Anybody with some VOIP advice would be helpful. I am thinking about opening
up a low cost international calling company in an Afrcian country similar to
telediscount. What equipment will be needed? Anybody have some documents or
white papers on the subject? Your valuable input will be much appreciated

Thank-you

IMPI

"IMPI" wrote in message
...
Anybody with some VOIP advice would be helpful. I am thinking about
opening
up a low cost international calling company in an Afrcian country similar
to
telediscount. What equipment will be needed? Anybody have some documents
or
white papers on the subject? Your valuable input will be much appreciated

ROFL :-) Sorry, but if you don't even know what equipment you will need I
think you are going into the wrong business. Whilst there are doubtless some
back-bedroom voip telcos on this list, running a reliable telecoms show is
not something you are going to be doing with nothing but advice off a
newsgroup.

Also if you want to be like Telediscount, millions of pounds in investment
might be a good start, as you'll need that to subsidise your users' calls
(Telediscount and/or their other brands sell at well below cost).

Presumably you were hoping to make a profit? Very few do in the telecoms
game. Margins are tight and competition for user base is fierce.

Regards
Andrew


--
Inweb Networks. Quality internet and telecoms services
Sales: 08000 612222 Support: 08704322222. http://www.inweb.co.uk
E1 call share. 0800, 0845 and 0870 numbers - best rates. Resellers welcome

"Andrew Crane" wrote in message
...

in an Afrcian country similar to telediscount.



Where is this country "telediscount"?

"Andrew Crane" wrote in message
...

"IMPI" wrote in message
...
Anybody with some VOIP advice would be helpful. I am thinking about
opening
up a low cost international calling company in an Afrcian country similar
to
telediscount. What equipment will be needed? Anybody have some documents
or
white papers on the subject? Your valuable input will be much appreciated

ROFL :-) Sorry, but if you don't even know what equipment you will need I
think you are going into the wrong business. Whilst there are doubtless
some
back-bedroom voip telcos on this list, running a reliable telecoms show is
not something you are going to be doing with nothing but advice off a
newsgroup.

Then again - its Africa....

Andrew,

I have an idea of what equipment is needed.
I am in the telcom industry, routing and switching, not ip telephony. I work
for a Cisco partner

If telediscount sell at well below cost, how do they stay in business? are
they a charity organisation?
Telediscount is owned by Finarea SA and have various regsitered domains for
low cost calling.
Are you suggesting that all these low cost calling card companies have
invested millions of pounds? New ones are popping up on a weekly basis.

All I am ooking for is a white paper or some sort of infrastructure diagram
to confirm or dismiss my idea on the the setup,
lets say something like a visio diagram of the finarea topolgy for
telediscount for example. Is this an unreasonalbe request?

Therefore constructive advice will be much appreciated.
Regards
IMPI

"Andrew Crane" wrote in message
...

"IMPI" wrote in message
...
Anybody with some VOIP advice would be helpful. I am thinking about
opening
up a low cost international calling company in an Afrcian country similar
to
telediscount. What equipment will be needed? Anybody have some documents
or
white papers on the subject? Your valuable input will be much appreciated

ROFL :-) Sorry, but if you don't even know what equipment you will need I
think you are going into the wrong business. Whilst there are doubtless
some
back-bedroom voip telcos on this list, running a reliable telecoms show is
not something you are going to be doing with nothing but advice off a
newsgroup.

Also if you want to be like Telediscount, millions of pounds in investment
might be a good start, as you'll need that to subsidise your users' calls
(Telediscount and/or their other brands sell at well below cost).

Presumably you were hoping to make a profit? Very few do in the telecoms
game. Margins are tight and competition for user base is fierce.

Regards
Andrew


--
Inweb Networks. Quality internet and telecoms services
Sales: 08000 612222 Support: 08704322222. http://www.inweb.co.uk
E1 call share. 0800, 0845 and 0870 numbers - best rates. Resellers welcome

"IMPI" wrote in message
...
Andrew,

I have an idea of what equipment is needed.
I am in the telcom industry, routing and switching, not ip telephony. I
work
for a Cisco partner

If telediscount sell at well below cost, how do they stay in business?
are
they a charity organisation?

No, it's the second or third option. I don't know if you are suggesting that
they are not selling routes below cost, but if so this issue has been
discussed to death on this forum over the years and I can assure you that
all of their new offerings will be littered with loss-leaders. It follows
that the first one (was it telediscount?) was funded by the people setting
it up.

Telediscount is owned by Finarea SA and have various regsitered domains
for
low cost calling.
Are you suggesting that all these low cost calling card companies have
invested millions of pounds? New ones are popping up on a weekly basis.

No, I'm specifically talking about Telediscount. The other Finarea brands
have followed the same path but presumably are being funded by the other
brands that no longer subsidise the calls.

All the same, if you think that you can buy in routes for zero pence a
minute then you'll be disappointed. And since Finarea regularly have zero
ppm routes in their retail plans, there are only two choices -- either they
are subsidising their customers' calls, or the revenue fairy comes to visit
them each night.

All I am ooking for is a white paper or some sort of infrastructure
diagram
to confirm or dismiss my idea on the the setup,
lets say something like a visio diagram of the finarea topolgy for
telediscount for example. Is this an unreasonalbe request?

I'm sure they would write an instruction book and let the group look at
their network diagram :-)

VOIP routing and switching is no different to TDM at a topology level, it's
just that the routes are virtual instead of real. Therefore the same
principles follow and routes are built out by economic forces rather than
technical or logistical ones. And just like TDM, what you can't (or can't be
bothered) to source from the lowest bidder, you shunt it out to someone else
who already has all the routes.

Each company has built their network based upon their own design and
experience and these networks have evolved. There's no set way of doing
things, but there are plenty of VOIP resources out there and plenty of
consultants who will design something for you.

Regards
Andrew

My advice to the OP would be to start by writing a business plan and
forget about the network architecture until they are sure that there is
a business case. I suspect that a PEST analysis (political, economic,
social and technological) will highlight some issues which need to be
thought through first. I would not be hugely surprised, for example,
to find that in some countries VoIP is not permitted (because it
cannibalizes revenues from a nascent PSTN) and that in others there
will be no fixed-line network, only mobile.

There are plenty of business plan templates available on the Internet,
available for example at Microsoft's web site.

Nick