Avaya Flare Launch Live Blog

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Avaya is launching a new interface called Flare. Rumors abound that the big deal here is it is a tablet. the reality is it is a UI which will run on tablets – including the one Avaya is launching today.

This is not designed to be an iPad killer but a Polycom killer instead as the tablet will lower the cost of executive telepresence drastically.

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Avaya CEO Steps onstage to talk about Avaya accomplishments and the importance of SIP.

“Apple revolutionized consumer apps – our assault to revolutionize how business workers communicate and collaborate”

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Here is the UI – just drag a contact to the center to connect with them. You can use Skype, Facebook, Twitter or the PBX – all under IT control. Avaya Aura is the backend UC platform – Flare is the UI – with full social networking integration and contextual communications – can see IM, video, e-mail and more – your entire history of of communications with all people in a conference can be seen in real time.

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You must have Avaya Aura 6.0 to make it all work.

There will be many SIP endpoints. There will be new room systems and a product line utilizing the Flare interface.

There is a quickstart kit to get up and running soon. Avaya is taking orders for the device now.

There is an integrated multimodal device – HD quality with half the bandwidth – a highly differentiated Flare experience – fun, compelling, productive and compelling.

Web.Alive will also be network based and hosted – configurable – integrates avatars and video.

High definition spatial quality – purchased from DiamondWare – years back – I have often praised the audio experience of of this technology.

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Here is the actual Avaya tablet
11.5 inch screen, 3 USB ports, WiFi and Ethernet, battery powered.

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This device was called Mojo while in development.

Here is a live demo – you just use your finger to drag and drop users into conferences. IMHO – this is so much simpler than what we all have to do with our phones and it even is a huge improvement over CTI-based screen interfaces on a Windows PC.

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TMC’s Paula Bernier covers the Avaya Flare story.

As Kevin Kennedy was leaving I got to speak with him for a moment and he was very proud as he told me, “People didn’t expect this from us.” he is right. I remain impressed and had a chance to play with the tablet for a few minutes. It was quite snappy and as fast as an iPad for sure. There are feet on the back which allow it to be help up a in a few positions for easy viewing and typing.

It is based on Android and does not support Flash yet but will when release 2.2 comes out.

Also the tablet itself is called the A175 and it has two speakers, two microphones, a video camera and a street price of $1,500-$2,000.

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Here is a shot with the on-screen keyboard

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Here is a shot comparing the Avaya tablet to the iPad which is on top

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After speaking with customers, they seem anxious to upgrade to Aura 6.0 and get these things into their organizations. The genius here is the “Kindle” concept – the device is just part of the strategy.

BTW – I hear Avaya “pushed Intel really hard” to help develop many of the components in this unit and moreover there have been many patents applied for. It is an impressive tablet – a bit thicker than the iPad though (and less dense) and I am now going to digest what I saw today as I head back on the train and give you more analysis.

One other point – it is 3G/4G ready and seems carrier-agnostic.

  • Christian von Reventlow
    September 16, 2010 at 6:03 pm

    Please check out the videos with the Avaya Flare user experience! I want to evolve Avaya Flare going forward. For that please let me know what you like and what you want to get added at: http://telecomdisruption.blogspot.com/
    Christian von Reventlow, Inventor of Avaya Flare, VP new Products at Avaya

  • Paul
    September 17, 2010 at 1:13 pm

    Wondering (out loud) if devices like this will have minimal impact even on telepresence … in favor of much less expensive devices (4G smartphones, like the EVO, for instance) that have many of the same capabilities and probably will be easier to use. About Me – http://bit.ly/c4BJLX

  • Christian von Reventlow
    September 26, 2010 at 9:10 am

    Great comment Paul!
    A great point i learned when creating Avaya Flare was: One can optimize the user experience for a purpose. And you get a much more fun and easier to use product when you do so. Thats why Avaya Flare has consistently rated 8.5+ out of 10 in wow factor and 9+ out of 10 in ease of use. As a consequence we found that executives and knowledge workers that collaborate get lots of value from the device.
    http://telecomdisruption.blogspot.com/
    Christian von Reventlow, Inventor of Avaya Flare, VP new Products at Avaya

  • Christian von Reventlow
    September 26, 2010 at 9:12 am

    Making collaboration easy & fun will make Avaya Flare succesful. However to your point Telepresence and its expanded form which i call contextual collaboration will find its way to other devices as well. Consumerization of IT is a major driver for that. My take: Going forward many of the concepts of Avaya Flare will find its way into software solutions for other plattforms. That is what i am currently pushing and i am looking for partners to work that with.
    let me know what you think: http://telecomdisruption.blogspot.com/
    Christian von Reventlow, Inventor of Avaya Flare, VP new Products at Avaya

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