Enterprise SIP trunking

SIP Trunking is one way to place voice calls and send digital communications over the internet.

SIP trunking services allow us to make Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls, send SMS/MMS messages, place 911/emergency calls, and use other SIP-based real-time communications.

Speed, agility, and leanness are guiding principles for companies that need to stay competitive today. To support those principles, businesses need technology that supports them. The benefits of SIP trunking include:

• Unlimited call capacity: SIP trunking gives you unlimited, simultaneous call capacity so you can get concurrent calls to and from a single number.
• Flexibility: Because phone numbers associated with SIP services are virtual, you don’t need to be tied to your physical location, except where regulations require this. This lets you use DID numbers and SIP trunks for a two-way voice service from your office in New York City, even though you don’t actually have an office in New York City.
• Scalability: SIP trunks bring flexibility and control to your business phone system, especially for larger enterprises. In these scenarios, your dedicated data circuits serve as the backbone for seamless communication.
• Cost savings: Traditional analog circuits are costly because they have to be designed, configured, maintained, and upgraded. SIP trunking provides the same call quality as traditional line, but since it runs over the Internet, it doesn’t require the same level of design and configuration. Plus, the maintenance and upgrades to the network would be necessary whether SIP trunking was being run through them or not. Long distance, local inbound, and termination services can be included, providing another opportunity to save costs. Plus, SIP trunking delivers cost savings as great as 60% over traditional methods.
• Direct-to-provider control: By leveraging SIP trunks over dedicated data circuits, you actually gain more control over your business phone system. As you expand to new domestic or international locations, you can manage and control your own resources.

The primary benefits of SIP trunks compared to Primary Rate Interface (PRI) are cost savings, cloud flexibility, and scale. Because SIP trunks are elastic, businesses can scale SIP services up and down to meet demand easily.

In addition, cloud-based voice like SIP removes the need for fixed overhead costs and on-premise equipment. The infrastructure costs for SIP trunking are also lower because SIP eliminates the need for primary rate interfaces (PRIs), which require enterprises to buy lines in bundles of 23. PRI customers who need 10 lines have to buy a bundle of 23, leaving 13 unused. SIP, however, can be purchased in whatever number of units a business requires.

SIP trunking allows businesses to converge networks because it’s an application, not a service. Just as copper lines transmit signals instead of creating them, SIP allows any endpoint to communicate with another, as long as the two endpoints both agree to use SIP. That means a single-location company can converge its networks, roles, and equipment into one system that meets all of its communication needs.

A hosted PBX is typically more cost-effective for small businesses that don’t have the resources or expertise to manage on-site PBX hardware. However, SIP trunking is often better if a company already has on-site PBX hardware, and wants greater control and customization options. Now with BYOC (Bring Your Own Carrier), SIP trunking can be used with popular UCaaS platforms like Microsoft Teams, Webex and Zoom

Today, many companies use SIP trunking to power the voice calling within their UCaaS and CCaaS platforms. However, SIP Trunk services can work with any SIP-ready hosted PBX system. SIP Trunks can also be made to work with a traditional analog or key phone system with an IAD (Integrated Access Device).

With all the advantages that SIP trunking offers, why do any companies still use traditional services? It's simple. Traditional telecom has been in existence for over 100 years. Over its lifetime, copper has been widely adopted, of course, and it’s the telephone technology that most of us grew up using. The short answer is: it was the best option that businesses have had until recent years. SIP trunking is only about 10 years old. That means it was purpose-built to work in today’s business environment.

Since the advent of SIP trunking as a business tool, nearly 70% of decision-makers have adopted SIP, and of those adopters, 96% report satisfaction with call quality. A protocol can only achieve widespread adoption when it’s based on consistent standards. The guidelines for how a SIP trunk should work and interoperate with a phone system are defined and guided by the SIP Forum, an organization of telecom experts who work toward the continual improvement of SIP standards.