Is Unified Communications the way of the future?
Unified Communications (UC) are vastly becoming the most preferred set up for small and medium businesses telecommunication systems. Traditional on-premise PABX telephone systems have been in use in business since the early 1960’s. By the 1990’s the systems had become more flexible but although they have evolved over time to better provide for the needs of business, it was the introduction of VoIP that really impacted the market. That said; the way we talk about PABX hasn’t changed a lot in the last 5-10 years. It usually involves a discussion about hardware, services, a contract and a recurring payment theme.
The PABX market in Australia is worth about $AU400 million a year (and shrinking). Most of that market is made up of SME’s who are still stuck in a legacy voice comms and infrastructure world.
Businesses today have many choices when it comes to identifying and selecting the ideal communications solution. But many have not thought about making a move until now.
As an NBN provider, we are seeing first hand the migration of small and medium businesses to the NBN. This is acting as a demand driver for cloud-based unified communications (UC). UC will drive simplicity and innovation into small business customers and bring a solution to SME’s that big business customers have long been enjoying without the issues of capital outlay.
The Australian UC market forecast to pass $1 billion by 2021. This is a huge growth area and it is becoming increasingly important for service providers to support their customers as they move to the cloud. A found that more than half of all businesses are anticipated to adopt cloud based Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS) by 2020 – with small business leading way (55% small business expect to take up UCaaS by 2020)
UC solutions provide voice, instant messaging and presence, a soft client for PCs and desktop, virtual meeting rooms and voice and video conferencing. Fixed to mobile integration is core to the proposition where users can add landline numbers to mobiles, transfer calls between desk phones and mobile phones and have calls ring through to multiple devices simultaneously. Solutions also include functionality such as email access to voicemail and automated attendants to direct calls to different people or departments.
A UC Cloud-based PBX is a comprehensive phone system that can sit as an app on your mobile or tablet, with features like being able to get your voicemail and your email, to have all your phones ringing at the same time, really creating that large business perception for your customers as a small business.
SMB customers work all hours of the day or night, they want to maintain contact with their customers; they may or may not have an office. This gives SMBs a mobile office, should they want it; and if they do have an office, it gives them a way to leapfrog older technology in traditional on-premise PABXs and enter the market with a future-proof solution.
Is this is end of the traditional on-premise PABX? Certainly its days are numbered. If it’s time for you to upgrade, call Now Telecom today. Our Cloud UCX solution will deliver a big business solution for your small business and take you into the future today
