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More on the CT Expo. Man what a show. For a non-techy such as myself, it was somewhat intimidating when seeing and hearing all of the high-tech presentations that are constantly taking place. Franklin's booth is located on the lower of two floors which is the same floor where registration takes place and advance registrations are picked up. So it looked like everybody starts on the lower floor (Kentia Hall). Franklin's booth is located in a section of Kentia Hall identified as the Editor's Choice Pavilion. Although their booth was not hard to find, my feeling was that the upstairs exhibit area (South Hall) was were all the action was. Each time I was at the Franklin booth there were anywhere between 4 and 12 people talking to the four Franklin representatives. Neil and Paul where always engaged with someone and I always had to wait to talk to a Franklin rep. So I would say that their booth was generally busy. However, when compared to VocalTech's booth, which had a swarm of people around it, you would have to say that Franklin has a way to go in the area of PR and knowability. I spent most of my time at the VocalTech booth telling people who just finished talking on their DVG, to go down to Franklin's booth and compare the quality. Like I mentioned before, there is no comparison. I can't believe that VocalTech is even trying to compete with their product. I think that they are the reason that the people I talked to at MCI, Lucent, and Brooktrout, think that voice quality is still not good enough to make IP Telephony competitive. Each time I heard that I sent them to Franklin's booth to hear the Tempest. I hope they go. Franklin's PR company has their job cut out for them in trying to overcome the misconception that VocalTech's technology is the best that the industry has to offer. If Franklin had the name recognition and exposure that VocalTech has, we would all be very rich. But what is most frustrating is VocalTech is being successful with an inferior product when compared to the Tempest. Franklin has the best product, period. Now they have to make sure that the world comes to know they have the best product. Don't get me wrong, I think Franklin has come a long ways in the area of PR; their booth is top drawer and Neil has a growing stack of business cards from new contacts that he has made at the show. But they have a long way to go in making their product known. Well, that's some of my reflections on the show. I need to get to my real job. Go FTEL. Bill |
