Vonage Mobile iPhone and iPod apps built by Truphone
There were a few rumblings related to this in the comments on CNET’s coverage of the Vonage Mobile VoIP service back in October.
by davismitch October 5, 2009 7:18 PM PDT
Does anyone notice that this is the same GUI (on the website and for the iPhone app) as Truphone…did they buy the Truphone app and re brand it? And yes…why is this app okay but not Google Voice…come on Apple and AT&T, what gives!
Hmm, I think this might shed some light on things…
Here is a screenshot I took today while trying to sign into the Vonage iPod Touch app with my Vonage Mobile user info. The same credentials I used to create an account via the Vonage Mobile iPhone app. It’s also the same error I get with Truphone iPod app under the same circumstances, no surprise there.
I can’t find any details regarding the relationship between Vonage and Truphone. My guess is that Vonage did a private label deal with Truphone and this screen snuck by the QA/Testing group(s).
Are we ready for a 3G softphone?
It’s been a while since I spent any amount of time thinking about the endpoint world but some recent developments around mobile SIP clients and softphones have my attention once again. The question is, “Are we ready for a 3G softphone?”
With 3G comes plenty of bandwidth and powerful mobile devices. The likelihood that carriers will want to cannibalize their own revenue in order to deliver VoIP on the cheap and/or free is… low, to say the least. With that being said there are rumblings that this is in fact what they are planning.
We all know that Rogers is bringing the iPhone to Canada on a 3G network. The fact that there is now an SDK for iPhone will make it rather easy to create a SIP client for the iPhone. On its own, the iPhone does not have enough of a subscriber base to drive mass adoption of a mobile SIP softphone, but it will certainly help.
I know the boys at Counterpath (Congratulations Donovan!) have been busy with FMC and it would seem as though they would be the carrier’s choice for any mobile 3G SIP softphone solution. Although, It’s not clear if a mobile SIP SDK is just a component within their enterprise offering?
So, what other 3G mobile SIP softphone solutions are there out there and which would qualify as a valid choice for a carrier?
If we search for “mobile sip” we see Nokia leading the charge. Not surprising, Nokia has been the predominant player in embedded SIP clients for years now. They have a bit of a leg up there, owning the device doesn’t hurt, or does it? From a carrier’s perspective one would think that getting further into bed with the device vendor could be troublesome but I guess it could work the other way as well.
Something else that’s interesting is that Google’s Android does not have a SIP stack. Not surprising when you think of it. After all Google Talk is still very limited in it’s telephony abilities. One would expect that with the introduction of Android, this would change.
Truphone would likely be a good choice but they are not a softphone vendor, they are a service provider, plus they currently only support Nokia devices. Although I know they have a version working on iPhone already and it would not surprise me if they were working on something for RIM devices.
So who’s left?
Tru Zone Eliminates Roaming Charges
Accoring some news I was sent by Andy, 
customers will be able to call countries in its “Tru Zone” at the fabulously low rates of just USD0.06 per minute to landlines and USD0.30 per minute to mobiles from almost anywhere on the planet. More importantly, a Truphone-to-Truphone mobile call is always free, no matter where in the world the two parties may be travelling.
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Sounds great, now if I could only use it on my Blackberry!
WebRTC.is 