UC-Unified Communications Apps Website & Newsletter

This effort is designed to inform, advise, evaluate and warn about Unified Communications Apps for iPhone/iPads, Windows, Android, developers, issues and editorial.

First, there will never be too many ads on this page. If you want to advertise your product, case, service, or other program, let me know.

Second, we encourage your own reviews of any length.  We won't edit except eliminate profanity and inappropriate language.  You can"RANT or RAV" as long it's in good taste.

Third, we don't have all the answers but willing to explore new editorial and content going forward.

Last, signup for the newsletter and pass it along it you like and tell us what you want more or less of.

Thomas Cross
Editor -  App Forum

(Sources - http://ucomapps.com/)

Aastra Mobile Client

The Aastra Mobile Client supports a wide range of mobile phones and smartphones popular with business users: Symbian OS S60 including Nokia, LG, and Samsung and BlackBerry RIM OS smartphones. The Aastra Mobile Client can easily be installed on mobile devices as an application via SMS or file download, using a straightforward activation imperceptible to the end user.  The Aastra Mobile Client further strengthens Aastra's comprehensive product portfolio which delivers mobility solutions (including DECT, SIP DECT, voice over WLAN and integrated Mobile Extension) to meet the needs of businesses of all sizes.   

Alcatel-Lucent IP Desktop Softphonet

 
The OmniTouch 8600 My Instant Communicator mobile edition delivers enterprise communication services to a wide range of single-mode (cellular) and dual-mode (cellular/WiFi) devices: RIM BlackBerry, Apple iPhone, Nokia Eseries, Microsoft Windows Mobile (Q3 2009) and Google Android.

Alcatel-Lucent OpenTouch 

The first iteration of OTC will support the Apple iPad, the most popular tablet device being used in enterprises today. The OTC will soon support multiple platforms including Windows and MacOS, Android, iOS, Blackberry, and Microsoft smartphones.

The intuitive "Face of Conversation" user interface provides effortless communication and collaboration with your community of favorites. Built-in presence and status information indicates reachability for you and your colleagues. Multi-media, whiteboard and document sharing resources can be easily folded into your conversation to enrich the communication experience. OpenTouch Conversation always puts you in control.

Cisco AnyConnect

 
Make the VPN experience easier and more secure with the enhanced remote access technology of Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client. This software builds on prior Cisco AnyConnect VPN Client offerings to improve the always-on VPN experience across more laptop and smartphone-based mobile devices, including laptops using Microsoft Windows 7. This client now universally supports IPv6.

 Cisco Global Internet Speed Test

 

Users can submit their test location enabling the global user community to learn the places with the fastest speeds and compare cellular and Wi-Fi speeds with iPhone, and Android users around the world.

User Speed Classifications

Web Grade (150Kbps - 449Kbps):
Your connection can support Web browsing, email, text messaging and other basic tasks.

Music Grade (450Kbps - 749Kbps):
Your connection is good enough for audio streaming or downloads and basic web browsing.

SD Video Grade (750Kbps - 1149 Kbps):
Your connection can support standard definition rich media content.

HD Video Grade (1150Kbps and Greater):
Your connection is strong enough to support high definition rich media content.

Google Voice

Google Voice gives you one number for all your phones -- a phone number that is tied to you, not to a device or a location. Use Google Voice to simplify the way you use phones, make using voicemail as easy as email, customize your callers' experience, and more.

Google Voice isn't a phone service, but it lets you manage all of your phones. Google Voice works with mobile phones, desk phones, work phones, and VoIP lines. There's nothing to download, upload, or install, and you don't have to make or take calls using a computer.

HD Phone

With Full Activation the app supports all the calling features you have on your desk phone, including: Short-code/extension dialing, Call transfer and attended/announce transfer, Call forwarding, Three-way conferencing, Call history, Speakerphone and mute options.  In addition to your desk phone features the app offers: Call recording, with playback option integrated in to call history, Multitasking background support for iOS4, Customisable ringtones from our selection or from your iTunes library, iPhone contacts integration and contacts search function. 

iCall

No gimmicks. No hidden fees. Just incredible audio and video quality - for free. The download and the service are completely free. All that stands between you, HD-quality video calls, and a host of free features and apps is the big green button.  iOS 4.1 or newer or Android 3 or higher is required to run iCall. An external headset with a microphone is required for second-generation iPod Touch devices.

