Advertisment

Unified Communications: Users Up In Arms

author-image
VoicenData Bureau
New Update

The unified communications wave has swept across several large

enterprises in the country. But CTOs/CIOs are still cagey about a number of

facts such as the extensive need for routers and issues related to

configuration. However, there is a sharp rise in the demand for unified

communications as enterprises are looking at thinning their spends in order to

enhance the bottom-line.

Advertisment

Billed as a mandatory item in enterprises' communication tools

set, the effective utilization of unified communications assists enterprises-both

large and medium scale-add value to an array of business processes. It also

substantially improves productivity and efficiency, and helps in gaining

tangible profits.

Has unified communications really simplified the issues faced by

enterprises? Has it offered what the enterprises had asked for? Let's explore.

Advertisment

Benefits Aplenty



Unified communications helps key people to become more efficient and
effective, regardless of where they are working, by providing universal access

to people and making enterprise communication tools accessible and more

transparent. Through unified communications, the users who could benefit the

most include highly mobile workers, those with frequent customer interaction and

those who need to collaborate with internal or external teams.

"Unified communications is at the heart of our solutions.

If I make a comparison between our expectations and actual realizations, I would

say we are happy with the solutions offered by vendors, though we are skeptical

about some issues," says Arindam Bose, head-IT, LG Electronics India.

LG Electronics, has a presence in consumer electronics, IT

products and GSM handsets businesses, and connects extensively with customers

and dealers. The number of customers and dealers is growing across the country

in a big way. LG has deployed unified communications and some of the benefits

the company has seen include assistance in conducting interviews systematically,

and reduction of complex issues such as those related to support, management,

billing. Financial benefits have been to the tune of 20-25%, and cost of

ownership has also reduced.

Advertisment

"It has not simplified

the communications. Users do not have faith in the systems and use them

only under very special circumstances"

-Alagu

Balaraman,
executive vice president (IT &

corporate development), Godfrey Phillips

Godfrey Phillips, the second largest player in the Indian

cigarette industry with an annual turnover of over $265 mn, had deployed a WAN

in 2003 and installed a VoIP telephone system and linked its video conferencing

system to it as well.

"Deployment of unified communications for contact centers

is not very large in number yet but there are centers with email/voice and chat

catering to our customers in the US/UK. HTMT as an organization uses unified

communications across multiple platforms and geographies to ensure online

availability of information to enable decisions to interface with our customers.

We have a strong backbone across our offices to ensure high availability and

achieve the desired results for providing information online at all times,"

says C Subramanya, vice president (technologies), HTMT, a leading BPO.

Advertisment

Some Concerns



Enterprises are up in arms as there is growing pressure on improving
performance. Concerns have overtaken advantages, while a few enterprises say the

simplification aspect is miles away.

According to Alagu Balaraman, executive vice president (IT &

corporate development), Godfrey Phillips, "There were issues of

availability and congestion, leading to breaks in the voice. At the same time,

telephony costs were rapidly dropping, while WAN costs were not. There was doubt

on the financial viability of adopting VoIP. Capital costs were high due to

regulatory restrictions on linking with the same EPABX units used for telephony.

As a result, VoIP usage dropped significantly. Video conferencing was much older

and there were issues of quality of images, complexity of operation and, also,

breaks in connections. Meetings were often disrupted due to technical problems

and fall back to conference calling was common."

Advertisment

"The cost of data

connectivity can be justified only if the call traffic is high between the

locations. This is particularly true in the current context, when the STD/ISD

charges on public switched network have come down drastically. It is now

simpler and cheaper to use PSTN"

-N

Chandrasekaran
, GM, IT, Ashok Leyland

"Users do not have faith in the systems and use them only

under very special circumstances," he adds.

According to N Chandrasekaran, general manager-IT, Ashok

Leyland, "As per the government regulations you can't have voice over

Internet. We have employed voice over our private networks using a separate PBX

dedicated for voice within our locations, without mixing it with the public

voice network."

Advertisment

Ashok Leyland has been facing challenges too with respect to

costs. The cost of data connectivity can be justified only if the call traffic

is high between the locations. In the current context when the STD / ISD charges

on PSTN have come down drastically, it's far cheaper to use the regular

phones. "The extensive need for hardware with regard to routers and

configuration needed to establish dialing when we use IP voice, drive the users

to resort to PSTN instead of IP phones," says Chandrasekaran.

Integration of various platforms and cultures across centers are

the main challenges faced by HTMT. Unified forms of reports across platform and

made seamlessly available across media is an ongoing task. "Implementation

for our customers as a contact center practice is yet to get initialized and we

are receiving queries from a few customers on such services. Going forward on

this could be a trend in the contact centers and we are in constant discussions

with our technology partners to address the new challenges," says HTMT's

C Subramanya.

Some of the major concerns include dependence on one vendor,

which may be a negative thing, as turnaround time is not up to the mark. The

last mile cost can go up because of remote locations. Companies are now opting

for opting wireless solutions for this. Issues such as security, reliability and

ease of maintenance are critical in the case of unified communications.

