Net2Phone
Does anyone remember Net2Phone, which was offering Internet telephony - the PC to PC variety - long before VOIP became the flavor du jour? Well, the company is apparently alive and well with a new and improved strategy focused on providing VOIP services to cablecos.
Today, Net2Phone said its service has been expanded to more than 80% of the U.S. The Newark, N.J.-based company, which crumbled when the dot-com bubble burst, has also moved into Canada by providing local phone numbers in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, Vancouver and Hamilton.
I've always found Net2Phone interesting because it was such a hot investment commodity after the Internet moved into the mainstream. At the time, the idea that you could make free phone calls over the Web was revolutionary.
Net2Phone's problem, however, was that it was ahead of its time because the company was relying on consumers using dial-up connections at a time when high-speed access was in its infancy. If the company had been three or four years later out of the game, it could have been Vonage.