Intelli IM

Intelli IM is a well-designed feature rich application that brings Mobility and Enterprise together. Intelli IM allows the end users to communicate with other enterprise users using Lync Server from their iPad. Intelli IM differs from other applications with some intelligent features like easy to use intuitive interface, Push Messaging, Time Zone, Location, Always ON, Smart Alerts, Programmable Status, Group Messaging and synchronization across iPad and iPhone.  

MobileMax

Mobile PBX / Business Features Business / Private calling, PBX features: Remote Office, Do not disturb, Call Forward, etc. VCC / Handover: Call Retrieve / Grab / Move, Mid Call PBX Menus - Conference calling, Call transfer etc. Mobile extension dialing, Corporate / Group Directory, Mobile UC: IM, Presence (XMPP & SIP),Telephony presence, Seamless Call Routing / Roaming solutions and Mobile VOIP softphone (WIFI, 3G/VoLTE), Click 2 call (seamless callback)

Polycom

 The RealPresence Mobile application is an easy-to-use video system that provides premium quality audio and visual experiences. Unlike proprietary applications, the RealPresence Mobile application is standards based and extends your organization's video network, giving you an engaging experience.

Qik

Capture life moments wherever they happen using your mobile phone.  Videos are instantly uploaded to the web for sharing or safe-keeping. Share videos privately with family and friends, automatically post to social networks, or broadcast to blogs and video sites. Stay connected even when you are on the go with 2-way live video chats.  

Vocalocity

If you're looking for an ultra-basic phone system with standard VoIP features, you'll be happy to know that each of Vocalocity's small business phone system lines come loaded with dozens of standard features. We also offer plenty of other advanced features at no extra charge, but if you're just looking for a phone system with a reliable dial tone and some business-class applications, we've got you covered.

Xavy

Lync users across the globe can now participate in IM, Audio, Video, and Collaboration sessions including Meetings on mobile devices of their choice. Xavy is a cross-platform mobile extension to Microsoft OCS R2 and Lync With Xavy, processes implemented via Lync and OCS can now be extended to smartphones and tablets. Xavy is primarily meant for on-premise usage by enterprise users. Xavy can connect from within or outside a corporate firewall.    

Uniquity

Andrexen Uniquity is a SIP mobility application available for IPhone, Ipad and Google Android.
Uniquity provides a business class service including 3way conferencing, all type of call transfers and a superior voice quality. Uniquity supports WiFi & 3G access when available.   

Tango

In fact, it's no longer accurate to call Tango a "video chat service" as we once did - it's now a social platform. The company has been slowly inching in this direction with the launch of video messaging and, more recently, text messaging. Today, it goes even further with the debut of photo-sharing features and its first in-app game, which Tango users can play together in real-time. 

Talkatone

Talkatone turns your iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad or Android into a true Internet phone. It uses any data connection, WiFi or 3G/4G. You'll be able to have high-quality phone calls even when cell phone reception is spotty and won't use up any of your minutes. Download Talkatone if you haven't yet and we'll show you the full power of your iOS or Android device.   

Skype

Talk to anyone else on Skype, anywhere in the world, for free with a Skype-to-Skype call. Catch up with your backpacking brother in Asia, check in with your boss away in the US - call any Skype contact for free   

MobileVOIP 

With MobileVOIP you can make cheap voip calls from your mobile phone. Make calls to any country you desire at the cheapest rates. MobileVOIP is currently supported on iPhones, Android phones BlackBerry, Windows Phones and Symbian phones. Simply download the free MobileVOIP app from your APP market and register with one of the supported Voip brands. 

Lync 

The Lync client for mobile phones and devices all require Office365/Lync Online account or on-premise Lync Server setup. Besides backend infrastructure updates and configuration settings*, users with Lync accounts must be enabled with the appropriate voice and mobility policy (where applicable).  

Line2

Stop carrying around two phones.  Keep your personal and professional lives separate on one phone, or turn an iPad or iPod into a phone. Get a dedicated line for your business

Pick a new number or transfer an existing number to add business-grade features to your mobile device.

