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Enterprise Unified Communication, VoIP & TDM Equipment 2010 (1Q10) forecast report

June 28, 2010

Infonetics Research released the 1Q10 results from its first quarter 2010 (1Q10) Enterprise Unified Communication, VoIP, and TDM Equipment forecast report. In it they point to how Cisco and Avaya battle for supremacy in enterprise telephony market with Avaya closing the gap with Cisco due to their Nortel acquisition. Could Avaya finally knock Cisco off their #1 IP-PBX perch?

Here's the news:

ANALYST NOTE
"We expected the acquisition of Nortel's enterprise assets to put Avaya in the clear lead for overall PBX equipment market share leadership, and while Avaya did receive a nice bump this quarter, softness in the acquired Nortel business combined with strong results by Cisco meant that Cisco and Avaya essentially tied for revenue market share, although Avaya is ahead in terms line shipments. This unfolding battle will be interesting to watch over the coming quarter, as both companies bring certain strengths and weaknesses to the table," notes Matthias Machowinski, directing analyst for enterprise voice and data at Infonetics Research.

1Q10 MARKET HIGHLIGHTS
- Cisco maintains its lead in the overall enterprise telephony market in 1Q10, but only by a hair over Avaya, which saw a 25% quarterly jump in PBX revenue after absorbing Nortel's enterprise solutions business
> Both vendors posted their strongest PBX revenue standings since the end of 2008
- Manufacturer revenue from PBX and KTS system equipment hit $2.0 billion in 1Q10, a 4% sequential dip
- Despite the quarterly decline, the enterprise telephony market continues to grow from the lows set in the first half of 2009, and is up 7% year-over-year from the first quarter of 2009
- The North American PBX equipment market posted the highest year-over-year (1Q09 to 1Q10) growth among all regions
- IP phones continue to recover from their 1Q09 low point, up 32% year-over-year to 3.9 million phones shipped in 1Q10
- Sales of unified communication (UC) applications are temporarily down due to expired promotions
> The UC market, led by Cisco and Avaya, is expected to resume growth in 2010

REPORT SYNOPSIS
Infonetics' quarterly Enterprise Unified Communication, VoIP, and TDM Equipment report provides worldwide and regional market size, market share, analysis, and forecasts through 2014 for the enterprise telephony market, including TDM PBX and KTS systems, hybrid and pure IP PBX systems, IP PBX by system size, VoIP gateways, unified communication applications (communicator, unified messaging), IP desk phones and IP soft phones.

















Unified Communications and VoIP Research Report for 2009/2010

April 1, 2010



New reports from Infonetics that I thought I'd share. They discuss how hosted VoIP services and unified communications will increase and they talk about capital expenditures on enterprise VoIP equipment. One point I'd like to highlight is they stated "Service provider revenue from residential/SOHO and business VoIP services increased 20% between 2008 and 2009, to $41.6 billion". Even in this prolonged recession, VoIP is still growing strong with no signs of slowing down!

Got Old VoIP Equipment? Check out this VoIP Buyback Program

December 15, 2009

Got some old VoIP phones lying around and want to upgrade to some newfandangled executive phone sporting a color LCD and video playback? Or how bout an upgrade to an HD IP phone? Well, VoIP Supply has your back with their buyback program. tomorrow they are launching their Reclaim VoIP equipment buyback program.

What Do You Do When Your Network Goes Down?

October 2, 2009

Aastra Launches HD VoIP Audio called Hi-Q & Takes on Polycom

September 3, 2009

At ITEXPO, Aastra announced G.722 wideband audio codec support (HD audio) in their new 67xxi firmware version 2.5.0 or later. It's available as a free download from Aastra with no strings attached. No need to upgrade your 67xxi (formerly 57XXi) phone to a newer model to get HD audio. I spoke with Aastra at ITEXPO about this free upgrade and got a demo as well.

SmartSIP Launches for OCS 2007 R2 Enabling Any SIP Phone & Any SIP Trunking Service Provider

March 4, 2009

OCS 2007 R2 won't replace your PBX just yet. However, their latest R2 version adds the ability to do direct SIP trunking, thus bypassing the need for an IP-PBX.

One drawback however is that Microsoft only supports direct SIP trunking with two providers, namely Global Crossing and Sprint. Well that's pretty lame, considering their are dozens of decent SIP trunking service providers and probably hundreds across the entire world.
Fortunately, Mike Stacy an OCS 2007 guru, over at Evangelyze Communications has some products that enhance OCS 2007 R2 functionality. One such product is SmartSIP which launches tomorrow.


