Bridging legacy infrastructure with modern connectivity solutions

How are service providers modernizing voice services, and what happens to critical systems still relying on copper lines? 

On this episode of Connected Nation, Jessica Denson talks with Ooma’s Michael Abenhaim about building flexible, cloud-based voice solutions, and how tools like AirDial are helping bridge the gap between legacy infrastructure and next-generation connectivity.

Related links:
Ooma's website
Michael Abenhaim's LinkedIn
Company on LinkedIn 

Transcript

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Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (00:07):

This is Connected Nation, an award-winning podcast focused on all things broadband. From closing the digital divide to improving your internet speeds, we talk technology topics that impact all of us, our families, and our neighborhoods.

(00:22):

On this episode of Connected Nation, we talk with leadership from UMA about the ways service providers are building and scaling modern voice services.

(00:32):

Plus, we talk about a new solution for replacing legacy copper-based lines that support critical systems. We cover everything from fiber, network innovation, and next-gen service delivery. I'm Jessica Denson and this is Connected Nation.

(00:50):

We are at Fiber Connect 2026 taking place in Orlando, Florida, May 17th through the 20th, and I am joined by Michael Abenheim, who is the vice president of sales for the 2600 Hertz business for OMA. Uh, welcome, Michael.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:04):

Thank you. Thank you.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (01:05):

Thank you very much. Thank you for joining us today. Um, let's, let's dive right in and get into your experience today. How has the conference been so far?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:13):

It's been great. Lot of new people, a lot of existing customers, and we had a great show. Thank

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (01:18):

You. Great show. And you guys had a booth down there?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:20):

We did.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (01:21):

Yeah. We

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:21):

Had a booth. A lot of people came to visit. We're excited to meet new customers, so I believe there's gonna be some potential great growth thanks to the show.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (01:29):

Any good swag at your booth then?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:31):

Uh, yeah. <laugh> We were giving out chargers.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (01:34):

Oh.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:34):

Uh, multi-unit chargers and some computer, you know, cleaners.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (01:38):

Oh, I miss that booth. I was only able to peek my head into the Xbo Hall so I didn't get to go over there. I'm gonna have to follow you down and get some chargers after this. <laugh>

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:46):

Sure. <laugh>

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (01:48):

Sure. Let's start from the beginning. Talk, talk about what OMA does and, um, uh, what makes the company unique?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (01:56):

Certainly. Um, uh, UMa has a division called, uh, 2600 Hertz, the one that I lead. Uh-huh.

(02:03):

And 2600 Hertz provides a cloud native communications platform. It allows businesses, businesses essentially to create their own telecom solutions. Uh, traditionally, you know, you get a black box and it's very complex to manage. But at the 2600 Hertz side, essentially we demystify that box and we typically provide up to like 300 APIs and we help the partners build and they will create bespoke offerings with these APIs. They can take the out of the box, uh, experience or they can take the APIs to build it out. Now, we're part of this Uma family and we can leverage the scale of Uma with the reliability of a major industry leader. It allows us to partner with even more, uh, you know, with more partners, uh, you know, because they have a significant amount of other solutions that they sell, um, such as Aerodial and Tello. Um, you're free to have when you use the 2600 Hertz, in essence, your own resources to build exactly what you need, uh, whether you decide to use your own in- house development teams or you want to use our own apps that are actually available.

(03:08):

Now what really makes us unique is most platforms are at Walgarden, but at 2600 Hertz, uh, we give you the tools to sort of create your, your own features and your own experience. Really a custom experience that you can have and offer, uh, and layer on whatever you want on top or integrate to other CRMs if you wanted to. Um, it's really up to you how you want that custom experience to look like for your end customers. Because we're an API centric, uh, design solution, it really gives the partners the ability to sort of use the tools and create solutions for like niche plays. Mm-hmm. Which is not common, you know, in this industry. Um, we'll give you the raw power, that's the idea, you know, the APIs to build, you know, you can brand it fully white labeled if you wanted to, you scale it in your own unique way and you don't have to be locked into exactly what the vendor's rigid model is or their roadmap, but because we offer sort of like an open ecosystem- mm-hmm.

(04:06):

... um, so you can use all the phone sets that you want. That is our unique sort of proposal.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (04:11):

And it's UMA, not OMA?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (04:12):

It's UMA, yeah.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (04:13):

Uma. Okay. Yeah. It's spelled O-O-M-A for our audience and I'll include it linked to the website in the description of this podcast. But, um, Uma has a product called AirDial- Yes. ... which is for replacing legacy copper-based lines. So talk about what that product does and I would imagine that replacing those copper lines can get expensive or is this a way to make that a little better?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (04:38):

This is a way to make it a little better. Uh-huh <affirmative>. So AirDial is a, um, it's a full-blown solution that essentially allows you to replace a copper line.

