Voicenet Solutions, a new managed voice over IP (VoIP) service provider, is looking for reseller partners as demand for this new telephony service soars.

The company was founded seven months ago by David Crombie, former sales director at Equiinet. According to Crombie, the company "shied away" from using the channel while the Aylesbury-based start-up proved to itself and customers that the concept worked.

Seven months later, however, Crombie said confidence in this market has been established and Voicenet is desperate to recruit channel partners to sell voice services.

The challenge, according to Crombie, is finding channel partners with sufficient knowledge in both voice and data fields. IT resellers could make a killing if they could make the adjustment to selling voice services, argued Crombie.

"People still think voice is a totally different discipline. It was, in the days of PBXs. But now the telephone service is just another LAN function. Any reseller that supplies LANs or networks could get involved," he said.

Voicenet currently partners with telcos and ISPs, such as InClarity and Easynet.

Alan Ryan, head of Easynet's channel, confirmed that he felt optimistic optimism about convergence opportunities.

"We're expecting VoIP to really hit the mainstream in 2005. The hardware's more economical then ever, the manufacturers are fully committed and the networks can offer the class of service that is needed."

crn@vnu.co.uk