IBM Sametime

IBM Sametime® software is a social communications offering that is the evolution of unified communications (UC), providing integrated voice, data and video. It can be integrated with applications your workforce uses every day for easy access to enterprise instant messaging, online meetings, telephony, video conferencing and more-wherever they are working  

Good Connect

 
Good Connect is an enterprise instant message (IM) and presence app that boosts communication and collaboration, protects corporate data, and respects employee privacy. Good Connect extends corporate IM platforms -like Microsoft Lync and OCS-to market-leading mobile devices without requiring a VPN, firewall holes, or servers in the DMZ. It delivers instant messaging, presence, and corporate directory lookup from an easy-to-use interface. 

goCall

 
goCall is a service that gives you low cost data calls over 3G or Wi-Fi via the goCall smart phone app. 

Avaya one-X

Users can access enterprise communications from a wide selection of mobile devices, including high-end smart phones and tablets. A choice of one-X Mobile clients is available for popular platforms including Apple iPhone, Google Android, RIM BlackBerry, and Nokia/Symbian.

Through integration with Avaya one-X® Client Enablement Services, one-X Mobile users have access to a broad range of Unified Communications capabilities such as visual voicemail, corporate directory, aggregated presence, VIP lists, and synchronized call logs and contacts. Avaya one-X Mobile gives users single number/single identity for both inbound and outbound calls, even when using personal devices.

Avaya Flare

Avaya Flare® Experience 1.0.0 for iPad app turns your iPad into a collaboration powerhouse. This fun and easy to use application extends the capabilities of your Avaya Aura Communications environment directly to your iPad. Stay connected to your enterprise while on the go with features that support audio, web based collaboration and more. 

AT&T Connect

AT&T Connect solves complicated problems with smart collaboration services. The opportunities are limitless. AT&T Connect provides the forum for communication that you have been waiting for with a range of meeting types, sizes, and business situations such as use a smartphone to join a weekly call while away from the office, collaborate with a team of subject matter experts while viewing and updating a document, real-time, engage industry analysts around the world with a highly interactive Q&A session as your meeting concludes, train sales reps on how to deliver a new customer presentation and capture and report information on attendees to provide sales leads.

What Is SIP Trunking?

Unified Communication - Improve Employee Delivery System.

Introduction.

Business communication technology is constantly evolving as employees seek better ways to reach co-workers and customers faster. For many enterprises, the next stage in this evolution is Unified Communications (UC), as it allows organizations to communicate and collaborate more efficiently, more accurately and in real-time regardless of location.

To bolster collaboration and communication of an increasingly distributed workforce, UC weaves together technologies such as Internet Protocol (IP)-PBX; voice over IP (VoIP); voice mail; Web, audio- and video-conferencing; presence; e-mail, unified messaging (UM) and instant messaging (IM); and various flavors of mobility.

Unified Communications is prone to market confusion as the term, at times, is misapplied by vendors and misused by analysts. The goal of this article is to offer a clearer understanding of UC essentials; the UC market; how to analyze your UC needs; and a how-to-buy guide that analyzes solution, cost and vendor considerations as well as suggesting a short list of solutions and vendors to suit your needs.

Unified Communications: The Top Reasons Why Businesses Buy?

1. Elimination of communications silos: Businesses recognize the need to integrate voice and telephony with other communications modes. The legacy approach of having silos for each mode — telephony, fax, email, video, etc. — is seen now as being costly and inefficient.
2. Lower cost of communications: UC consolidates the aforementioned modes, which is more cost effective than maintaining them separately. Many UC offerings also have a hosted component, reducing or eliminating the need for capital-intensive hardware, especially around the phone system.
3. Improved collaboration: Businesses see the possibilities for better collaboration among employees, as well as improved personal productivity, both of which can provide competitive advantage.
4. Simplified IT: IT is under increasing pressure to do more with less, and UC offers a way to do this, long with simplifying their operational needs.
5. Strategic Initiative: Businesses are at a point where leaders are thinking more strategically about communications, not just in terms of the investment level, but about what it can do to make the business perform better. UC is more than just an IT domain, as it speaks to making all employees more effective in their jobs as well as better team players.
6. Innovation: Businesses understand that IP and Web-based communications are rife with innovation, these new applications will benefit their business, and UC represents the best way to do it.