John Chambers Blogs about Broadband Stimulus on GigaOM

March 4, 2009

Om Malik sent a note saying Cisco CEO John Chambers posted a guest blog entry so I went to check it out.

John begins:
Now that President Obama has signed the $787 billion economic stimulus package into law, the real hard work begins: using that money to create jobs. If spent wisely, this package has a chance at fundamentally reforming the U.S. health-care system, making our economy energy efficient and providing Americans with the training and skills required to succeed in a 21st century global marketplace.

But the country can't accomplish these goals unless it has the infrastructure to support them. That's why the funding for broadband was so vital.



SHSU Switches Back to Cisco CallManager from Asterisk

February 27, 2009

In 2006, I came across a Network World article, which espoused the fact that Sam Houston State University (SHSU) had switched from the Cisco CallManager IP-PBX to open source Asterisk. I wrote about this news since 6,000 students and faculty were moved off Cisco to the open source Asterisk IP-PBX, which was great news for the open source Asterisk community. This deployment demonstrated that Asterisk could scale and put to rest one of the main complaints against Asterisk.

Well, 3 years have passed, and according to this thread written by Jason Fuermann, who is responsible for SHSU's IP phone system, SHSU has switched back to Cisco from Asterisk. Say what?





Cisco TelePresence Video Conferencing Enables Fans to Interact with NBA Players

February 13, 2009

This weekend, the NBA and ESPN will utilize Cisco TelePresence technology to create an interactive "in-person" forum to allow athletes and fans to interact using Cisco's videoconferencing / telepresence technology.

According to Cisco, Cisco TelePresence has been deployed on the All-Star Jam Session floor allowing fans to interact "face-to-face" with NBA stars from the convention center's green room and backstage at the arena. On-site Cisco digital signage will provide All-Star programming content and live updates of the NBA Jam Session Trivia contest.

Additionally, ESPN will broadcast exclusive NBA All-Star Weekend reports on the network's popular news shows directly from the Cisco TelePresence system in Phoenix back to ESPN's studios in Bristol, Connecticut.

Here's the full details:

ESPN and NBA Bring Fans Closer to All-Star Game Action With Cisco TelePresence Technology

Cisco TelePresence Technology Will Be Used to Create an Interactive Experience Between Fans and NBA Players and Legends at NBA All-Star Weekend

NBA All-Star Weekend -- The National Basketball Association (NBA) and ESPN today announced that they will utilize Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) TelePresence(TM) technology to create an immersive "in-person" experience that will bring NBA players and legends closer to fans at the NBA All-Star Game in Phoenix this weekend.

Facts:
•    ESPN will broadcast exclusive NBA All-Star Weekend reports on the network's news and information shows, such as "SportsCenter," directly from the Cisco TelePresence system in Phoenix back to ESPN's studio in Bristol, Conn.
•    With the implementation of TelePresence in ESPN broadcast operations, the sports network will be able to deliver a higher level of interactive sports broadcasting for major events happening across the globe.
•    During NBA All-Star, Cisco will deploy two Cisco TelePresence units at the Phoenix Convention Center and one at U.S.
















Cisco Unified MeetingPlace 7.0 with WebEx integration Review

February 5, 2009

Here is a preview of the TMC Labs review of Cisco Unified MeetingPlace 7.0, which is scheduled to be published in the March issue of Internet Telephony Magazine. Enjoy!



Cisco Systems, Inc.
Web site: http://www.cisco.com

Pricing:
40 concurrent user licenses (750 users), audio conferencing, includes application server software and media server hardware for voice conferencing - $79,999 ($2000/concurrent user)

100 concurrent user licenses (2000 users), audio conferencing, includes application server software and media server hardware for voice conferencing - $127,999 ($1280/concurrent user)

In both sample pricing scenarios, it also includes 6 concurrent web and 6 concurrent video licenses (customer needs to purchase video blade to use video licenses)

Note: As seen by the two example prices the concurrent user price comes down quickly as the system size grows.
Additionally, the customer would also need to purchase a $12,000 Cisco Media Convergence Servers, which is a standard server running Linux

//////////////////////////////////
RATINGS (0-5)
Installation: 5
Documentation: Not tested
Features: 5
GUI: 5
Overall: A
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Unified communications is all the rage these days, especially when businesses are looking to optimize productivity and reduce costs. But what really is "unified communications"? You might be surprised at the different answers you'd get from various people.

























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