XO says minutes and lines no longer matter for telephony services. They have launched pricing for telecom services based solely on bandwidth. XO argues, rightfully so, that voice service is no different than any other application riding their IP backbone. Instead of charging customers on a per line and charging for traffic by the minute XO’s new XO IPfolio product suite will charge for bandwidth tiers, including 1.5 Mbps to 45 Mbps. Customers can then select the number of telephony lines they want, based on bandwidth capacity. The XO IPfolio includes the following products: XO IP Flex, XO SIP, XO One iPBX, XO MPLS IP-VPN. The new pricing paradigm simplifies an often complex pricing scheme for business class telephony services.
XO hopes this new effort creates some differentiation for them in the highly competitive small business and enterprise markets. The business sector is getting hyper competitive as a trifecta of incumbent carriers, CLECs, and now cable companies battle it out for this lucrative market segment. Going to a bandwidth pricing model makes a lot of sense, and probably represents a glimpse into the future for telecom billing.
