"India Has the Greatest Opportunity for ITXC" Tom Evslin Chairman and CEO ITXC.

Recently,
ITXC has signed an agreement with VSNL to provide ILD services through Internet
and VoIP technology. VSNL will also have access to ITXC.net which has
relationships with hundreds of carriers around the world and VSNL will
benefit in terms of additional traffic and revenue from those carriers. On this
occasion, Pravin Prashant, senior assistant editor, Voice & Data spoke to
Tom Evslin, chairman and CEO, ITXC about VSNL relationship and the India
activities of the company.

ITXC has tied up with both VSNL as well as Data Access. What is the nature
of relationship between the two companies?

Recently, ITXC tied up with VSNL for traffic which is originating from India
whereas for Data Access it is for traffic originating outside India but is
terminating in India. The relationship with VSNL is for calls originating India
as VSNL management realizes that the market is competitive in nature and they
have to move beyond traditional relationship, which will help in high quality
service at a lower cost. In a competitive market place VSNL can think of
becoming more competitive now.

What would be the capacity of the network once it becomes commercial?

The details are not public but the traffic is going to match the capacity of
VSNL. Any increase in VSNL traffic will match ITXC capacity as due to technology
we can add traffic quickly. Presently, ITXC is already carrying a million
minutes of Data Access traffic coming from outside India.

When will VSNL route international traffic through ITXC?

Worldwide, it takes anywhere from one to two months for deploying IP
connectivity. We will put our equipment next to the switches of VSNL in the VSNL
facility and the traffic flows from the switch to our network and our switch
will in turn convert into IP and will travel to the destination network and will
be converted back into TDMA in the last mile.

Even, the lack of IP capacity will not be an obstacle in roll out of the
services as ITXC will convert the TDMA traffic into IP before transmitting and
vice versa in the terminating end.

What about India operations of ITXC?

India has the greatest opportunity for ITXC. We feel that India is already a
significant destination for ITXC as it is a significant source of traffic and it
will contribute 10 percent of our total traffic. The company is planning to have
a full time presence in India and has appointed Vinayak Rajanahally as country
sales manager (India).

The India strategy is to have strategic relationships with old and new
carriers as quickly as possible as it helps in lowering of prices and also
bringing the grey market back into the main stream. ITXC also helps in providing
good rates to Indian carriers as ITXC.net has agreements with 173 countries so
that they can provide good calling rates. Even international carriers can opt
for the best way to call India. The company is in active consultation with other
ILD carriers like Reliance and Bharti Telesonic. In India, the company is
planning to make investment in carrier relationship and equipment. The company
has already invested in equipment for Data Access and will do the same for VSNL.