(04:49):

If that line has been deprecated and removed for, from a very large tier one service provider, you can use the AirDial product. It is an equipment that has a four ports and will let you, uh, um, offer, um, not only a wireless backup, uh, but at the same time, you know, have the ability to, for internet access to have internet access and as well, you can connect a, um, you know, a, uh, an RJ11 jack, which essentially is a typical copper line if it still existed. Mm-hmm. So the typical use case for this equipment, um, and solution is an elevator that essentially has no more copper fiber in that area and you will put it downstairs in the elevator, uh, in one of the, you know, casings and you'll use it to be able to ensure that the individual should, should they be stuck in an elevator, they can actually press the button-

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (05:44):

<laugh>

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (05:44):

... And, and get a call out through the multi-solution that, um, allows, uh, for you to communicate in some way or form. Uh, other so- you know, other use cases that are there are fire alarm panels or simply that, uh, you know, there's a fax solution that's required that's, you know, been removed and now you need to be able to replace, um, you know, replace the, the actual, uh, voice capability with the solution. Uh, we are very much, uh, in the space of replacing pots lines. Uh-huh <affirmative>. We have, uh, um, a number of customers across the US that, that, that do use this and great partners that are, uh, very much, uh, selling air dial, uh, nationwide.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (06:29):

And was that because you guys saw this problem that would, needed to be addressed that there's gonna be a shift coming or ...

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (06:36):

Yeah, the shift's been coming for a while and we noticed that and, and, and the team at whom essentially created, uh, this solution to address, um, you know, the removal of copper, uh, wiring, uh, nation, you know, nationwide from all the big, mostly the tier one operators. Mm-hmm. Um, I mean, you know, f- fiber is being installed everywhere, it's definitely a solution that can replace, um, you know, it can replace, at least for an interim stage, uh, the fiber from being there and, and sometimes it's, you know, you decide not to install the fiber in that area and you decide to have the solution because it's, you know, it's, it's cost competitive as well. Mm-hmm. Right?

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (07:14):

Mm-hmm. So, uh, for you guys, being at Fiber Connect, why was that important?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (07:19):

Well, we offer a voice platform, the 2600 Hertz platform. And many of the broadband providers and the fiber connectivity and the utility telcos and all these cooperatives are rolling out fiber and they have existing businesses where they're servicing consumers or residential customers and at the same time, businesses. Now, on way to have added value is to offer voice services to all of these customers and, uh, because we offer the voice platform, um, in, in a model that they can layer it on top of their fiber, uh, and it's very much over the top, you can very easily, uh, grab and grow your business by offering it to all of your customers, a part of them or, you know, as long as you have something that you can manage, uh, and you have the skillset to manage it. And we can train, right? We can train, we can help, we, uh, we do that with a number of customers, uh, and you can offer the voice services for calling meetings and a full-blown suite of collaboration, uh, you know, solution.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (08:28):

I would think also within the voice services, one of the n- needs would be accessibility for people, uh, you know, with disabilities or lack of sight or a need for a, a voice thing. Is that a piece of this or no?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (08:44):

Well, very often, um, if you don't have fiber in the area-

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (08:49):

Mm-hmm.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (08:50):

... well, you need a way to be able to try to get a voice service in somewhere form. If it's a copper and the copper has been removed, uh, you need to have a way. So you can use Oradel to be able to try to do that and that's one way. The second way is if there is fiber and internet access in some way, you need to have a voice service that can run over it. Uh-huh. Um, if there's no copper anymore and that voice service is a SIP service of some sort. If you have a platform as a service provider and you're offering it to the end customers, those end customers can easily get, you know, a toll free number, a phone number, run a business out of that area- mm-hmm. ... and, and very easily with our platform, uh, be able to, uh, allow them to, to get access essentially to the voice service that they would normally need.

(09:34):

Um, it's not something that, uh, it's not something that's immediate, especially in a rural area-

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (09:40):

Uh-huh.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (09:41):

... right? And that's where the challenges lie very often. Uh, when you have, uh, you know, when you have the fiber that's being rolled out by all these companies that are here at FiberConnect, um, definitely a great opportunity is to be able to layer on the voice and bring in these customers and sort of like have a joint offering there for voice and data-

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (09:59):

Mm-hmm.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (10:00):

... for them.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (10:00):

And in your role, talk about what your role is. Are you going into these areas or do you guide a team or how is it that your tac- you tackle your role as a VP of sales for 2,600 Hertz business?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (10:13):

Sure. Um, so, so my role, uh, in essence is to lead a sales and sales engineering team and, uh, into the market to be able to identify all of these potential partners that would like to work with us and build out these solutions. So we create the service with them, we deploy the services in their environment and their network and then we onboard them, we build a go- to-market offer with them and we support them whenever they need from a tier two and tier three perspective and we make sure that they are properly trained and, uh, we go in some customers, right? So we go and pitch it to their existing customers or the net new customers and see how they can offer the service. They can often offer the service on their network- mm-hmm. ... that's existing, or they can offer it over the top outside of their network depending if they want to do that.

