Government Computer News is reporting that Cisco Systems CEO John Chambers is preparing to make an announcement tomorrow, the subject of which is likely to be the integration of Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) into all of the company’s future voice-over-IP products.

In fact, according to a pre-briefing we had last week, Cisco doesn’t acknowledge IP telephony as a standalone application anymore (although it acknowledges that VOIP may be the only one agencies focus on at first). The fact is, an IP-based dial tone it just one collaboration application. Therefore Cisco is rebranding a bunch of its products under a Unified Communications System umbrella.

SIP is an IETF standard that enables VoIP products to recognize point-of-presence, IP-based conferencing, and instant messaging capabilities already used by other VoIP components.

(Government Computer News)