Right now I would say ILNK is not low risk, so I don't know if it fits the GG criteria?
Not yet profitable, competition is on the horizon. Partners need to be made, funds to be raised, etc.
But leading edge - Oh yes!
Saying ILNK has 'market redefining' products/services is not as simple as comparing wired to wireless (the useage difference of THOSE is obvious)
I-Links' services incorporate - and parallel- these these wired/wireless services and actually combine and extend them - not concepts simple to market to the average user.
Wireless does an end run around traditional telco, whereas VoIP piggybacks existing circuits while hopping over the central offices. So they both evade the common telco toll paths to bring new capabilities.
CDMA/wireless is fine for portable products, but it can't beat cost/reliability for a persistent wired-circuit to an office/home.
The MAIN problems I see with wireless are: coverage (in populated corridors- but getting better), reliability (not suited for continuous internet connection) and cost (per min charge), Bandwidth (text display for the handhelds is ok at this point- graphics surfing would bring it to it's knees).
ILNK may save people money, but keep in mind the telcos don't like having money pass buy THEIR pockets.
Telco's have a problem with their need to support their billion dollar switched voice network - cellphones have been grafted onto that network.
Microsoft tried, and failed, to wedge itself into the telcos standards meetings to incorporate MS software and API's into the telco world... the telcos don't want to give up the cash cow they have built all these years.
Look how long it took telcos just to add answering service to the common phone bill.
It takes companies like ILNK to leap to the next generation of phone service, and SERVICES is what its all about. That's what's unique about I-Link from the user's 'product perception' standpoint.
Mass adoption is gonna have to come via marketing -- ILNK has taken the unusual route of starting with multilevel marketing via bigplanet.com (now have 80,000 users), and also uses independent marketers (which is how a lot of discount LD and telcom products are marketed), and now courting a telco-style partners (of which there is said to have been 3 making contact).
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I-Link's V-Link product is interesting in that it ties both wired and wireless together in a unified system... and they've given it the handle of "Unified Messaging".
People contact you via ONE personal 800 number and the system routes, per your instructions, to the devices of your choice cell/desk/pager/email/fax or answering service. And you interact back through the same devices and services.
To unique examples: if you are on a cell call and walk in the office, you push a couple buttons on your cell phone and that call is hot-transfered to your desk phone - you don't miss a word of the conversation.
or all of your personal emails, faxes AND VOICE messages display on your computer screen, you can click on your voice message to hear it through your computer, or have your fax read to you over your cell phone.
Voice interactivity is in development.
Whether this platter of services is an easy sell to the average phone user... i dont know, but it sure raises eyebrows
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* I-Link's Indavo product would appeal to the small biz office -
turning your single DSL line into multiple phone/data ports, (6 virtual lines for 12 phones)
i-link.com
* V-link for the hectic family or traveling business person.
i-link.com
* The advertiser supported 'TalkFree' will appeal to everyone on the internet who wants to make 3+ minute free LD phone calls using regular phones. (They have had a beta in operation and are now looking for a sponsor site)
weblink.i-link.net
* The release of the I-link Gateway/Softswitch and VoIP API platform opens thier network up to some imaginative telecom designers to create their own products/services that ILNK could not have imagined. i-link.com
(In fact one of NTOP's VoIP products uses I-Link's network i-link.com |
