Probing the Vast Universe of
Telephone Manufacturers

The telecom market is crowded with telephone manufacturers, all claiming their solutions are best - best in technology, customer service, value, and so on. Businesses are by no means all the same when it comes to requirements for a telephone system, and as I've mentioned before, it's difficult to compare apples to apples in this business.

It would appear that most of the major business telephone manufacturers, or at least recognizable brand names, are all available in the Austin area - Panasonic, Avaya, Samsung, Nortel (acquired by Avaya), NEC, Toshiba, and Mitel all have certified dealers in central Texas. Lesser known options are also available from other telecommunication equipment manufacturers like ESI, Vertical and Shoretel.

As voice and data continue to converge, we're seeing more data and Information Technology companies exploring telephony - they seem to gravitate toward IP enabled and pure IP systems such as Cisco, Vertical, Zultys and Allworx.

That's not to say that these are the only options. Hosted VoIP, open source software based systems, notably, Asterisk, and niche telephone manufacturers like Xblue whose product line features phones in both blue and red are also readily available.

There are dozens more, and as we run across products that seem unique or interesting - worth writing an article about, we'll do so. Telecom offerings today are increasingly complex and numerous. In addition to standard telephone systems - key systems, PBX's, VoIP Systems - there are also specialty manufacturers like Clarity who makes amplified telephones that are louder than standard phones; Polycom and Konftel known for full duplex conference phones; and Engenius, specializing in industrial, long range cordless phones.

It's easy to become overwhelmed by all the options, but we hope to help you by giving you some basic information to both simplify and clarify. Sometimes a customer already has a clear idea of what they want - a wish list of features that would be meaningful and beneficial to a business, priorities. If that sounds like you, then give us a call and we'll help you (or if we can't, we'll point you in the direction of someone who can).

Many, if not most, telephone manufacturers use a channel sales approach, meaning you'll work with a certified vendor/dealer such as Crockett Communications. For this reason, it's obviously very important to choose a solid, professional vendor who can add value to the product they recommend. Many feel that the choice of vendor is more important to most businesses than the manufacturer of the system.