AT&T, RingCentral Launch POTS Enhancement Service

AT&T, RingCentral and DataRemote have teamed up to digitize legacy telephone lines.

AT&T unveiled AT&T Phone for Business-Advanced, which converts analog traffic from POTS lines into a VoIP managed facility voice network (MFVN). An appliance from DataRemote will help connect AT&T telephones, alarms, modems and other devices to RingCentral cloud features. As a result, businesses can pair security features, failover options and inexpensive maintenance with the historical reliability of POTS.

AT&T’s Rick Shaw

“Until now, traditional wireline phone service has been hard to beat for specialty data and voice lines. With AT&T Phone for Business-Advanced, we’ve found a way to modernize these lines to introduce customers to new cloud capabilities while maintaining the reliability and regulatory compliance that they require,” said Rich Shaw, vice president of voice and collaboration for AT&T Business.

Vendors in 2021 have strategized about ways to help their customers manage their POTS lines and move to an IP-based option. For example, Granite Telecommunications this summer purchased POTS replacement device manufacturer Epik. Windstream and BCN also announced services designed to offer POTS alternatives. Costs are rising, and support is decreasing for the technology, which dates back to Alexander Graham Bell’s 1876 patent.

Additional Details

The offering contains an internal battery backup that provides 12 hours of operation. In addition, the service includes 24/7 data monitoring and wireless LTE failover. Customers do not need to be using AT&T internet.

In addition, business can bring all of their lines into a single bill.

RingCentral’s Sandra Krief

“We are excited to launch a new offering with AT&T and DataRemote to the millions of customers with traditional phone services including specialty lines. RingCentral believes enterprises today are looking for trusted relationships and joint innovation to deliver the most seamless journey to the cloud across every use case,” said Sandra Krief, RingCentral’s vice president of service providers for the Americas.

AT&T has announced several partnerships around voice and unified communications in the last year. The company in June expanded its Cisco Webex Calling with AT&T offering. It added a wireless option to its RingCentral-powered collaboration solution in the spring. In addition, the company added a new SASE offering through a Fortinet partnership.

Check out the top partners in the AT&T Alliance Channel program.