Colin C. Haley

The more challenging a job, the more satisfying. If that adage is true, Bo Parker must be thrilled. As managing director of PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Global Technology Center, Parker helps telecoms navigate a swiftly changing industry. Once unchallenged, carriers must now answer threats from cable operators, Voice over IP upstarts and Internet giants entering the communications business. […]

My wife and I recently bought a minivan. It was time. The old car was impractical and unreliable (but damn if it wasn’t fast). But the process of buying was almost enough to make me want to walk. According to a new report from telecom research and consulting firm Savatar, it wasn’t unlike being small […]

UPDATED: Making its second major acquisition in as many months, E*Trade today said it will pay $1.6 billion in cash for J.P. Morgan’s BrownCo online trading unit. The deal will give E*Trade 200,000 new well-heeled customers who carry an average balance of more than $145,000 — the second highest in the industry, E*Trade said. In […]

While Skype executives were busy negotiating eBay’s blockbuster deal to buy the VoIP company, its developers were enhancing Voice over IP software in the lab. The Luxembourg-based company today announced Skype for Windows 1.4, which boasts better sound quality and new features aimed at improving callers’ experience — and Skype’s money-making potential. The offering, code-named […]

UPDATED: In a major shift in the PDA industry, Palm is expected to announce today that its Treo 700 smartphone will be powered by the Microsoft mobile operating system. Palm President and CEO Ed Colligan, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates and Verizon Wireless CEO Denny Strigl are expected to make it official […]

BOSTON — Voice over IP service providers big and small are in a full-court press to lure small and medium businesses (SMBs) to IP telephony. Some of the most recent moves include Qwest teaming with Microsoft and Vonage partnering with TowerStream with services for the 1.8 million SMBs. “A lot of people are trying to […]

BOSTON — A good telecom venture capitalist is like an NBA shooter. Every once in a while he misses a big shot. The key is, he puts it behind him and hits the next one, and the one after that. Charles Lax of Grand Banks Partners and David McCarthy, of BCE Capital, are prime examples. […]

BOSTON — Jeff Pulver, founder of the Voice Over Net (VON) conference, remembers the first VoIP blogging panel he assembled. “It was two years ago during spring VON,” said Pulver, himself an avid blogger. “No one came.” But like the VON show and the industry it covers, VoIP blogging has seen tremendous growth. Blogs are […]

BOSTON — The Voice Over Net (VON) show celebrates Skype, Vonage and other VoIP pioneers. If the Baby Bells are mentioned at all, it’s usually with disdain. Just yesterday, a U.S. Senator equated legacy telecoms with the Recording Industry Association of America, saying both are clinging to old models that suppress innovation and competition. But […]

BOSTON — Jeffrey Citron, CEO of VoIP giant Vonage, called for a “broadband bill of rights” at the Voice Over Net (VON) show here Monday. The document — which will be developed with Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, AOL and others in the Internet community — would serve as a guideline for state and local lawmakers as […]

BOSTON — When Hurricane Katrina knocked out landlines and cell phones, city officials in New Orleans turned to VoIP to get the word out. IP advocates should remind legislators and policy makers of that as future rules for IP services are being developed, U.S. Sen. John E. Sununu (R-NH) said in a speech at the […]

LOS ANGELES — One theme of Microsoft’s Professional Developers Conference is enhancing the appearance of applications and Web pages. Fitting really, given the city. A key example is the new Expression Suite, which includes tools to design 3-D graphics and animation. “People are visual animals,” Thomas Murphy, a Microsoft group program manager, said during a […]