Digium Strikes a Deal With Japan’s NTT
NTT Software Corp. will develop its own version of Asterisk Business Edition for use in its ProgOffice PBX product
In the first of moves by Digium’s new executive management staff, the company has signed a licensing deal with Japanese Telco NTT. Under the terms of the deal, NTT Software Corp. will develop its own version of Asterisk Business Edition for use in its ProgOffice PBX product for Japanese small and medium-sized businesses. According to Jim Webster, Digium’s Director of Software Technologies the deal,
“…will help raise the knowledge and awareness of Asterisk in Japan in that Asterisk will now be seen as something that’s ready for mainstream use…”
It will be interesting to see how deals like this further shape the go to market strategy for Digium. This deal, on the surface is much more of an OEM type agreement than a channel agreement. I, for one, had always felt strongly that Digium’s only way to grow was through a formal channel of resellers and integrators who had the ability to sell a “canned” or appliance based device. With moves like this one with NTT, you have to wonder if Digium is also looking towards OEM licensing deals with major telco’s as another way to grow their business.
