According to the latest research report from Synergy Research Group, “Q4 2009 and YE 2009 EMEA and Western Europe market shares,” the though Enterprise Voice market, year over year, fell over 23 percent in Western Europe, however, the second half of 2009 showed solid improvement.

“The growth in Q4 2009 was more robust than any quarter since Q4 2007,” the research firm said.

Even within the challenging economic environment, some vendors fared better than others, navigating through increased competition and tightened customer spending.

The top three vendors gaining share in Western Europe included Alcatel-Lucent, Avaya (News - Alert), and Aastra.

The report also found that IP Telephony continues to be the fastest growing segment of the Enterprise Voice market, which includes IP-only and Converged IP/TDM PBX (News - Alert) phone systems and IP Phones.

In 2009, IPT represented nearly 70 percent of the total Telephony market, with the remainder comprised of the legacy markets of PBXs and KTS.

Market share gains in Western Europe in 2009 were difficult at best with those who gained or lost evenly split between 7 vendors gaining share and 7 vendors losing.

'In looking at the vendors in Western Europe, we see an extraordinary tight race for the #1 position. It could be argued that 3 vendors tied for second place in 2009,' said Jeremy Duke, principal analyst and founder, Synergy (News - Alert) Research Group.

'Nowhere else in the world do we measure such a close proximity and concentration of market shares,' Duke said.