Your Needs

There are three major motivations for implementing in UC: to reduce costs, to improve collaboration and communications and/or to enable key business processes.

Cost Reduction :There are lots of ways to reduce costs with unified communications; heading the list are reduced travel, reduced administration/TCO, and improved productivity.

Reduced Travel: The justification for video conferencing has always been based on reducing travel, but video was only one mode and an expensive one at that. UC has the potential to democratize video and put a camera on every desktop at the office and/or at home. Combined with richer collaboration tools such as desktop-sharing, a lot more can be done than before. Factor in the increased costs and dramatically increased hassle factor of traveling and the business case becomes quite strong. The hassle factor is especially important. You can’t get through security at an airport in less than an hour anymore, and you can’t take a suitcase easily either.

Reduced Administration: This goes back to centralization enabled by VoIP, SIP, and broadband. This is the first time since the invention of the PBX that a branch office may not need a PBX anymore. Either simply place remote phones there and/or a gateway. These gateways have a come a long way and now companies such as Microsoft, Avaya, and Mitel offer survivable gateways that can fail over to local POTS lines should a WAN failure occur. Centralizing administration reduces costs in lots of ways — each branch PBX is expensive, requires administration, and requires peak circuits for peak capacity. The switch maintenance costs and circuit costs are recurring and add up.

Product Consideration

1. Network interoperability: There are a number of ways to develop UC solutions, and you want a minimum of compatibility problems to make it work. Investigate potential issues around how well the solution will interoperate with your existing phone system and network infrastructure.
2. Scalability: It is not safe to assume that all UC solutions scale equally, a consideration most relevant for larger enterprise.
3. Provider reach: Aside from being able to support a large number of sites, you need to know that a potential provider can serve all your locations. The more geographically dispersed your sites are, the more of challenge this could be.
4. Mobility: While demand for mobility is growing, you need to consider what types of devices/endpoints the solution will support, along with which specific vendors and operating systems. UC providers will have widely varying capabilities here, and if you are heavily invested in a particular mobile deployment, this could be a deal-maker or -breaker.
5. Pricing models: Pricing models can vary widely, as there are many variables that impact the overall expenditure. The key driver could be amortizing the hardware investment, bandwidth consumption, or the price of voice minutes. To avoid surprises, you must know your usage patterns, or work closely with the provider to craft a pricing plan that best reflects this.
6. Feature parity for telephony: The better you understand your current feature set, especially the ones you use most often, the better prepared you will be to evaluate UC offerings. Among telecom vendors, voice feature sets for UC will likely match what you have now, but other types of vendors probably will not.
7. Support for applications: App support is an important part of the evolving value proposition for UC. Capabilities here — not just to support applications, but also develop them — will vary widely. This holds for all types of solutions, even among those from telecom vendors.

Skype Ends Support For Open-Source Digium Asterisk VOIP PBX

Skype has terminated its partnership with Digium, effectively killing Skype for Asterisk, which integrated the VOIP service with the open-source telephony platform.

Two weeks after Microsoft said it would acquire Skype, the voice over IP company has begun cutting its ties with the open-source world. Asterisk was the first partner cut loose.

Skype decided not to renew its agreement with Digium, which allowed Asterisk, the open-source telephony system, to be integrated with the Skype service, Digium said May 25 in a letter to users. Digium is behind most of the work on Asterisk and sells commercial products based on the platform. Skype for Asterisk uses some proprietary code from Digium to connect the two products.

"It includes proprietary software from Skype that allows Asterisk to join the Skype network as a native client. Skype has decided not to renew the agreement that permits us to package this proprietary software,” according to Digium’s letter.

Skype for Asterisk sales and activations will end on July 26, but Skype has promised to continue supporting and maintaining the software for two more years. Skype may extend this time period “at their discretion.”

Many businesses and governments around the world rely on Asterisk for its free and flexible PBX to power their VOIP deployments. The integration with Skype gave access to low-cost voice and video calls without complex integration. After July 26, new Asterisk users will not be able to connect to the Skype network.

