VON Enterprise Forum: The analyst perspective on the enterprise
Tuesday, October 19, 2004, 11:15am - 12:45

An ever-growing number of large Enterprises are embracing VoIP and switching to IP for their communications infrastructure. Current forecasts indicate that IP Telephony will achieve a 50% share of the enterprise telephony market this year and that annual spending on IP-based phones will reach $5.3 billion by 2007. Beyond substantial cost savings and productivity gains, network convergence holds the promise of fundamentally changing the way Enterprise’s configure and utilize their communications networks.

This session is devoted to the analysis of this very broad, far reaching change. The session will examine the current state of the opportunities and challenges faced by the Enterprise and will explore how VoIP and IP Communications will maximize opportunities and face the challenges together. Together, these very senior level professionals will highlight the infrastructure requirements for the Enterprise including QoX, the application opportunities for a virtual Enterprise, and the security concerns of migrating to an IP based Communications Network.

David Fraley is a principal analyst in Gartner Research, where his research focuses on convergence communications, signaling, security, and cyber warfare and terrorism. Prior to joining Gartner, Mr. Fraley worked at leading companies, including Nortel, Siemens, TRW, as well as multiple Silicon Valley startups. Mr. Fraley is a Major in the United States Army Reserve with qualifications in engineering, communications, and public affairs, and he has served in multiple leadership and staff positions. Mr. Fraley has a B.S. in economics, an M.S. in telecommunications and an M.B.A. in finance. He is a graduate of the U.S. Army combined arms and services staff school and multiple military communications and engineering schools.

Ronald Gruia is the Program Leader for Frost & Sullivan’s Enterprise Communications Solutions service. His major focus areas include global markets such as IP telephony, wireless LANs, enhanced carrier voice services platforms, IP Centrex and enterprise voice equipment. Ronald was a speaker at events such as Comdex, ICS (Intel Communications Summit) and VON (Voice On the Net). He is based in Toronto and has made TV appearances in programs at ROB-TV. Prior to joining Frost & Sullivan, Ronald has accumulated years of experience in the telecom industry, having held several roles at Nortel Networks’ Enterprise Division. He is an MIT graduate in Electrical Engineering and holds a contact center patent.

Kenneth Osowski, Vice President of Marketing and Product Management has been at Pactolus for over 4 years, joining during the company’s early development stage. Osowski started in the enhanced services market in 1993 at Boston Technology (acquired by Comverse), where in a senior product management role introduced the company’s carrier-focused messaging platforms, the CO ACCESS 500/600, Access NP, and AccessMAX Service Creation Environment. In a Director of Sales role, he sold to the ILECs, CLECs, and major independent telcos. Osowski holds a B.S. degree in Physics from Franklin & Marshall College and an M.S. degree in Computer Science from Columbia University.

Stephen Raab joined Dell’Oro Group in February 2003 and is responsible for Dell’Oro Group’s IP Telephony research program.

Mr. Raab has more than 18 years of experience in the voice communications industry. During his extensive career, Mr. Raab held technical positions at AT&T Bell Labs focusing on enterprise communications products. Subsequently, he migrated to product management, engineering management and business development roles at HTI Voice Solutions, an Avaya Conversant system integrator; Aurora Systems, the maker of the FastCall CTI application; Siemens ICN; and StarVox, a VoIP application developer.

Mr. Raab holds both Bachelors and Masters degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University and an M.B.A. from MIT Sloan School of Management.

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