[Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?

[John Todd]

At 1:18 PM -0500 on 6/16/04, Jay Milk wrote:
>I took a little foray into pricing out IP Phones for my home pbx
>yesterday.  $75-$750 seems to be quite a range, so I took a closer look.
>
>[snip]
>Am I dreaming?
>

Well, yes, you're sort-of dreaming.

The trick is not designing the hardware or the software - anyone with 
$100k (or much, much less) and the right engineers can get something 
working to the point where it is ready to be produced.

You will hit the wall with:
   - finding reliable suppliers of manufacturing technology
   - finding enough money for cash "float" during the sales cycle
   - finding enough money for marketing "float" during sales cycle
   - finding adequate sales channels
   - compensating your sales channels

The last two are the most important.  These are not engineering 
questions; they are business and political questions, which is why 
the hardware market looks so easy but is so littered with the dead 
husks of failed companies run by engineers.  Selling direct is a 
limited market; there are only so many Asterisk home users that you 
can advertise to via the mailing lists.  :-)

JT