8x8 has upgraded its VoIP network to support an industry standard wideband audio codec to enable HD calling for business phone service subscribers. 8x8's new HD business voice feature delivers significantly enhanced audio fidelity to users of its 6753i, 6755i and 6757i IP phones. Subscribers using these telephones can now enjoy a more "in-person" conversation and richer calling experience as if all parties on a call were standing in the same room. While Voice over IP services have long been able to mimic the same voice quality as the traditional PSTN, 8x8's new HD voice service now greatly surpasses any audio capabilities of the legacy PSTN network. This new service allows all calls within a small business or distributed enterprise to benefit from the efficiencies accompanying in-person conversations, with easier to recognize voices, better understanding of accented speakers and greater voice clarity in the presence of background noise.

Traditional telephony is based on sampling the sound stream 8,000 times a second using 8-bit coding, constraining the reproduction of the sound spectrum to the range between 200Hz on the low end to 3.3KHz on the high end. In HD voice, a wideband codec doubles the sampling rate to 16,000 times a second using 14-bit coding and more than doubles the width of the sound spectrum reproduced, from 50Hz to 7KHz. This adds significant depth and nuance to the transmitted sound while not significantly increasing bandwidth utilization.

8x8's HD voice is a standard feature offered free of charge to all business subscribers. All new 8x8 subscribers after January 4, 2010 will automatically receive the HD voice service with their subscription. Existing IP phone subscribers can contact 8x8's customer service at 1-888-898-8733 to receive the upgraded HD voice service.

8x8 Vice President of Business Development Huw Rees will discuss the company's HD voice technology and strategy in greater detail during the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show HD Voice Summit being held on Wednesday, January 6 from 1 - 5:30 p.m. in Las Vegas.