(11:13):

So, um, that's one area of, of growth. The other things that we do is we very often integrate with partners that are CPAS players. They have CRMs or solutions that are specific and niche verticals, and we will integrate and be an OEM player under the hood. Uh-huh

(11:31):

<affirmative>. So we would integrate, they would bring in the voice capabilities that we offer and they would very much use those to be able to offer that solution that they have, that CRM, for example, in dental clinics and they would use the capability of, uh, voice that we have to offer, uh, calling, potentially meetings and messaging- mm-hmm. ... uh, to those customers and bring in that telecom spend, especially if, if, you know, if they decided to sort of buy a, uh, fiber connect, uh, broadband provider and then they can offer a three-way, right? Like the, their CRM, the, you know, the calling and voice solution as well as the, um, as well as their fiber, you know, data access, the internet access. So I mean, there's always ways. We have a lot of different players that partner with us and, uh, very often it is, or a CPAS player or it is a, um, a reseller or it's a service provider or one of these fiber broadband providers.

(12:26):

Got

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (12:26):

It. So Michael, what is the company really doing within the AI space? I, I know that you guys really launched some really great stuff recently, correct?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (12:35):

Correct. Yeah. Um, launched a, uh, suite of business in, with AI capabilities, uh, Uma AI. And in essence, it has, um, AI transcriptions, uh, an automated answering service and a twenty four seven AI receptionist for call routing and booking. And of course, uh, have advanced, uh, conversation insights that are offered. The key features, uh, of this AI suite are, uh, you know, to convert call recordings into searchable texts, uh, with concise summaries and actions typically like AI transcriptions also, um, an AI answering service that acts as an intelligent virtual agent to answer missed calls and capture details and of course reduce voicemails or abundant calls. And of course, we have two beta products there, the AI receptionist that's a twenty four seven virtual front desk that can intelligently route calls, bok appointments, of course, and send some SMS followups to, um, whoever's calling in. And, uh, we have also another beta insights, the AI insights to analyze the conversational trends, the call topics and customer sentiment, uh, to help businesses understand what their callers typically need.

(13:48):

And we also did an open AI integration. So it allows recorded calls to be processed natively, uh, using the ChatGPT, um, solution for deep dive conversation data and, you know, typical customer prompts.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (14:03):

So when was this recent? Was it, is it now available to your customers? Are you, what are you hearing from them?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (14:09):

Yeah, so it is available to our customers. Um, the included services are the AI transcriptions and the AI insights with no additional charge for now with the Uma Office Pro Plus and, um, AI answering service is, uh, available typically as an add-on, uh, to the licenses, uh, that you'd have. There's pricing already out there, uh, that we've put in the market similarly for the AI receptionist and our beta products, um, you know, will, will be available soon, of course. The customers are liking it, uh, you know, they're, you know, comparing us to all the other products that are out there, but it's very positive feedback that we've received so far and, uh, definitely lots of, uh, good feedback, um, that we're getting, uh, from our customers and they can't wait to have it on 2600 Hertz, which is underway. <laugh>

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (15:01):

And, uh, is there a, are, are you excited about what's next then, um, or is this just, is this first step you think moving forward?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (15:10):

This is definitely a first step and we are, uh, really excited about what's coming next, but I'm gonna leave that to be, uh, private and confidential until we now. <laugh> We are definitely working on some, uh, some new, uh, um, you know, new features and, uh, and of course, um, some, uh, some net new products with regards to AI and we'll announce those in time when they come.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (15:36):

Yeah, ex- it's an exciting time to see what happens next. So, um, uh, uh, you were warned, I was gona ask you a litle bit about yourself and your background. Sure. So talk about where, where your professional background is, where you come from and how you ended up at, um, Uma now.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (15:53):

Certainly. Um, well, I've, um, I'm a computer engineering background and an MBA. I've worked for over 25 years in the technology space early in my days was in the telecom world. So I worked for Telus for many, many years, for like 10 years and, uh, in Canada and, uh, in the last 10 years I would say I've worked for vendors, Cisco Systems, I was the head of Cisco Systems in the collaboration market in Canada selling, uh, Webex <laugh>, uh, among other solutions. I worked for Broadsoft prior to that before they got acquired by Cisco and, and also RingCentral, but, um, that brought me to Uma with a, you know, a lot of experience in the collaboration world and this, the software solution. Solumas, Uma's got a great, uh, culture, great company and very actively growing and the solution that they had not only offers a full stack with regards to voice, video and messaging, but it gave me the opportunity to go out and sort of like expand the portfolio.

