[asterisk-biz] RE: Bottom end of the market for an Asterisk PBX ?

[Raymond McKay]

> You want to charge $5000 for a small biz Asterisk server? Yes, you
> definitely need to rethink your strategy. I would rather think that $1500 
> is the maximum

At risk of sounding a bit rude....

I really have never understood where this mentality of Asterisk being a 
"cheap" system ever got started.  Lets look at the cost facts here.

You have a couple options when building the system core.  A small embedded 
system  ($600)  or a redundant server such as a dell PowerEdge 1800 ($1500)

Decent phones are going to cost between $100-$250 a piece.

A PSTN interface card is going to cost around $249

Per channel the costs of labor to setup are usually 1 hour per channel. 
I've seen labor rates for this between $50-$150 / hour


So lets do the math based on these assumptions:

Customer does not expect extreme growth.  Maybe expansion up to 12 channels 
and 4 lines is max within 3 years.  Customer wants upper end phones (Snom 
360) full 4 port PSTN support now.  At a system with 5 phones and 4 lines 
configured cost breaks down as such.


$600 System Core
$1095 5 SNOM 360s Provisioned
$249 PSTN Card 4 Port
$1125 About one day of labor to install and configure. (assuming locally at 
$125/hour per 9 channels at an hour per channel)
_________________________________________
$3069 or $341 per channel.

Now how exactly to you make that system only $1500!?!?!?  Now consider that 
a comparable system from Avaya, Nortel, Cisco or ANY reasonable other is 
going to cost at least $800 / channel.  Notice I do not compare to low-end 
Korean imports.  This is because Asterisk does not compete well with such 
systems.  Most of my systems replace such low end systems because of their 
limitations.  In cases I replace upper end systems from the big names with 
Asterisk systems for the same reasons.

Sellers of Asterisk hear me!!  Don't sell yourself short here.  When you 
sell Asterisk, you are selling a top grade, top of the line phone system 
comparable with the big names.  There is no nead to try to compete with the 
low end Korean imports.  Let them have their fun and go in and replace them 
when the customer realizes that they don't provide everything they thought 
they would.  You will end up with happier customers that actually get what 
they need.  Anybody looking for the above system with an expectation of a 
$1500 system cost does not have a reasonable expectation for costs of a top 
notch phone system such as asterisk and is not a customer you want.

OK enough of my rant.  Please flame me directly if you think I'm on crack so 
as not to bog down the list.


Raymond McKay
President
RAYNET Technologies LLC
http://www.raynettech.com
(860) 693-2226 x 31
Toll Free (877) 693-2226