December 5, 2007... Another way to monetize VOIP: licence the technology to IBM

The future of VOIP really is an either/or proposition with respect to Skype/SIP competition. Lest anyone reading this blog should still have any doubt that the future of telephony, especially enterprise telephony, will harness Skype's technology rather than SIP, there are now indications that IBM will licence Skype for its Lotus Unyte.

Jim Courtney in the referenced Skypejournal article speculates as follows:

"Would it not be a fair prediction to assume, given:

1. The statement of IBM's ongoing search for excellence,
2. Skype's investment into ac knowledgeably improving both audio and video quality and performance
3. The more intensive exposure of IBM SameTime's Unified Communications and Collaboration team to Skype over a few months
4. WebDialog's pioneering partnership work with Skype
5. Not only Skype's high quality voice and video but also more comprehensive real time conversation offering incorporating auxiliary services such as securely encrypted file transfer and chat,
6. IBM's expressed desire to work with its partners
7. Microsoft's current campaign launching their Unified Communications Services,

that IBM is investigating at least a licensing partnership for incorporation of Skype technology into its various SameTime real time communications offerings where appropriate?"

Let's note some things about IBM. Their focus is not on selling their own technologies, but rather about licencing, integrating and deploying best-in-class technologies for their customers. They are all about enterprise, cross-platform, performance, stability, and security. If Jim Courtney's speculation is accurate, and I think it is, then Microsoft's efforts to establish something competitive may well amount to nothing.