Wholesale: eYak 'eSees' Potential in Wholesale IP Platform

Posted: 12/2000

eYak 'eSees' Potential in Wholesale IP Platform
By Khali Henderson

eYak Inc. (www.eyak.com) announced the availability of its eSee Conferencing, the first enhanced service the wholesaler plans to offer over its new IP platform. CEO and founder David Friend says it will be built on unprecedented scale--100,000 ports--and offered at unprecedented price points.

eYak's John Boynton told PHONE+ that wholesale customers could realize margins of 200 percent to 300 percent reselling the eSee Conferencing service--on-demand, self-service conferencing with web-based document sharing.

In a retail market trial underway in Minnesota, eYak is charging consumers 15 cents per minute--a realistic price point for its wholesale customers, he says, to achieve the target margin range. The going rate for traditional circuit-switched conferencing services varies from 22 cents per minute to more than $1. The average price per minute is 40 cents to 50 cents, he says.

Boynton says the company is in negotiations with over a dozen carriers with expectations that deals will be closed by year end with two Bell companies, half a dozen CLECs and one or two VoIP providers. The company already has passed interoperability testing with Level 3 Communications Inc. (www.level3.com). The IP carrier is expected to offer eYak IP services, but no launch date has been set yet.

eSee comes in two flavors that Boynton designates, and "ASP" and "wholesale" delivery options. Under the ASP model, eYak provides the conferencing service as well as the transport, customer care and billing. Under the wholesale model, eYak provides bridging only. Bridging and transport are priced per minute while customer care and billing are offered for an additional monthly recurring charge.

The platform is private branded and can be up and running in 60 to 90 days. Boynton says eYak plans to remain a wholesale provider and has no plans to offer service in competition with its customers. It will not seek agents with the exception of Internet portals that want to add voice services.

The company plans to offer additional services over the IP platform, but declined to elaborate on what they might be. eYak is in beta testing, however, on a second offering called Buddy Yak, which voice enables instant messaging. The service is expected to be available this month.

Graphic: eYak