(17:02):

What that means is you go out to these players that are developers, they're open source players- Uh-huh <affirmative>. ... and they want to be able to build their own custom experiences. It's very, it's very common that you hear from every single service provider, "How am I going to differentiate myself?"

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (17:19):

Yeah.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (17:19):

And the, the challenge is, well, you can't just tell them it's the logo. <laugh> You know? You can tell them, um, that was a, quite a bit of a difficult situation at, at, at, you know, other solution providers. At Uma, you can actually really do that Because of the APIs, you can differentiate yourself very significantly and create a full blown automation, a partial one, none whatsoever, you could do just the standard logos <laugh> if you wanted to, but that was very attractive to me from a career perspective. Mm-hmm. And I said the breadth of customers and partners that we can go after are very much, they're much more significant than what it was in past roles. So it would give me the ability to be able to scale more, grow more and, and, you know, bring in a great team and figure out how we could, uh, we could grow as a business overall.

(18:11):

And it's been fun. It's been great. It's, you know, almost, I guess, two years now and, um, you know, we've grown sizably and we continue to, uh, to be successful in this area.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (18:21):

Uh, I saw, I saw that they were, uh, your, your past company was down there too in the Expo Hall. Did you guys have like a, uh, sharks versus Jets fight? <laugh> Just kidding.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (18:33):

You mean Cisco? Yeah,

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (18:34):

Cisco.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (18:35):

Yeah. Um, yeah, they're great people also. I, I have great relationships with a lot of them, uh, still till today. Uh-huh. Uh, they have a great platform, but you know, to, to each their own. You are. They're very much integrated in, in, into the Cisco ecosystem with all their technical architectures that they have. It's very different. Uma is a, is a company that focuses on the collaboration solutions and meeting needs that, that, that need to be, um, you know, that need to be, uh, fixed, I'll call it in the market, like the podsline solution for, uh, for AirDial.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (19:10):

Is there a little more flexibility too with Uma?

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (19:13):

Oh yeah, absolutely. You know, smaller companies, I mean, you know, sys- Uma is a public company and, and they're quite sizeable, but there's much, you know, you know, compared to Cisco, they are certainly not their size. <laugh> Yeah. Uh, but it's great. You know, the team is growing, we've done recent acquisitions and, and, and it's fun. So Uma is a, uh, is a company that, you know, will bring you into an enjoyable culture and, uh, I could tell you one thing is, is you have the ability to be able to be more nimble when you are, uh, you are here than, uh, than what you would be in a very large player. It's normal.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (19:50):

Gotcha, totally. Yeah. So you, you alluded to it some, uh, that you were excited to come on board because you want to be able to do things for the future. So I'd love to wrap this with that. Where do you see things going for the future of UMa? Where, where, what's the big, next big thing? Are you guys looking for the horizon? Are there any, any little tidbits you can give me, some inside baseball maybe? <laugh> <laugh>

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (20:14):

Yeah. Um, we are very much, uh, focusing on AI and expanding our solution set on the collaboration side. You can always bring in additional partners that offer capabilities in marketplaces and you can integrate new solutions in the verticals and of course you can meet some needs, uh, for specific market segment that you don't today, like children as an example. Um, most definitely, uh, we are working towards, uh, growing, uh, our solutions in, in a number of these areas. I mean, at UMa, we have a hospitality space, have a number of integrations in other players, uh, like Clio in the legal space- Uh-huh. ... but we are working towards doing more and this is where we are heading, not only from an AI perspective, but of course from niche verticals so that we can grow as a business.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (21:07):

Well, that's exciting. As you do, as you reveal new things, I would love to do a follow-up podcast and talk about your new products and things that are coming out. It'd be awesome to sh- to share that with our audience.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (21:18):

Yeah, certainly. Yeah. Absolutely. It'd be a pleasure.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (21:20):

So Michael Abenheim. Yes. I got it right. Uh, Vice President of Sales for 2,600 Hertz business. Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

Michael Abenhaim, VP of Sales, 2600 Hertz, Ooma (21:28):

Thank you very much. It was a pleasure.

Jessica Denson, Podcast Host (21:30):

And I'm Jessica Denson and this is Connect to Nation. If you wanna know more about us, head to connectednation.org and you can find our latest episodes on your favorite podcast platform.