VoIP and Embedded Linux

According to statistics from aplio.com, the market for VoIP/Internet telephony is expected to explode. One research company, Probe Research Inc., suggests that the total traffic for Internet telephony will reach or exceed 250 billion conversation minutes by 2005. Aplio recorded its five millionth minute in June 1999.

Calvo notes that 70% of those who use the Aplio/Phone and Aplio/Pro are what he calls members of “ethnic communities” or those “global citizens” who work in one country yet often have family or other strong ties to another country. These core Aplio/Phone users would otherwise face heavy long-distance charges without a solution such as VoIP. Similarly, Calvo estimates that the remaining 30% of Aplio's customer base consists of internationally oriented businesses, who are also looking to avoid long-distance tolls while conducting business around the world.

Asked to characterize the Aplio premium on VoIP Internet appliances, Calvo offered the expected: (1) Aplio/Phone and Aplio/Pro are non-PC products; (2) both appliances have “extremely good” voice quality; and (3) both Aplio/Phone and Aplio/Pro feature easy-to-manage user interfaces. “Our goal is to have many companies build[ing] many different appliances. In that sense, betting on an open-source operating system like Linux is a good thing, because we can very quickly prototype, develop and test our products and get them to market.”