Pacific Internet and callthai.net to provide a VOIP service in Thailand.

 Remember that  Pacific Internet Singapore and Skype have a deal ? Now check the below story and note that nothing is mentioned on Skype. And have a look at what they are offering on their website www.callthai.net.  It is a SIP-service and there is nothing mentioned about Skype whatsoever. The products and services are build up around a CAT PhoneNet  | CAT2Call | Broadband Phone | IP Network Camera | Video Phone | SMS Marketing | ADSL Modem Router. My interpretation : Skype is missing out here big time since they are focussing on their deal with Ebay (yet another 1 billion USD) and are not moving forward strong in the small and medium sized business market. There is a Skype for Business website, www.skype.biz but the Skype for Business project is not moving forward for now. Maybe it is just not the moment in time, but on the other hand SME is asking for solutions, resellers, agent. Where does that leave Skype now ? Maybe Skype just filled up via viral marketing a mental gap and market hole and has prepared the market for others ? In some cases it definetely looks like that. I have heard many times saying «how can you make money with Skype, if it’s for free» and then a whole reasoning of community and blogbuilding and what is happening around it starts boiling up (sometimes) to try to find some revenue-stream around it anyways. But I have not heard or seen lot’s of business-people in this segment go for this concept (apart from some Skype-shops) and the affiliate-system well that is just enough to pay for the coffee at Starbucks… Admit it. Look at your google add-sense, probably not more in it than some buck to pay for the coffee. Anybody who says otherwise should publish their fat paycheck on the internet. Same goes for Paypal. I still got quite some dollars stuck in that system, which shows for me how difficult it is to get money out of the internet. Money gone virtual tends to stay virtual. It’s too much walking around with no business proposition and a label «for free» on your fore-head. No SIP sales-person will do that. So the question remains. If you have to «run the last mile» bringing Skype into an SME, you better have a good strategy and be capable of talking about something else too. Or you have to be very very patient and friendly (who will pay the bills in mean time) to wait for the user– conversion to paying customer. Get ready in mean to be overruled by better and smarter software-developers. And spice up your support and don’t complain when people complain. It’s what computer-users do : they complain and you must convert the complaints into better service and support, within time. Which is exactly what Skype seems to do. The long marathon run. The big masses. Win a lot, lose some and stay away from now from the demanding and personal middle segment of SME. These are business consumers and expect SLA, which is what Skype cannot offer right now. Maybe in the future they can. How close is the future and who is filling the market holes right now ? See what is happening in Thailand.

«Pacific Internet (Thailand) vice president Supachot Kanjanakontong said the company has signed a marketing agreement with callthai.net to provide a VOIP service beginning from next month. The service will allow customers to make cheap calls from personal computers to telephones anywhere in the world. It will be launched in three phases. It will begin with a "softphone" programme, which is free software allowing users to make VOIP calls; then it will provide a ready-to-use VOIP hardware kit, allowing users to plug a phone into a USB port on their PC; and, lastly, it will offer a pre-paid card, making it convenient for VOIP users to fill-up and pay for their VOIP calls, he said.

The second phase is to begin in July and the third phase in August, Supachot said. The prepaid card for VOIP calls aims to help the service gain popularity.

Earlier this year, the National Telecommunication Commission liberalised the VOIP service for PC-to-phone calls, but it maintains a ban on phone-to-phone VOIP to protect state-owned CAT Telecom Plc, which banks on traditional overseas calls for revenue.

Pacific Internet (Thailand) senior vice president Thayawat Unnanond said the company had recently changed its strategy from focusing on providing Internet service to offering Internet Protocol-based communication solutions such as VOIP and WiMax (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access).

It recently announced trials of a mobile WiMax service in Singapore. Thai telecom authorities have not yet allocated frequencies for WiMax, which is a wireless technology similar to wifi but able to cover a much greater distance.

Since early this year, Pacific Internet (Thailand) has also shifted its focus to providing Internet services from the consumer market to the corporate market. The firm has stopped seeking new individual consumers, although it continues to service existing customers.

"We've shifted our focus to corporate customers, for whom quality of service is more important than pricing. We're targeting multinational corporations that know us well," said Thayawat. Pacific Internet, which is listed on the Nasdaq, is headquartered in Singapore and currently has a presence in Hong Kong, the Philippines, Australia, India, Malaysia and Thailand.

Supachot said Pacific Internet was favoured by multinational corporations because it offered clients a service-level agreement that guaranteed, for example, uptime and downtime, as well as a response time for its service staff.» source : Pacific to offer PC-to-phone call service

CallThai.NET partnered up with Pacific Internet (NASDAQ: PCNTF)
CallThai.NET launch Chaiyo.com

Related : Skype in Thailand | Skype in Asia | Skype in Malaysia | Skype in Singapore | Skype in Indonesia |