Voice services continue to be the mainstay for most communication service companies in the U.S. even in the face of all the exciting changes taking place in the market and the explosion of growth opportunities in new areas such as video and broadband. While it is true that the IP revolution combined with competitive and regulatory environment changes have initiated massive change in the voice services market, this does not mean that traditional voice communication, a key medium for effective human interaction over many years, will suddenly disappear.

New analysis from Frost & Sullivan, U.S. Residential Voice Services Study - Is Voice Still the Killer App?, finds that the market generated revenues of more than $50 billion from the traditional voice services segment in 2006 in the U.S. Revenues from this market segment will increasingly shift to emerging voice services such as VoIP and converged wireline-wireless voice applications by 2013.

If you are interested in a virtual brochure, which provides manufacturers, end users, and other industry participants with an overview of the latest analysis of U.S. Residential Voice Services Study - Is Voice Still the Killer App?, then send an e-mail to Mireya Castilla, Corporate Communications, at mireya.castilla@frost.com with your full name, company name, title, telephone number, city, state, country and e-mail address. Upon receipt of the above information, an overview will be sent to you.

"Traditional voice services are netting substantial revenues and generating healthy margins for U.S. residential voice service providers," remarks Frost & Sullivan Industry Analyst Piyush Arora. "Even though demand and revenue opportunities are shifting from circuit-switched to IP and to some extent, to wireless, market participants cannot afford to ignore conventional voice services."

There is an increasing trend toward service bundling and converged services. This will offer voice service providers, including telecommunication companies and cable MSOs, opportunities to continue packaging wireline voice services along with broadband access and emerging broadband voice/data applications.

However, the challenge of managing duplicate networks to support both switched and IP telephony customers is bound to be a difficult task for incumbent telcos. On the other hand, emerging providers such as cable MSOs and independent VoIP providers will face the twin challenges of ensuring timely roll-outs of voice services and managing expectations of customers that shift from stable switched telephony to IP telephony.

Compared to the approximately 8 million residential VoIP subscribers in the U.S., there are more than 100 million residential switched access lines. Incumbent telcos support and service the bulk of these switched voice customers. In contrast, cable MSOs and others started offering voice relatively recently and are mainly providing IP telephony services to their subscribers.

"While the migration from circuit-switched to VoIP access lines is inevitable, this is a gradual process," says Arora. "For the foreseeable future, service providers, particularly telcos, need to manage both types of voice customers."

Telcos need to maximize their existing switched access lines but must also work to retain subscribers that wish to move to IP-based voice services. Telcos that focus on holding on to their traditional voice service platforms could lose out to competitors that are able to offer more feature-rich and cost-effective IP-based voice services. Cable MSOs and independent VoIP providers, on their part, need to offer differentiated voice services while meeting customer expectations in terms of reliability and voice quality.

Going forward, the market will see a change in the way voice services are sold to consumers as new business models, marketing strategies, and pricing schemes evolve. Future growth opportunities will favor new competitors and companies that offer voice as well as other consumer communication services.

U.S. Residential Voice Services Study - Is Voice Still the Killer App?, part of the Communication Services Subscription, provides an overview of key trends in the consumer voice services market as well as a detailed revenue/demand analysis of various segments. In addition, the study identifies the key market drivers and challenges and discusses current and emerging trends. Interviews with the press are available.