Startup offers unlimited, free domestic calls

Users plug in the so-called Hub — a white machine smaller than a macaroni-and-cheese box — to a broadband connection and primary phone. Ooma Scouts, which cost an additional $39 each, connect to every active phone extension — in the office, kitchen or kids’ rooms.

When you pick up the phone, you hear a melodic, digital dial tone. You place calls as you would normally and get voice mail by pushing a button on the Hub. You pay for international calls with a credit card online.

The technology hinges on a patent-pending call-routing algorithm called “distributed termination,” similar to peer-to-peer and distributed computing ideas.

Traditional phone switches connect a local-toll or long-distance call through the public switched telephone network — but ooma, which works with both cable and DSL, uses the Internet and P2P technology to connect the calls for free. Ooma’s architecture allows it to bypass fees that most telephone providers pay to connect calls to landlines and cell phones.

Ooma customers who maintain their landlines help enlarge the network by contributing their connections to a local calling area, allowing another ooma customer to use it to complete a call. Thanks to call-routing software, phone calls should not be affected if someone’s line is being used by someone else.

Frame said many customers would likely keep their landlines — if only because they want reliable 911 service. (Also, people who participate in the beta test must agree to keep their landlines.) If a user places a call through the landline without ooma, it would be subject to the regular charges.

But even if a great majority of customers ditch their local phone lines, Frame said, there’s plenty of unused bandwidth because so few people are at home during the day making phone calls.

Patrick Monaghan, analyst for research firm Yankee Group, praised the programming-intensive approach to telecommunications, usually characterized by billion-dollar infrastructure investments and huge companies such as AT&T Inc.

“Ooma is tapping into a category that is starving for a new solution,” Monaghan said.

Not a threat
EBay President and Chief Executive Meg Whitman, who oversaw the October 2005 acquisition of Skype for $2.1 billion, said ooma didn’t threaten Skype. The division’s second-quarter revenue was $90 million — 103 percent higher than the year-ago period. Skype members surged 94 percent in the past year.

But Whitman said she’s not surprised to have cross-town competition. Silicon Valley companies ranging from Mountain View-based startup Jajah Inc. to Cupertino-based Apple Inc. are engineering products that make established companies such as Verizon Communications Inc. and Motorola Inc. take notice.

“Startups by their very nature try to launch products and services that are better for consumers — better functionality at lower cost,” Whitman said, noting that eBay plans to aggressively invest in and expand Skype. “Like every startup, Skype needs our attention.”

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