The trend in new offerings of Asterisk appliances continues unabated.
On a VUC call a couple of weeks ago Dean Collins & Co. detailed the VDEX-40 from Technoco, with The Amanda Company providing US distribution.
That conference call was great (hear it now if you like) with lots of detail about the hardware, software (a Druid variant) and target market. To the extent that VUC includes some very technical people, including resellers, and met the apparent demands of the group, it appears that the device has a bright future. It features a dual processor hardware design setting it apart from others, as well as an attractive price point. Dean certainly knows what he’s doing so I expect we’ll be seeing more from them as time goes by.
This week I heard about another new offering from Toronto-based Jazinga. This I learned about by way of Alec Saunders blog & podcast. That call is also available for download.
Their literature is light to technical details, but what is there seems solid. Since all these devices are Asterisk in the core they are differentiated on the basis of hardware flexibility & middleware/GUI solutions. It would not surprise me at all to find that Voiceroute have their fingers in all these offerings to some degree. The end-point auto-provisioning described by Jazinga sounds really familiar.
Some time ago Cory Andrews wrote a post giving a short overview of the Asterisk Appliance market. Since then there have been three or four new devices offered in just a few short months. It certainly seems like it’s about time for someone to get some hardware in-hand and perform a comparative review.
It seems like a great time to be an Asterisk VAR.