ITSPA Award winners - download press release here

ITSPA Awards - Winners Announced

10th December - The success stories of the VoIP industry were announced in Parliament today at the 2nd annual ITSPA Awards. The ceremony was attended by over a hundred people including parliamentarians, civil servants and industry representatives. It took place in the Strangers Dining Room of the House of Commons and was hosted by Andrew Miller MP. The awards were presented in 5 categories, representing different areas of the VoIP and Unified Communications industry.

The Award Winners were:

Best Consumer VoIP - Vonage V-Plan 4i
Best Business ITSP (SMEs) - iNet Telecoms (Voipfone)
Best Business ITSP (Large Enterprise) - ntl:Telewest Business
Best VoIP Hardware - Polycom VVX (TM)1500 D
Most Innovative VoIP Product - BT IP Exchange

Those Highly Commended were:

Best Business ITSP category (SMEs) - Telappliant
Best Business ITSP (Large Enterprise) - Ipitomi Ltd & Voicenet Solutions
Best VoIP Hardware - Nortel: (CS 2000)
Most Innovative VoIP Product - Snom 870

Sponsored by:

Best Consumer VoIP Award Finalists:
Coms Plc: Coms Personal VoIP
Inet Telecoms Ltd: Voipfone
Telappliant: VoIPtalk
Vonage:  V-Plan 4i

Sponsored by:

ntl:Telewest Business Award Finalists:
Coms plc
Gradwell
Inclarity
Inet Telecoms Ltd (Voipfone)
Telappliant
Timico
Vostron

Sponsored by:

Best Business ITSP (Large Enterprise) Award Finalists:
BT Global Services
Ciptex Solutions Ltd
Ipitomi plc
Timico
NTL/Telewest
Voicenet Solutions

Sponsored by:

Best VoIP Hardware Award Finalists:
Cisco:  Cisco SPA525G
DIGITALK Ltd: DIGITALK Session Border Controller
Nortel: Nortel Communications Server 2000 (CS 2000)
Polycom: VVX (TM) 1500
Snom: Snom 870
Yealink (UK) Ltd: T20P-T28P Phone Range

Sponsored by:

Most Innovative VoIP Product Award Finalists:
 BT: IP Exchange
Polycom: VVX (TM) 1500
Snom: Snom 870
TeleWare plc: Intelligent Connect

The revolution started by Alexander Graham Bell is well and truly into its latest phase.  Analogue telephony moved into a digital world and has now further progressed to the use of Internet Protocol. Voice over IP is no longer a sunrise technology but the basis of a maturing industry spawning profitable business models and high levels of growth.

The use of IP and the development of related industry standards such as Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) has revolutionised the way people can communicate. The rich and diverse functionality that standards bring about is coming to the fore as are the associated cost benefits and productivity improvements. Telephony is also becoming network agnostic and the fact that it no longer requires government scale investment to enter the market makes it easy for new players to join in the game.

In the UK the growth in the number of new “telephone companies” quickly reached a critical mass and in 2005 the VoIP service provider community was brought together as the United Kingdom Internet Telephony Service Association (ITSPA).

Following the success of the inaugural ITSPA Awards in December 2008, ITSPA will be hosting the second annual award ceremony on 10th December 2009, in the Strangers Dining Room in the Houses of Parliament. Following the success of the first awards ceremony, it was felt appropriate to continue to recognise those companies in the industry who are providing the highest standards of service as well as the best product innovations that have recently entered the market. The results from the 2008 Awards, can be found here.

The evening will be hosted by joint Chairs of the All Party Communications group, Derek Wyatt MP and John Robertson MP. The award categories are representative of the spread of voice communications markets in the UK.

Further information about general logistics will be posted on the ITSPA awards website. Alternatively please contact the ITSPA Secretariat for more details at admin@itspa.org.uk or 020 7340 8733.