Skype may be moving away from Asterisk because Microsoft is expected to launch a Microsoft-hosted version of its Lync unified communications server this summer. Asterisk competes directly with Lync.

Digium may have seen this one coming, as the CEO predicted shortly after the $8.53 billion deal was announced on May 13 that Microsoft may “wall-off” Skype from competing products. Microsoft’s tendency toward “notoriously proprietary tactics” will slow the development of Skype as a business tool, Danny Windham, Digium’s CEO, wrote on the company blog.

“Microsoft plus Skype equals Microsoft,” Windham wrote.

While it may be easy to pin down Skype’s decision as yet another example of Microsoft trying to shut down the open-source community, Tim Panton, a Skype developer, pointed out on his blog that Skype for Asterisk has been dying slowly for a while because of issues with scalability and maintenance. Skype had “hobbled” the product with a number of license restrictions and the company delayed development, according to Panton.

“Skype probably never envisaged renewing, so when it came due, they pulled the plug,” Panton said.

“I do love a good conspiracy, and it would be great to pin this on Microsoft,” wrote Dave Michels, president of Verge1 Consulting, specializing in PBX strategies. However, Michels noted that it was unlikely Microsoft was calling the shots when the deal hadn’t even closed yet.

Michels also pointed out that while Asterisk is open source, Skype is not, so claiming Microsoft will ruin Skype because of its anti-open-source stance is “hypocritical jabberwocky.” Skype uses its own clients, its own codecs, its own signaling and its own firmware licensed to hardware partners. It does not interface with any other networks or equipment other than basic voice services. “If anything, Skype might teach MS a thing or two about being proprietary,” Michels said.

A Gartner analyst agreed that Skype’s decision had nothing to do with Microsoft. This is a sign Skype will open up its service to other telephony platforms via Skype Connect, Steve Blood, research vice president and agenda manager at Gartner, told eWEEK. While Skype for Asterisk was a bit deeper than what Skype Connect (formerly Skype for SIP) offers for other telephony platforms, it's a "stronger business proposition" for Skype to offer more customers Connect than to support a proprietary product for a specific vendor, according to Blood.

"I don't think Skype for Asterisk was compelling enough, nor did it generate enough money for Skype to continue to support it," Blood said.

Skype Connect currently works with telephony systems for Avaya, ShoreTel, and Cisco, among others. Digium will be validating Skype Connect next month, according to Blood, so Asterisk customers will continue to have some Skype support.

(Source - http://www.eweek.com)

Video conferencing bandwidth management and planning guide

by Dan Devine

Video conferencing enables members of an enterprise's distributed workforce to connect face-to-face no matter where they are, increasing flexibility and improving communication provided, of course, that your network can stand up to all that video conferencing bandwidth strain.

An individual video conferencing call requires a substantial amount of bandwidth; a high volume of calls can cause nightmares for network managers who haven't properly prepared for the flood. How can you ensure that your network is ready for business video conferencing bandwidth demands?

The news articles, columns and expert advice from the SearchUnifiedCommunications.com archives that are compiled in this video conferencing bandwidth learning guide will help you cover all your networking bases when implementing video conferencing solutions. From fundamental issues like calculating how much video conferencing bandwidth your setup will require to more nettlesome specifics like handling a desktop video conferencing deluge and delivering high-quality video conferencing to branch offices, we've got the expertise you need to keep your users connected and your network strong.

In this video conferencing bandwidth learning guide, learn about the importance of making sure your network can handle the bandwidth demands of an enterprise video conferencing implementation. Get tips on calculating video conferencing bandwidth, find out how to manage bandwidth without forsaking video conferencing quality and learn about the role that a Quality of Service (QoS) deployment can play in the process.

Check out the following articles, tips and videos for an in-depth look on these topics and more:

• Calculating video conferencing bandwidth requirements for enterprise deployments : The first step to a successful video conferencing setup? Determining just how much bandwidth you'll have to devote to supporting multiple high-quality video conferencing calls. We'll help you do the math.

• Understanding and controlling video conferencing bandwidth demand: After you've calculated how much video conferencing bandwidth your implementation will require, you've got to make sure supporting it won't adversely affect mission-critical applications. Leveraging QoS, network design and call admission control can give you the best of both worlds.

