The Future Premise Network, Part 2

Last week, I level-set on what a typical Premise Network might look like today. Advanced networks, including mobile networks, are impacting the definition of the premise though and so this “typical” concept is evolving rapidly.  More and more people are connecting to the enterprise network via mobile devices, even on mobile devices the IT people wish they wouldn’t connect with.  But customer desire is overwhelming the IT people and these devices are coming to the enterprise networks, whether IT managers like it or not.  Additionally, fast IP networks enable applications to be hosted outside the premise, but serve the premise nonetheless.  In other words, cloud computing is having a huge impact on the enterprise or CPE network.  Advanced networks enable the premise to be expanded, and the definition becomes fuzzy, so it’s no longer “premise” per se, it’s more of your “corporate network.”  This is not really a new concept, since for years VPNs have been enabling the enterprise network to shift out to cover whatever is IP-connected.  But that was for data type of applications.  Now it’s happening for all the traditional enterprise communication applications.

Cloud is now entering the realm of telephony and is not just for CRM or for storage.  Analysis I’ve done of Infonetics data shows that PBX lines should be about 25% hosted/cloud by 2015, and UC applications should be a little under 10%.  In other words, this is happening, but it’s also still in the early stages.