8x8, Inc., provider of Packet8 residential, business and video Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone services, announced the launch of a new, high performance T.38-based business-quality fax over IP service. Packet8 fax service can be immediately provisioned on the 2nd line of any Packet8 Virtual Office BPA-410 business phone adapter. No additional hardware is required, other than the business' existing fax machine(s).

Unlike other "best-effort" faxing solutions in the VoIP industry, 8x8's fax service offers the industry's most reliable fax solution based on the T.38 ITU standard for sending faxes across IP networks in a real-time mode. Ratified in 1998 by the ITU (International Telecommunications Union) as the standard for real-time fax over IP, T.38 describes the technical features necessary to transfer facsimile documents between two standard facsimile terminals over the Internet. The use of this standard in Packet8's fax implementation offers increased fax transmission speeds as well as a significantly higher level of transmission reliability.

"The absence of an effective fax over IP solution has been a barrier to the adoption of VoIP telephony services, particularly in the small business market segment," said 8x8 Chairman and CEO Bryan R. Martin. "With the Packet8 fax service, subscribers worldwide now have a reliable alternative to traditional PSTN faxing and an opportunity to realize even greater cost savings and functionality from broader usage of their existing high speed Internet connection. Packet8 Virtual Office subscribers can add as many fax lines to their Virtual Office system as they have business phone adapters -- a fax line can be easily and inexpensively added with no additional hardware to each and every extension in the business," concluded Mr. Martin.

Fax Extension, Packet8's business fax service plan (available now), and Freedom Fax standalone fax line service for residential users (available soon), are compatible with all standard fax machines and are priced at $9.99 per month for 300 outgoing minutes and unlimited incoming minutes. Extra domestic outgoing fax minutes are billed at 3.5 cents per minute with outgoing international faxes billed at Packet8 International rates. Additional information can be found at http://www.packet8.net/.