LinuxWorld IP Telephony systems based on open source technology will eclipse revenues from Linux over the next two years, a leading open source guru predicted today.

Jon 'Maddog' Hall, president of Linux International, told delegates at the LinuxWorld conference in London today that open source VoIP technology, such as Asterisk, would take the market by storm. He said systems based on Asterisk would be up to ten times cheaper than proprietary IP PBX (softswitch) products from the likes of Cisco and 3Com.

Mick Balma, worldwide strategy and planning manager at HP, said that the use of open source technology on embedded systems, such as consumer devices and networking kit, was growing rapidly. Low costs and easy customisation are making the use of open source technologies such as Linux on embedded devices an attractive option for developers. ®

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