Unified communication : Overcoming Challenges

Business, today, requires to navigate complex inter-company networks of
customers, colleagues and partners. The companies moving quickly to embrace
collaborative processes and tools, that allow their employees, customers and
partners to connect and interact anytime, anywhere, via any device have
continued to thrive.

Collaborative cultures enabled by unified communications (UC), business
video, and Web 2.0 have helped companies to gain advantage against their
competitors. Such companies have moved faster, capturing market inflections and
securing business advantage ahead of their competitors.

The year that was

The adoption level of UC was very low in 2008, despite the fact that having
a singular communication console can bring down communication costs and improve
productivity.

The technology faces certain challenges that impede its growth in India.
Costly IP phones, security issues, low awareness levels, regulatory
restrictions, low broadband penetration in India, and quality of services are
certain challenges that hinder its growth.

But, vendors are saying that the situation is changing this year.

“The enterprises are much more aware of UC than they were last year, and they
are better at making sure their deployments are planned in the context of a
broader UC strategy, even if they did not directly contribute to it.
Organizations are beginning to realize that they will be left behind if they
don't make a decision on UC now,” said Niranjan Limaye, Regional Director-West,
Enkay Technology.

However, the pioneer in UC, Cisco has different results. Minhaj Zia, National
Sales Manager-UC, Cisco, India & SAARC said, “The year 2008 has been a
phenomenal year for Cisco in selling UC solutions. Cisco's core business is
enabling an IP-based network platform. Because it is one company in this market
and IP enables the ability to converge data, voice, video and mobility, which
are the key components of UC. Cisco is well positioned to drive the UC platform
in the market over the next few years. Also Cisco is the leading supplier of IP
PBX solutions with a 28.2 percent marketshare (Q2, CY 2008, Frost & Sullivan).”

Present situation

Voice and visual communication is becoming a vital business tool that helps
companies deal with real-world challenges like increasing dispersed workforce,
rising fuel costs and globalization. There is an evident shift in the market
from video-conferencing systems to desktop applications which makes conferencing
more accessible and acceptable, not only at the global level but also at a
national scale including each and every enterprise.

According to forecasts by Frost & Sullivan on UC in India, the total market
size of UC was around $670 million in 2008, which is likely to grow to more than
$1 billion by 2010. Majority of this includes enterprise IP telephony (almost 50
percent) and applications like presence, mobility and conferencing and
collaboration are around 10 percent. The highest growth area is around these
applications which add maximum value to end users.

There has been a significant increase in the adoption of unified
collaboration solutions in the past few years across various verticals like
government, enterprise and medical health-care; and it is likely to grow in
India in the next few years.

Medium businesses will be generating a major portion of this spending accounting for nearly 59 percent of the total SMB networking expenditure

“Polycom has witnessed one of the fastest growths in India in the adoption of
our voice and visual communication solutions. With the increase of globalization
and considering the vast distance barrier, collaborative solutions have become
indispensable for organizations in India. The major advantage that these
solutions carry is the travel cost cutting,” pointed out Anshul Dhingra, Senior
Marketing Manager-India and SAARC, Polycom.

The drivers

Prominent factors that have instigated UC growth, include high availability
of bandwidth with reduced costs and availability of affordable VoIP solutions.
These are a great replacement for the traditional analogue system, besides,
reduction in the cost of communication and improved employee productivity with
UC solutions.

Vishal Singh, Country Manager, Tadiran Telecom said that the biggest
challenge in terms of implementation of UC lies in the reliability, security and
ease of maintenance of IP networks. The regulatory roadblocks haven't been
addressed properly. “Among other important hindrances is the lack of
availability of standard equipments across an enterprise, low awareness about
new technologies like presence and UC applications,” he pointed out.

According to AMI-Partners, SMBs are on track to spend $1.04 billion on
networking products and services this year, up by 11 percent over 2008. Medium
businesses (MBs or companies with 100 to 999 employees) will be generating a
major portion of this spending accounting for nearly 59 percent of the total SMB
networking expenditure. The growth in networking spending among small businesses
(SBs or companies with up to 99 employees) will be spearheaded by wireless
networking; this makes it clear that there is a huge market waiting out there to
be tapped and companies are focused on addressing it. SMBs are looking to IT, to
help them be more like enterprises by enabling them to access broader resources
and create effective communications on a global basis. At tough times like
these, IT can enhance both, a company's own revenue and reduce expenses.

