vonage

Buzz Out Loud 825: Go toward the light...It's got Wi-Fi!

Apologies in advance for the slightly dirty word toward the end of the show. Now you'll all listen, won't you? In other news, Ford wants to make sure your kids don't speed, that they wear their seat belts, and that they intensely hate your guts. And Google wants to make sure you don't send mail when you're too drunk to do math. Listen now: Download today's podcast EPISODE 825

A.M.D. to split into two operations http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/07/technology/07chip.html http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-10059766-92.html

Warner … Read more

Vonage struggles to attract new customers

Internet telephony provider Vonage is struggling to attract new customers, as the company is forced to spend less on advertising.

For the second quarter, Vonage reported it had lost $6.9 million, compared with a whopping $23.2 million loss during the same quarter a year ago. The company also increased revenue about 11 percent to $227.5 million.

But the positive gains in the company's financials came at a price. During the quarter, Vonage added only 2,080 new subscribers. A year ago, when the company was still marketing heavily on TV, it added 56,691 during the … Read more

Vonage names new CEO

Internet phone company Vonage is turning to a former Cingular Wireless to help guide it forward.

Vonage announced Wednesday that Marc Lefar, former chief marketing officer at Cingular, will become the Vonage's new CEO. Lefar, 44, will take over the top spot at the company from Jeffrey Citron, Vonage's founder who stepped in last year to help guide the company through its legal battles and financial issues.

Now that Vonage has made headway through these troubles, Lefar will take over to guide the company's long term strategy. Earlier this week, Vonage said it had gotten $215 million in debt financing … Read more

Vonage to get new CEO

Internet phone company Vonage will name a new chief executive as early as next week, according to a story published in The Wall Street Journal Friday.

The newspaper cited people familiar with the situation. The news comes as Vonage secures funding to buy back some of its debt. On Thursday the company said it has a letter of commitment from the hedge fund Silver Point Finance to provide up to $215 million in private debt financing.

Vonage will use the cash, plus some of its own, to repurchase the remainder of its $253 million in convertible notes, the Journal story … Read more

Comcast and Vonage collaborate on network management

Talk about an odd couple. Cable giant Comcast said Wednesday that it will work with Vonage to help ensure Vonage's Internet phone service works well over its broadband network.

The Comcast/Vonage alliance follows other similar announcements made with other Internet companies, as the cable operator tries to convince customers that it's not looking to kill competitive services that run over its network.

Last year, Comcast was discovered slowing down peer-to-peer traffic on its network. At first the company denied it was filtering traffic. Then it admitted it had slowed down some types of traffic to manage congestion … Read more

Comcast Voice better than AT&T landline

NY Times is reporting that Comcast voice service sounds better than anything else, including AT&T landline and Vonage.

The differences between the two kinds of digital voice services were brought out sharply in a study released last month by Keynote Systems, an Internet testing business based in San Mateo, Calif. Placing 75,000 test calls among various phone services, Keynote found that not only were Comcast's audio scores superior to those of Vonage, but that Comcast also scored higher than even AT&T's landline service.

Of course, as Randall Stross, the author of the article … Read more

Vonage: On the road to recovery?

Internet telephony company Vonage is getting back on track with improved quarterly earnings and a deal, announced Thursday, to resell broadband service from Covad, a DSL service provider.

The new service, called Vonage Broadband, will offer speeds of 3 megabits per second to 6 Mbps to residential and small-business customers. It will allow Vonage to bundle its Internet telephony services with broadband services. Until now, customers using Vonage would get their own broadband service from a cable company or phone company and then add the Vonage service on top.

The news of the deal comes as Vonage announces first-quarter 2008 … Read more

Vonage customers bolting for the exit. Try Skype next time

Vonage narrowed its loss this past quarter, but its customers are cutting their own losses with the struggling VOIP provider. I should know. I dumped Vonage two months ago and will never go back. Its service was terrible, both the customer support and the technology.

I'm with Comcast now for its Digital Voice offering and it's better (which is perhaps not surprising since Comcast intentionally hurts rival services on its network to preserve its own services). My problem now is that the Comcast VOIP boxes causes my wireless router to reset several times per day. Very, very aggravating.

The most surprising thing in all of this is how much better Skype is than either Vonage or Comcast Digital Voice.… Read more

Sprint & Verizon to ride the patent gravy train

Sprint Nextel and Verizon Communications both see an opportunity to make a buck on their IP telephony patents after successfully suing Vonage Holdings last year.

On Thursday, Sprint Nextel said in a U.S. District Court in Wichita, Kan., that it was suing four small phone companies. Sprint alleges that Nuvox Communication, BroadVOX Holdings, Big River Telephone, and Paetec Communications are infringing on six of its patents.

Those patents, part of a larger portfolio of patents that cover voice over IP technology owned by Sprint, are the same ones used to successfully sue Vonage. The two companies eventually settled the … Read more