The Bad News For Vonage Keeps Getting Worse
Source: smithonvoip.com
People Do Stupid Things
Like use other companies patented technology to power their own service.
In what I consider to be a modern day corporate stoning, a federal judge has issued a permanent injunction against Vonage for use of rival Verizon Communications Inc.’s patents. Vonage now has to weeks to switch the backend technology powering their service away from the ones patented by Verizon.
How Much Can You Really Fix in Two Weeks?
I have to imagine that it would take more than two weeks and or a whole pile of money to fix these problems. According to the rulings, Vonages patent infringement revolves around a method for translating calls from the Internet to standard phones, as well as call-waiting features. Those are some mighty BIG fixes, especially since Vonage is an company the routes calls through the internet.
I know there is more than one way to translate calls from the Internet to the PSTN, but can an alternative be found, tested, and deployed across 2.2 million customers in two weeks - seems unlikely. As word of this perdicament spreads among the customer base of Vonage one has to wonder how many will leave in the coming weeks, and who will be the opportunistic service provider as the one who “pays for their VoIP patents, so your service sees no interruption.”
