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MARKET REPORT MARKET FOR IP TELEPHONY
Andy Brocklehurst: “Smaller businesses are rapidly becoming aware of what else they can run across their IP investment”
needs is always the key to long-term profitability for the channel.”
Sign of the times From its conversations with SMB customers, Avaya is seeing definite signs that the market is now recognising the benefits of IP. Increasingly its customers are choosing IP-ready devices over standard PBX systems. There are a number of reasons for this, but the main point that comes across is that small business customers are constantly aware of the pressures of having to compete with larger enterprises, with bigger budgets and a much larger customer base. “As such, they tell us that they need communications solutions that are cost-effective and allow them to be more flexible and responsive,” said Götz Tscharf, Director SMEC EMEA, Avaya.
“Another massive pull for the SMB market is that IP voice solutions are hugely flexible and don’t require a big upfront investment. Businesses can migrate to IP over a period of time or implement an all IP
solution from day one. The point is that businesses can easily scale up and evolve their communications as their business grows, beginning with a pure IP voice solution, for example, and then adding new applications as their organisation develops.”
VoIP will continue to play an important role in the future of telephony and the market for IP PBX systems is set to expand further. Evolving at a great rate, it is now in the mainstream phase of its development and doesn’t look like it’s going to stop, according to Tscharf. “Avaya foresees the future performance of VoIP naturally improving as technology matures and becomes more established and mainstream,” he said. “At the core, the quality of IP networking is improving and is now virtually ubiquitous. Additionally, IP extensions are now as easy to install as traditional digital or analog extensions.”
Avaya predicts that in the future the customer and end user will get much greater control over the
flow of communications, enabling businesses to increase the speed and efficiency of contact. “VoIP sits at the heart of this so it is difficult for businesses to avoid,” added Tscharf. “For small businesses looking to move away from traditional PBX systems, VoIP is not only the foundation for any communications environment but also the bridge to implementing a unified communications environment in which more and more small businesses are taking an interest. Therefore, the uptake of VoIP will be absolutely crucial to the development of next generation communications, and this will play a significant role in shaping the telecoms market.”
Owners of small to medium sized operations are beginning to see that new technology can help bridge the productivity gap, and that replacing an existing PBX will enable them to optimise existing resources. One of the biggest incentives for investing in an IP solution is that it can be tailored to a customer’s exact needs. End users don’t really care about the technology and what it does, they are more concerned with how it will solve their particular challenge, points out Marco Crueger, Director of Sales at Swyx. “This is why it is the reseller’s role to listen to what the customer needs and then build a solution that can address the issues,” he said.
Growing awareness “There is more awareness of pure IP and unified communications being available, but there is still a lot of propaganda in terms of what it actually delivers. It’s in the hands of
the reseller to identify how UC can help a particular business. It isn’t a one size fits all approach, which is part of the appeal of a software-based solution which can bend to the requirements of a customer. The value that a reseller brings to the table is advising a customer how UC can work for them and then assist in making it happen.”
Greater market choice is helping drive demand in the pure IP voice arena, says Paul Burn, Head of System Sales at distributor Nimans, however he believes that the percentage of the market taken up by pure IP is still relatively small, pointing out that some manufacturers are now bringing to market ‘hard’ versions of soft IP solutions to open up new reseller opportunities.
“They are offering a soft PBX in a box with a server to make it a lot easier for resellers to embrace this area of the market,” Burn said. “Data resellers are comfortable selling software-based solutions but it’s a different scenario in the voice arena. Voice resellers can seem more nervous due to concerns, rightly or wrongly, about network reliability. Most of their customers didn’t put their network infrastructure in place with the premise of adding voice.”
However, pure IP gives smaller organisations the same advantages as large players at an affordable price point. The benefits of driving down operational costs and increasing productivity are complemented with a swift and measurable RoI. “Smaller companies have similar needs and
requirements as larger companies,” commented Robert Hutton, Director of SME at Mitel.
“They want the ability to work from anywhere and stay connected to colleagues, suppliers and customers, whether it is on the road, at a client’s office or from home. By being always available, companies can deliver first time call resolution to customers providing them with an outstanding service, which of course is essential to attract and retain customers in today’s competitive marketplace.”
Ease of use In order to change the way people work, applications need to be simple to deploy and easy to use. Staff are too busy doing their day jobs to spend time working out how to access new features on a smart phone for example. Mitel’s Mobility solutions, such as Mitel Dynamic Extension, Mitel Unified Communicator and Mitel Teleworker, enable businesses of all sizes to change the way people think and work, resulting in increased efficiencies, productivity and improved business processes. Unified communications offers SMEs the ability to integrate with business applications and processes therefore making bespoke unified communications solutions easy to deploy.
“IP is no longer a new technology and businesses are aware of it,” added Hutton. “The industry is in the second wave of deployment where many organisations are looking to deploy their second IP PBX solution as the total cost of ownership is so compelling.”
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COMMS DEALER NOVEMBER 2010 91
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