CIOs Seek Next-Gen Unified Communications

The next phase of unified communications (UC) is emerging in the marketplace, and CIOs may want to put it on their wish lists for 2010.

Sometimes referred to as business process integration, UC was all the buzz before the financial breakdown of 2008 and 2009. Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT), Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ), IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM), Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO), Avaya Inc. , Nortel Networks Ltd. , Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE: ALU), and Siemens AG (NYSE: SI; Frankfurt: SIE) had some of the most robust offerings. Now that the economy is showing signs of life, the multi-technology combination of VoIP, conferencing, presence, instant messaging, email, and voice mail into a single platform and user experience is gaining momentum.

A September Aberdeen Group Inc. report claims that 79 percent of companies surveyed achieved a breakeven return on their UC investment within the first 12 months. Those companies using unified communications found they were improving customer relations, increasing collaboration between work groups, enhancing the effectiveness of a static or shrinking workforce, and improving compliance with government regulations.

But it's the next phase -- called Unified Communications, Collaboration and Contact Center or UC4 -- that has some companies really excited.

"With UC4 and contextualized communications, UC is already becoming a mature technology," said Kevin O'Callaghan, head of Alcatel Lucent in Ireland. "The Blackberry and iPhone are commonplace, and organizations can't afford to treat technologies in isolation -- they need to unify all communications processes across all devices, from the desktop to the mobile phone."

What's needed, say insiders like O'Callaghan, is an integration of an enterprise's business process software and job functions to make sure the technology matches employee roles and timeframes.

"We also see video becoming a key communications technology, fueled by the need for companies to reduce travel costs and make quicker internal decisions," O'Callaghan said. "High-definition (HD) video conferencing can now be achieved at the click of an icon on a user's desktop, giving employees instant video links with their colleagues."

Mobile devices certainly are a key enabler of UC's future. Aberdeen's report revealed that 94 percent incorporate laptops, 88 percent integrate smartphones, and 63 percent include tablet PCs in their UC strategies.

O'Callaghan estimates that more and more IT departments will act as internal service providers, complete with service-level agreements and security policies based on employee profiles rather than some type of blanket coverage.

Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) is one of those companies adopting next-gen UC strategies. In 2007, the telco was weighed down with $2 million worth of maintenance and upgrade costs every 18 to 24 months. After reviewing alternatives -- including a $19 million VoIP strategy that wouldn't break even for six years -- the company set forward on a software-based UC solution.

Joe Hamblin, manager of unified communications engineering for IT client services at Sprint, said the company leveraged its own Session Internet Protocol (SIP) trunking to better unify departments, collaboration efforts, and contact centers.

"My challenge is the same that all IT managers face, regardless of industry, Hamblin said."How can we drive cost out of the business?" And cost could be found everywhere from upgrading PBXs every two years to underutilized IT communications facilities. "We found that some of the space we had was under-utilized by 30 to 40 percent," he added.

Hamblin said he is currently managing about 66,000 device accounts, 4,500 of which are voice-enabled, and the number grows by 200 to 300 each week. The UC architecture put into place to meet Sprint's needs is fully redundant, scalable, and highly available, all of which are must-haves.

The company said it is on track to have 80 percent of its total UC project completed by December 2009. Once finished, the effort is expected to save the company $6 million per year in local carrier charges alone. They expect to save another $2 million every year and a half to two years by eliminating the need for PBX system upgrades and associated maintenance contracts. An additional $1.25 million in savings from reduced power consumption.

Whether finding cost savings or improving collaboration, it could be argued that even if budgets were constrained in the past, CIOs need to think and act now about UC technologies in order to deliver a service that meets all future demands.

— Michael Singer, Senior Editor, Internet Evolution. His focus includes executive issues... What's top of mind for CEOs, CIOs, and CTOs?