work out the number of data bits going over the network, but it’s harder with voice and this area will present challenges” says Black.
Another challenge with Wi-Fi-based Bluephone devices, meanwhile, is battery life because the wireless technology was designed for laptops rather than mobile phones and is particularly power-hungry.
All these issues combined indicate that there are still a lot of unanswered questions over the future success of Project Bluephone, and fixed mobile convergence in general and adoption is unlikely to be instant.
"There’s probably be lots of initial noise, a few intrepid users, various problems with quality and handsets, wrong billing and poor customer service, followed by a more cut-down realistic service, which will begin to grow and define the market over a five-year period. A typical solutions curve if you like,” says Longbottom.
