Vonage almost finished with workarounds
Internet telephone company Vonage has deployed two out of three workarounds that Verizon claims infringes on copyright Verizon holds.
Jeffery Citron, Vonage CEO, said in a conference call that the Voice over IP provider imployed on or about July 1. The two workarounds deal with Vonage customers while the third deals with wireless voice. Citron claimed the imployment of the workarounds were “transparent”.
For the last workaround Vonage consulted outside the company and made sure not to violate Verizon’s patents. The last workaround has not been deployed yet.
In 2006 Verizon sued Vonage, claiming that the VoIP provider infringed on seven patents. Five months ago the case was ruled in Verizon’s favor with a $58 million reward to Verizon. Vonage has filed an appeal, that is still pending.
In the conference call Citron did not want to divulge too many details on the workarouds, saying it would strengthen their appeal.
The case has hurt Vonage. This past quarter the company added only 57,000 compared to 166,000 during the same quarter last year. Vonage is the biggest independent Voice Over IP (VoIP) provider with 2.45 million phone lines in current service.