VON Magazine does a great job educating us on the latest applications, issues, and opportunities surrounding the rapidly evolving world of voice communications. Much of this coverage is about software. That?s very important, but what about that hardware stuff that runs it all? Isn?t a rack full of pizza-box servers good enough for everything? The answer is ?no.?

Telecommunications technology?both hardware and software?has been largely proprietary for the last 100 years. That?s changing rapidly on both fronts. Service providers and carriers need to constantly offer new features and services that they can bill for and that act as differentiators. That means fast time to market. The telecommunications equipment providers (TEMs) that deliver the equipment ready to deploy face the same issue. The old days of taking five or more years to deploy a new piece of equipment or service are over. New products and services must be delivered in a fraction of that time, and that has led to significant changes in both hardware and software strategies.