Ring 2 sets, controls conference calls from BlackBerries

U.K. provider Ring2 is now selling a voice conference-call service in the United States and trying to separate its offerings from competitors’ with software that lets customers control calls from their BlackBerries.

The way it works, when the first participant has called into the conference, the conference leader’s BlackBerry buzzes with a message that the first person has arrived. The caller then asks the leader if he wants to see who it is. If the leader clicks yes, the device shows the person’s name, and then adds names as other callers join. The leader can also add people via the Blackberry and mute lines.
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“This seems like a niche market, but it might be something that customers like,” says Kitty Weldon, an analyst with Current Analysis. The service would be best suited to companies that issue BlackBerries to their end users and for whom conferencing is a big part of doing business, she says. Ring2 says it hopes to attract law firms, financial institutions and consultants.

InterCall has similar remote conference control for BlackBerries, but other conference-call providers, such as AT&T, BT, Premier and Verizon, do not.

Ring2 claims only 30% of call leaders dial in from their own office where their computer is available, so the BlackBerry controller expands the locations from which they can exert control. The company claims customers use desktop control of conferences 2% of the time, but use of BlackBerry control is 60%.

The cost of Ring2 Conference Controller for BlackBerry is rolled into the standard fee for the provider’s conferencing service, which is typically eight to 16 cents per minute per caller on a conference. For a large enterprise with more use, that price can drop as low as three cents per minute.

When customers sign up for the service, they get controller clients from Ring2 that they distribute to their BlackBerry users via the corporate BlackBerry server. End users don’t have to do anything to install the software. Customers provide the BlackBerries.
Source:http://www.networkworld.com/