Advertisment

"Unified communications

is at the heart of our solutions. If I make a comparison between our

expectations and actual realizations, I would say we are happy with the

solutions offered by vendors, though we are skeptical about some

issues"

-Arindam Bose,

head-IT,



LG Electronics

What is Expected



Any new communication tool has to be simple and intuitive to operate. It
needs to be highly efficient and reliable. Since communication is exploding, it

needs to be cost effective as well. Finally, it needs to integrate with the rest

of the world and cannot be an isolated network. With the deep penetration of

mobile phones and dramatic lowering of costs in mobile telephony, fixed units

have lost favor.

"Any device coming in now must be capable of working with

GSM and VoIP. Otherwise, I believe users will not switch over to this usage;

email and mobile phones today are doing a very good job. Unless something brings

them together, it will lead to more clutter than use," says Balaraman.

The most desired situation is to have a system whereby we are

able to make a call to any phone whether it is an IP phone or PSTN from any

desktop or laptop. The system should facilitate audio/video conferencing and

instant messaging, according to Chandrasekaran.

HTMT finds implementation and integration across platforms and

the customer relationship management software a challenge across the centers as

the same would have to be synchronized at all times. "Internally, we also

intend to migrate to an ERP. The challenges of implementation with a single

platform and then migrating towards unified communications center would remain a

challenge. This implementation being a back office function for HTMT, achieving

return on investment is an ongoing issue," adds Subramanya.

Another challenge faced by HTMT is the management of the user

community across levels, he adds. "User training and flexibility

expectations from the user community will continue to exist. The user/management

requirements are prioritized based on the business needs and efforts are on in

the right direction with executive committee decisions to ensure timely

implementations. The implementation of unified communications for our customers

would bring along with it completely diversified task lists that would also

include some of the enterprise challenges and the customers interface to the

existing process and tools they currently possess. Knowledge base integration to

the unified agent continues to be an ongoing effort," he says.

Worldwide

corporate unified communications revenue will increase from $559 mn in

2006 to $1,158 mn in 2010

Source: Radicati group

According to Subramanya, in the current scenario, implementation

across enterprises and a template-based design with simplified data collection

points would ensure easy execution. The task of integration across business

verticals and solutions with openness in architecture to integrate with multiple

mediums of communication devices with industry standards would ensure

minimum/incremental investments on the new solutions. In this case, the standard

demand of user comfort for switching between devices across the enterprise,

which is a given requirement during IP-based implementations, will not be

compromised.

In a BPO, mobility across geographies and devices with common

user interface navigations for a contact center agent would offer greater

business benefits. The service providers would jump start providing such

solutions for their global customers that could also result in higher customer

satisfaction. Indian providers of these solutions should work with regulatory

bodies and ensure that the organizations/global service providers are removed

out of day-to-day challenges of integrating devices across centers. This is more

from a compliance perspective than from a technology functionality perspective.

A senior manager of a leading automobile enterprise sums it up

this way: "Simplification will happen when the regulations in the country

are relaxed and we get the right hardware and software from the vendors at rates

which are competitive and not opportunity based escalated costs as of now."

Global Market



Worldwide corporate unified communications revenue will increase from $559
mn in 2006, to $1,158 mn in 2010. The growth of the unified communications

market is driven by the need of employees to communicate more efficiently with

each other. There is also the desire to manage a number of communication devices

and applications in a cohesive manner, according to the Radicati Group.

"Implementation for our

customers as a contact center practice is yet to get initialized and we

are receiving queries from a few of the customers on such services. Going

forward, this could be a trend in the contact centers and we are on

constant discussions with our technology partners to address the new

challenges"

-C Subramanya,

VP-Technologies, HTMT

The potential for this market is phenomenal-with 18 mn

deployed on-premises unified communication mailboxes in 2006, this market is

slated to grow to around 47 mn deployed mailboxes by 2010. Geographically,

on-premises unified communication solutions have the highest number of

deployments in North America (47%), followed by Europe (37%), Radicati group

said in its report.

The potential in India is huge and hence global unified

communication vendors are looking at both large and medium enterprises with

their unique solutions. Certainly, the experience of some of the enterprises has

been positive. Now it is being time tested for contact centers for serving the

clients. This would also improve better utilization of resources, higher

customer satisfaction and ensure more personalized services for customers and

faster resolution with interconnection between multiple resources.

Becoming Intelligent



A recent IDC Asia Pacific survey revealed that more and more businesses
recognize that a lack of an effective, unified communications system is

detrimental to business performance. Almost two-thirds of managers surveyed

throughout the region admitted to missing an important business meeting,

customer enquiry or new business opportunity by not being able to call or email

someone. As industries get increasingly competitive and communications become a

key differentiating factor, more and more organizations are looking towards

intelligent communications to help transform their business. Intelligent

communications embeds communications applications into real-time business

operations, giving users access to hitherto unavailable personalized

capabilities. Its ability to offer a seamless user experience, allowing mobile

workers to work from anywhere and enhance customer service are key drivers and

benefits of the adoption.

Today's increasingly competitive global business environment

puts more pressure than ever on large enterprises, whether they cater to the

domestic market or overseas markets. In this connected, real-time world, the

productivity and efficiency of an enterprise depends on its ability to do

business with globally distributed customers, prospects, partners and employees.

There is still a hope of unified communications vendors being able to meet the

fresh needs of enterprises and solve their existing issues.

Baburajan K



baburajank@cybermedia.co.in

Advertisment