By Allan Maurer
MCLEAN, VA – When telecom veteran Stephen Canton, CEO and chair of VoPI company iCore, founded the company in 2001, he had to seed it himself because “No one had ever done this before,” he says of the hosted phone services model. “If you think it’s such a great idea, do with your own money,” one former partner who had made money with him previously told him.
He did, funding it himself for three years, developing the company’s technology through 2003 and winning its first customer in 2004. By 2006, iCore raised an oversubscribed A round of $6 million and in 2008 did a $2 million inside round.
This year the company also renegotiated its line of credit with Chevey Chase Bank. The company now has more than $20 million invested in the company and its infrastructure.
Voice Over Internet Protocol, VoIP for short, is the routing of voice conversations over the internet or any other IP-based network. VoIP allows users access to advanced features that take advantage of integrated voice and data network environments.
ICore is a managed networking and VoIP company that offers small and medium-sized business a managed, secure, hosted, end-to-end voice and data system that gives them the same capabilities enjoyed by Fortune 500 companies at a savings over their current voice and data providers.
Now celebrating its fifth anniversary, the 60-employee company has doubled its number of subscribers every year and now has 20,000 business customers.
Online consumer oriented VoIP, iCore sells voice over private internet—in which everything is secure on a dedicated circuit. Because the system and its applications are hosted, businesses do not need to install equipment and firewalls and so on at every location, Canton says.
It can be used with phones from any maker, but iCore sells Cisco equipment. “They’re the defacto leader and will continue to be,” says Canton. “They have a $7.5 billion a year in cashflow.”
Deciding to go with one equipment maker evolved from a story one of iCore’s investors told Canton while he and his engineers were testing a roomful of equipment from various manufacturers.
“He was the founder of Airbus USA and when he walks into a room, everyone stands up,” says Canton. He called during the equipment deliberations. “He said, ‘Did I ever tell you how Southwest Airlines got started? Its model is based on one key decision. They chose just one type of aircraft.’
That, explains Canton, means they don’t need to train mechanics on different airplanes, order parts for different airplanes or worry about supplies for different airplanes. “So we went with the Southwest Airlines model,” says Canton, “and chose Cisco.”
Because iCore’s voice Private Business eXchange (PBX) application is housed in a carrier grade dfacility, it eliminates the worries about system failures due to power outages. The company adds a further level of security by having fully redundant systems in case of an equipment failure.
The company says it can save more than 40 percent on monthly and annual communications costs and eliminates the need to buy an expensive in-house VoIP PBX.
Today cashflow positive iCore has more than $40 million in contracts with “Some of the best enterprise customers in the country,” says Canton. “We’re ringing up sales with a disruptive technology that works.”
Online: www.icore.com
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