AudioCodes Enters IP Phone Market With HD Series

Following the announcement of its high-definition VoIP strategy earlier this week, AudioCodes Ltd. announced Wednesday its entry into the IP phone market with the launch of its 300HD series of IP phones, offering greater voice fidelity, advanced security and an enhanced user interface.

AudioCodes announced Monday the launch of VoIPerfectHD, its high-definition voice over IP technology, which doubles the audible voice spectrum to deliver higher voice clarity, better intelligibility and richer sound.

Based on the new VoIPerfectHD software, the IP phones are designed to use the wideband coders such as G.722, G.722.2 (WB-AMR), G.729.1 and G.711.1. Enhanced proprietary capabilities, such as packet loss concealment, wideband acoustic echo canceller and low delay adaptive jitter buffer, have been added.

The 300HD Series includes three models. The 310HD IP Phone is positioned as an entry level device and includes a basic display and user interface. The 320HD Premium model includes a large monochrome LCD screen. The 350 Executive model has a large color LCD. All are interoperable with most IP PBXs, softswitches and IP Centrex solutions.

“AudioCodes’ entry into the IP phone market is a bold and strategic move. It enables AudioCodes to address the fast growing market for third-party IP phones with the latest developments in high-definition voice technology,” said Jeremy Duke, president and CEO of Synergy Research Group Inc.

“The IP phone market has consistently delivered strong shipment growth over the last eight years as it continues to displace the large installed base of TDM phones worldwide. We believe the second growth phase of the IP phone market is just beginning to take hold, driven by increased deployments of SIP in the enterprise and an increasing number of service providers offering managed VoIP services.”

According to a Synergy Research Group forecast from December 2007, the enterprise IP phone market is expected to grow from $2.1 billion and 11.8 million units in 2007 to $8.4 billion and more than 63 million units in 2011 at a CAGR of about 40 percent.

The introduction of HD IP phones is expected to expand AudioCode’s reach to enterprise customers by providing an end-to-end HD VoIP solution, said Lior Aldema, vice president of marketing and product management at AudioCodes.

AudioCodes plans to embed HD VoIP across its product portfolio, which includes multiservice business gateways (MSBG), media servers, media gateways and DSP chips and IP phones.