Unified Communications, told as it is, at last!
November 13, 2007
We’ve had communications Vendors telling us for months that;
- Voip is Unified Communications
- Unified Messaging is Unified Communications
- Sending an SMS from a database event is Unified Communications
All very irritating for everyone (ok, that would be me), but probably even more so from an analyst point of view.
The good news that someone sensible from the analyst community got involved, and Melanie Turek, tells it like it is. Bravo
The CURRENT guestimated market size is very interesting indeed, less than $10M.
I’m sure that’s about right given the (correct) definition
However, Vendors have all promised their investors that there is gold at the end of this rainbow. The land of Unified Communications will deliver prosperous and wonderous times.
So, how long will it take to get there?
VOIP (red) vs ‘Unified Communications’ Search trends (blue)
Having figuratively left Reading Town a few months ago, my guess is that we’re only up the road in Newbury, the natives look pretty similar, and the emperors new clothes are still only just getting worn in.
There is a broader point
Until we define things properly and without fluff and nonsense, then the interest in unified communications won’t hit the heights that vendors want to see.
(More diagrams after the jump for RSS readers)
I have seen what is possible, and (plug caution) Alcatel Lucent’s My Teamwork is a great example.
When EVERY telephone call is a potential multimedia, multiperson, recordable and auditable conversation, we’re getting somewhere. And browser based what’s more - so you don’t even all need to be ‘users’.
Unified Communications Search Trends - nothing much happening
But even less happening now in IP Telephony search trends
Is this corresponding rise in UC marketing (blue), coincident with with the drop in interest of IP Telephony (red)?
–
The only (very) minor contention for me in Melanie’s post is that -
“Voice, presence, chat and audio/video/web conferencing integrated in a single application“
Nitpicking it may be, but I don’t believe that a single application will be good enough on all fronts for quite some time.
A single Interface for the user - Yes.
A single Application - Not necessarily.
Vertical stripes work best in an enterprise, not horizontal ones, and this is because design detail is important. Whether a technology deployment is defined a success is often about what it can’t do. That’s today, but more importantly about tomorrow’s requirements as well.
Unified functionality in a single Client.
Polycom and Radvision MCU’s powering My Teamwork….for example.
But I digress. Thanks very much Melanie.
Comments
One Response to “Unified Communications, told as it is, at last!”
Got something to say?
nice point through to that report. the point I made over on Melanie’s blog is that “point solutions” in combination, may be addressing the UC market: at its core, UC has to provide to a market need, the need is various modes, in various contexts. It’s just been addressed differently. The lesson is that perhaps who is left into the UC camp might be shifting….