ShoreTel gives Skype's enterprise plans a lift

ShoreTel, a big enterprise telephony player, has just given Skype's business plans a boost.

ShoreTel said Wednesday (statement, Skype blog, Techmeme) that it is interoperable with the beta version of Skype for SIP, which launched in March. SIP stands for Session Initiation Protocol, which is a standard for voice over Internet protocol used it corporate networks. Skype will now connect to corporate phone systems so you can Skype fixed line phones and mobiles from a traditional PBX system—your standard phone set-up.

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The problem: There weren't a lot of corporate phone systems connecting to Skype. Enter ShoreTel, which has 11,000 enterprise customers. ShoreTel customers can now register for Skype for SIP. Given the need to save dough don't be surprised if more than a few enterprises give Skype for SIP a spin.

ShoreTel customers can get inbound calls through their unified communication systems from Skype's 400 million registered users. ShoreTel users can also use Skype to get low rates on outbound calls.

Add it up and ShoreTel's plunge is likely to give Skype for SIP some momentum among potentially skeptical enterprise customers.