To tap the opportunity, Cisco's leasing and financing arm-Cisco Capital
recently announced the launch of its Zero Percent Progress Payments program for
Cisco UC solutions in the Asia Pacific region, targeting especially to the SMB
segment.

SNAP INTERVIEW
QUESTIONS		Anshul Dhingra Senior Marketing Manager, India and SAARC, Polycom		Minhaj Zia National Sales Manager Unified Communications Cisco, India & SAARC		Vishal Singh Country Manager Tadiran Telecom
Having a singular communication console can bring down communication costs and improve productivity. Why then has the adoption of unified communication been slow?	Polycom has witnessed one of the fastest growths in India in the adoption of our voice and visual communication solutions. With the increase of globalization and considering the vast distance barrier, collaborative solutions have become indispensable for organizations in India		2008 has been a phenomenal year for Cisco in selling unified communications solutions. Organizations that move quickly to adopt collaborative cultures enabled by unified communications, business video, and Web 2.0 gain first mover advantages against their competitors		It was a fair assessment to state that at the end of the 2008, but I think in an industry that learns and adapts fast and more so in the current economic climate, I believe the astute IT as well as Business managers have moved beyond the buzzword and haziness to postulate the UC strategy for their organizations and also closely align it to their business imperatives
Is UC the playing ground only for big solution providers?	With the overall market showing signs of high growth, the development of channel partners is palpable along with the industry. Since Polycom is a completely channel-oriented company, the partners are bound to experience the growth and benefit from the overall development of the market		We are a channel-driven company and we rely heavily on our channel partners to help develop and penetrate enterprise and SMB markets globally and in India		Unified communications is being used by all segments be it SMB or large enterprises The drivers which have significantly contributed to the growth are reduction in the cost of communication and improved employee productivity with unified communications solutions

Zia revealed that Cisco Capital's Easy Lease program specifically addresses
the needs of the SMB market.

“It has been designed to respond to the fast paced environment that these
organizations operate in, delivering a simplified way to finance their
technology requirements. All technologies provided by Cisco can be leased with
the Easy Lease program. Payments can be broken down into monthly or quarterly
amounts,” he shared.

Channels and UC

In the extremely competitive market, vendors have realized the need for
partners to be constantly updated about new technologies and products introduced
in the market. They provide training at regular intervals and ensure that they
are well-equipped to handle any customer query.

Most of the channels partners act as mere box pushers, however, vendor these
days recommend solutions selling approach to UC. This means that the partner
organization, interfacing the customer, should understand the actual
requirements and build a solution that not only fits immediate requirements but
is also scalable and works on open standards. Partners need to be trusted
adviser's to customers.

Commenting on the role of channels in today ecosystem, Dhingra said “ The
expertise provided by the channel partners in various domains including SMB/SME
solutions, helps potential customers to get an in-depth understanding of the
technology and attain a customized solution to their specific requirements. The
channel structure that Polycom has acquired in India helps ensuring regional
assistance to all our end-customers for every requirement, eliminating the
possibility of any inconvenience that a customer could face due to faraway
operations.”

Cisco, on the other hand, has already a strong channel network with over
1,000 resellers in 100 cities. But still, the company plans to further add 600
new partners specifically certified to cater to SMB customers especially in
tier-2 and 3 markets.

Cisco's offering combines all crucial elements of Cisco solutions and
services, including intelligent services, growth technologies, strategic partner
assistance, and service and support.

These solutions are developed specifically for a particular market or
industry segment, making it easier for these organizations to deploy and manage
their networks to achieve maximum business value.

“Our partners help us in reaching out to businesses in smaller towns, and we
have a number of initiatives designed to assist them in their outreach.

To enhance the technological assistance that our channel partners can provide
customers across India, especially in high-tech solutions such as UC, Cisco's
focus currently is on building the advanced technology channel in India,”
concluded Zia.

Akhilesh Shukla

akhileshs@cybermedia.co.in