• Balancing video conferencing bandwidth demands with video quality needs: It's a simple rule of video conferencing: The higher the quality of experience you want to deliver, the more network bandwidth you'll need to support it. How good does the video need to be for your users? How much bandwidth will that demand? You've got questions; we've got answers.

• Video: How does video conferencing deployment affect the network as a whole?: After it's been deployed, video conferencing can quickly account for as much as half of total network bandwidth consumption. How can you manage that kind of load? In this video interview, NetForecast Principal John Bartlett and TechTarget's Sue Fogarty discuss the challenges network managers and architects face.

• Video conferencing over the WAN: A network design checklist: Proper configuration of the enterprise wide area network (WAN)—including making sure the enterprise WAN has enough bandwidth available to cover demand—is critical to ensuring high-quality video conferencing service delivery. This list of WAN video conferencing requirements will simplify your network design process.

• Keep desktop video conferencing from overloading the WAN with smart network planning: When you bring video conferencing to your users' desktops, you open the door to the prospect of many new video sessions being initiated at the same time, which could overload already-taxed WAN links. Learn how careful desktop video conferencing network planning and provisioning can spare your WAN an untimely demise.

• Video conferencing in branch offices over iVPNs: Bandwidth strategies: WAN optimizers and link aggregation could be valuable tools for enterprises looking to ensure bandwidth availability and performance stability when providing quality video conferencing to branch offices over an Internet VPN (iVPN) linked to the enterprise WAN.

• UC and video integration: Alleviating video conferencing bandwidth concerns: Concerns about bandwidth—namely, the need for a lot of it and the cost of procuring it—rank among the major factors limiting widespread deployment of video conferencing and other video technologies within UC setups. With our help, though, you can address those concerns and launch a successful UC/video integration project.

(Sources - http://searchunifiedcommunications.techtarget.com)

Sangoma Sponsors Asterisk Community Portal - First of Three Educational Online Community Portals is Launched

TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - 05/13/11) - Sangoma Technologies Corporation (TSX-V:STC - News) , a leading provider of hardware and software components that enable or enhance IP Communications Systems for both voice and data, today announced the launch of the first of a series of Global Online Communities on TMCnet. TMCnet is the world's most-read B2B website covering communications technology.

Recognizing the need to continue the education of decision-makers, influencers, developers and customers in the world of communications and technology, Sangoma has partnered with TMC to sponsor and update three Global Online Communities. The first of these, the Asterisk Global Online Community goes live today.

In the coming weeks, Sangoma and TMC will partner again on an IP PBX Global Online Community and an IP Telephony Global Online Community.

"We realized that while these three topics are all closely related, there are real distinctions in the decision making and implementation issues addressed by each of the technologies and markets that are addressed by these communities," said Jeff Dworkin, director of marketing for Sangoma. "They are all in states of rapid transition and we want to help as many companies as possible navigate these ongoing transitions."

The Asterisk Community will serve to introduce new players to Open Source Telephony and advance innovative developments around that technology.

The IP PBX Community will help those who are just now moving their Businesses and Enterprises from TDM-based technologies to an all IP-based infrastructure.

The IP Telephony Community will serve as a resource for Developers, SMBs, Enterprises and Carriers who are looking for the most innovate and up-to-date information and solutions in this space.

About Sangoma Technologies Corporation

Sangoma is a leading provider of hardware and software components that enable or en-hance IP Communications Systems for both telecom and datacom applications. Sango-ma's data boards, voice boards, gateways and connectivity software are used in leading PBX, IVR, contact center and data-communication applications worldwide. The product line in-cludes both hardware and software compo-nents that offer a comprehensive toolset for deploying cost-effective, powerful, and flex-ible communication solutions.

Founded in 1984, Sangoma Technologies Corporation is publicly traded on the TSX Venture Exchange (TSX-V:STC - News). Additional information on Sangoma can be found at: www.sangoma.com.

