In recent years, the business world has reaped tremendous benefits from the many exciting products and applications made possible by the marriage of data and voice technologies. Now, the efficiencies and enhanced services resulting from that revolution are being enhanced by the magnitude of change possible as data networks become the transport for voice. IP Telephony, or Voice over IP (VoIP), is the exploding new technology enabling voice to be carried over IP-based, packet-switched local and wide area networks.

Now the efficiencies and enhanced services resulting from that revolution are being eclipsed by the magnitude of change possible as data networks become the transport for voice. The open standards approach adopted within the voice over IP world has meant that public and private network operators are now able to remove their dependence on buying everything from one vendor that was a fact of life in the closed/proprietary nature of the traditional circuit- switched world. Other advantages that have attracted a lot of attention include the ability to bypass the PSTN and its toll charges,applications made possible by merging voice with Internet data,lower operating expenses,and network service presence.