A September 2005 FCC report titled “Trends in the International Telecommunications Industry” provides significant insight into the progress of the Telecom industry since the 1950s, as well as how new technologies impacted the industry overall. For example, prior to 1960, the Telegraph industry dominated revenue shares of the Telecom market. After the 1960s, voice telephone service finally surpassed telegraph/telex service, and today the voice/telephone industry is the telephone industry.

 

Rise Of Telephone Industry

 

Just as the fledgling VoIP industry is called a “disruptive technology” by the telecom industry today, the transmission of voice signals over telephone wire was the disruptive technology of the 1940s and 1950s.

 

 

The graph above shows the historic rise of the telephone industry, and the dramatic fall of the telegraph industry. Additionally, as telephone technology became integrated into business and commerce, the use of voice communication technologies climbed dramatically. Once the telephone industry established a strong foothold in the 1980s, its use and proliferation throughout society rose astronomically as shown in the chart below, in reference to use of voice telephone technology in international communication.

 

 

Rise Of IP Telephony

 

Another factor described in the FCC report is regarding what percentage of international calls were billed in 2003 per country. In other words, the snapshot below provides useful insight into what percentage of voice communications are used by consumers in different countries. This information can be extremely useful to VoIP companies who are looking to establish a market share of international calls from the United States, and would like choose technologies and international relationships that provide the best return on investment.