The TSX Venture Exchange does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

(Sources - http://finance.yahoo.com)

Top 5 trends in enterprise IP telephony

by Irwin Lazar

So you’ve completed your enterprise IP telephony implementation, your systems are running without incident, and every person you meet in the hall stops you to shake your hand for all that you have done to improve their lives. It’s time to kick back and relax, right? Not quite. New options and services present challenges and opportunities to improve collaboration and reduce costs. So what comes next after full-scale enterprise IP telephony deployment?

In our research and consulting interviews with IT architects, we see the rise of five distinct trends in enterprise IP telephony shaping communications going forward:

1. Unified communications: While often a confusing term, we define UC as the joining of various real-time communications applications into a suite of integrated collaboration services. For most, this means tying telephony together with instant messaging, conferencing, unified messaging and video—enabling users to see each other’s presence status and initiate any form of communications via a single application. Over 60% of companies have some UC implementation under way, often starting with IM-telephony-presence integration before moving on to additional applications.

3. Video: Is video the next voice? Perhaps. As quality improves, prices fall, and workers are increasingly distributed, we are seeing an increase in video conferencing adoption. Desktop video is now an inherent feature in most UC platforms, while vendors including Avaya, Cisco, Microsoft and Polycom enable integration of UC desktop apps with room and immersive telepresence systems. Video hasn’t quite emerged as a replacement for voice, but we do see desktop video conferencing growing, primarily to enable distributed workers to join room-based meetings.

4. Virtualization: In the last few years, VoIP vendors including Avaya, Cisco, Microsoft, Mitel and Siemens have ported their IP PBX software to virtual appliances or general purpose hypervisors, enabling their customers to take advantage of lower infrastructure and operating costs. Now some of those same vendors are working to support voice and video via virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). VDI raises some particular thorny challenges thanks to the need to localize voice/video encapsulation, but it also offers the potential to reduce capital and operational expenses at the desktop.

5. Mobility: One of the most frequent questions I get is, “can I get rid of my desktop phones?” Companies are actively looking at extending telephony and UC capabilities to mobile users across a range of smartphone and tablet devices. While the ab ility to eliminate the expensive desktop phone (and the required Ethernet infrastructure) is attractive, be aware that mobile voice services require careful attention to wireless LAN (WLAN) architecture. For those on public wireless services, voice quality still lags behind that of a hard phone. Still, we see growing use cases, especially for field workers, where simply provisioning an integrated mobile phone makes a great deal of sense.

Now is not the time to rest on your laurels. While the enterprise IP telephony market is indeed maturing, there are still significant opportunities to reduce costs, improve services and drive innovation in your organization.

(Source : http://searchunifiedcommunications.techtarget.com)

About the author:

Irwin Lazar is the vice president for communications and collaboration research at Nemertes Research, where he develops and manages research projects, develops cost models, conducts strategic seminars and advises clients. Irwin is responsible for benchmarking the adoption and use of emerging technologies in the enterprise in areas including VoIP, unified communications, video conferencing, social computing, collaboration and advanced network services.

Convergence Enterprise Communications. Information Technology (IT) and The Cloud

Over the last ten years, there has been a rapidly accelerating series of convergences in the communications world. The world of telephony has changed forever, from its roots in traditional Plain Old Telephone (POT) voice through an initial convergence with IP networks.

The TDM PBX was self-contained and comfortable – a separate network, proprietary hardware, proprietary devices, specialist communications personnel. The argument for moving to IP telephony has been focused towards reducing costs and offering new functionality by utilising data networks to carry voice traffic.

While it is true that rationalization of two separate networks into a single infrastructure has simplified the corporate network architecture, the reality has been the replacement of one set of proprietary appliances with another. Maintaining high quality voice calls over a shared data network has also provided an additional challenge. Communications application suites designed to enhance the user experience with IP telephony systems often have been no more sophisticated than similar applications used with TDM systems.

IP telephony has delivered on some of its promises but the overall benefits to the enterprise have been questionable. In many ways the status quo has been preserved, with ownership transferred from telecoms personnel to the data networking groups within the IT department. However it has transported telephony away from its isolated silo and connected it to the IT world, laying the foundation for subsequent rounds of convergence and further potential benefits to the enterprise.

The concept of ‘unified communications’ is compelling, the convergence of all methods of communicating between two or more people, from any application, using any device, at any location, via the most appropriate route, enabling effective collaboration with business-grade security.

