Unifying a communications presence

Setting standards
The development of open standards and Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is well underway. 3D Networks' Luxford said many vendors had SIP offerings as well as proprietary solutions, but he saw more interoperability coming our way in the next six months as SIP continued to grow and partnerships bore fruit. Luxford said open standards will be the key for allowing users to connect and communicate on any device: IP phones, PDAs and PCs, and integrate with any software.

Alongside SIP, open standards being used include eXtensible Mark-up Language (XML), Voice eXtensible Mark-up Language (Voice XML), Service Oriented Architecture Protocol (SOAP), and Web Services Description Language (WSDL).

While companies have been using technologies such as conferencing, messaging and collaboration for some time, the integration piece has been missing. With an integrated UC environment, the network does the hard yards, searching and coordinating, speeding up the worker's response to critical situations and eliminating redundant work efforts due to limited staff collaboration.

Multi-vendor support was the all-important issue, Avaya Asia-Pacific senior product manager, unified communications and emerging technologies division, James Sia, said.

"Users want true collaboration. By adding voice onto the desktop, it makes the communication process much easier," he said.

"You can communicate when and where you want whether it be with voice into mobile or voice into desktop."

Poised for expansion
Mitel is another vendor making integration moves. It recently advanced integration between the Mitel 3300 IP Communications Platform (ICP) and Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging using SIP connection capabilities.

Managing director, Gwilym Funnell, said its embedded SIP integration eliminated the need for a separate SIP gateway when integrating a Mitel 3300 ICP system with an Exchange Server 2007. The solution also simplified support for multiple forms of UC including voice, email and fax.

"Mitel's latest solutions allow businesses to integrate directly with both Microsoft Live Communications Server and Exchange Server 2007, greatly simplifying the deployment of enterprise-grade Unifi ed Messaging" he said.

Mitel and Microsoft have collaborated to deliver UC solutions since 2004. Funnell said it had seen a 500 per cent increase in UC sales in the last six months. "The level of application integration into Microsoft LCS is immense. It's not just voice telephony, but, for example, contact centre, and unified messaging," he said.

While the driver for IP telephony was cheaper phone calls, Funnell said the reseller sales pitch for UC should focus on improving overall business communication. The market is going to get noisier. Over the coming year, Microsoft is bringing out a variety of UC solutions, including updated versions of its real-time collaboration technologies, Microsoft Offi ce Communications Server (OCS) 2007, Microsoft Office Communicator 2007, and Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007. It is also supporting a set of new communications devices from partners.

Gartner said software like OCS represented a revolution in the telephony infrastructure space. It signaled a move away from the traditional PBX and IP-PBX to a platform where voice traffic was handled completely in software and not on big, dedicated boxes.

Microsoft's Graetz said the latest developments in software would give partners new business opportunities, particularly in consulting and support.

"The new OCS, out in a couple of months, offers more around voice control and remote call," he said. "It blends the world of software with the traditional hardware infrastructure (and PBX), which is often managed by different parts of the organisation."

Graetz said it was an interesting time from a reseller's point of view. The software giant is working on building its partner base in this area.

System integrators already on-board include Dimension Data, AlphaWest and Data#3.

"There's an opportunity for partners to bridge the gaps and integrate the legacy PBX with the software," he said.

An applications flavour
Alcatel-Lucent unified communications manager, Dinesh Divakar, said the next step in UC was to link critical business applications.

He used a portal application for online orders as one example which allowed business to speed up the order process by getting access to the right people and info when needed.

The company's OmniTouch UC suite has four applications: MyPhone, which provides softphone capabilities for any device; My Messaging, which provides unifi ed messaging integration with email systems; My Assistant, which provide personal call routing; and MyTeamwork, which provides triple-play conferencing, IM and presence capabilities.

Divakar said the suite implemented the latest Internet technologies (XML/SOAP, SIP and VXML). These minimised capital expenditure by integrating communication functions with Web services in a simple and cost-effective way, while providing knowledge workers with a richer, more personalised communication environment within the context of their business.

In conjunction with four local partners, Alcatel has done close to 30 UC installations.

"We're ahead of the pack; we offer the whole solution set," Divakar said. "UC is bringing productivity into the forefront. Collaboration and conferencing are key market drivers."

And it's not just the larger fish in the sea that are interested. Divakar said SMBs were looking into UC, with unified messaging a top driver.

"SMBs lack a unified experience, so resellers can get their foot in the door and help them sort it all out," he said.

Express Data's Sutherland said CRM was a prime example of a desired link-up of communications and sales. The distributor recently struck an alliance with Microsoft to get the vendor's resellers working closely with Cisco's Unifi ed CRM Connector 3.0.

GlobalConnect managing director, Pushkar Taneja, agreed the next step in UC functionality was serving up integration with business applications. He was also seeing the combination of UC with speech automation and speech recognition.

IDC's Li said offering customised UC solutions was a hot opportunity for partners. The value-add comes in embedding the apps into their customer's daily communication tools, and understanding the unique needs of, for example, a retail or a warehouse environment. "Tailor the applications in select industries to meet business requirements, drive productivity, and meet an end-user's needs," she said.

Microsoft's Graetz said partners could write applications on top of the presence engines with offerings such as SAP and Oracle.

"The role of software is much greater, and the IP telephony market is set to take the next step," he said. "It's a disruptive evolution, not a revolution, and partners can help a company take the necessary steps in planning and coordinating a long-term UC roadmap."