But what does it really mean? Over the last few years there has been an avalanche of vendor product announcements, hijacking and redefining the term ‘unified communications’ to reflect the feature sets of their products. To make matters worse, there has been a singular lack of emphasis on the key message – explaining the real benefits of unified communications. Sadly, the concept has been diluted and hugely devalued in the process. Unified communications ‘products’ from different vendors often have little in common with each other, other than some degree of presence management and instant messaging.

As a reaction to this, some vendors are starting to rebrand their products as ‘collaboration’ rather than the somewhat out of favour ‘unified communications’.

At the same time, mobile devices have become smart. We have come a long way from the early mobile phones – dumb handsets with primitive features. Today’s generation of intelligent mobile devices are some of the most sophisticated technology items aimed at the individual and often a fashion accessory at the same time. Little wonder that some of these devices make traditional phones seem antiquated.

But the fixed and mobile worlds are now converging at a phenomenally fast speed, offering advantages to the increasingly flexible and mobile workforce of today. It is now perfectly feasible and becoming more commonplace to use a mobile phone instead of a desk phone. In some cases this is the result of simply replacing the enterprise PBX with mobile phones. However, more sophisticated variants allow seamless handover from mobile carrier networks to enterprise networks, using wireless LAN infrastructure or femtocell technology. These are focused at reducing call costs by moving communications traffic in one of two different directions: towards the enterprise communications system or alternatively towards the carrier network.

More recently, many IT vendors have become aware of the growing opportunity arising from the convergence of the IT and communications worlds. The opportunity is to integrate communications totally within IT systems. This disruptive yet exciting development heralds the dawn of a new age of communications.

The traditional approach from the communication vendor community has been to deploy user-facing applications to control functionality on the communications platform. The approach adopted by the IT community, primarily by software vendors, has been to develop some communications functionality within their applications. Often the two worlds have been connected by gateways or middleware to try and deliver a seamless experience.

As these have been enhanced, we are seeing the emergence of early communications-enabled applications, often the desktop applications commonly used by workers. But the underlying technologies are still not well integrated.

The melting pot of the converging IT and communications worlds is now becoming a noisy place. Unfortunately as the hype increases in volume, it is becoming more confusing for the enterprise to understand the real differences between the various approaches. Significantly, vendors from all sides are struggling to escape from the confines of their traditional products.

‘Communications-enabled business processes’ (CEBP) is being used by some to try and show that they are thinking out of the box. But scratch the surface a little and it becomes very clear that most vendors are unable to explain what this means. Businesses processes have always required communication and collaboration between people. CEBP suggests that this becomes more automated in some way. But where are the examples?

Ignoring the hype, this leaves us with a converged IT and communications zone that is very flat and uninspiring, in many ways two-dimensional.

In order to understand how to move beyond this dead zone, it is fundamentally important to consider communications as a part of the overall IT strategic plan of an organization.

Let’s look at one of the top issues for a CIO – virtualization. What is the primary driver here? In the current economic situation, reducing costs is not optional. It is mandatory. It is not just servers that can be virtualized, but also PCs, storage, applications. Virtualization allows costs to be reduced in many ways, reducing hardware investment, reducing power consumption, reducing management complexity – the list is a long one.

Some communications vendors have jumped on the server virtualization bandwagon but this is not innovative – it is an IT imperative driven by critical business needs. All communications activity needs to be capable of being virtualized, just like any other application. Communications servers and applications need to be virtualized, and capable of being deployed over thin client virtual desktops – the business benefit being not only to reduce costs but also to facilitate new, flexible working models.

Network bandwidth is increasing all the time. What we do today was unthinkable a couple of years ago, from both a technology and commercial perspective. Tomorrow’s networks will be even faster and cheaper.

Virtualization (which implies centralized IT architectures) and high speed networks are two fundamental components that take us to a tipping point in IT architectural terms. The enterprise and the worker become less interested in where their platforms and applications are being hosted. The concept of services from the cloud becomes reality. Centralized systems connected to remote locations using high-speed networks allow cloud services to be provided quickly. Centralization brings cost savings leading to new utility pricing and deployment models.