This article originally appeared in the April 2011 issue of INTERNET TELEPHONY.

Businesses everywhere are working to achieve ever-higher levels of operational efficiency while at the same time keeping capital expenses at a minimum. While many of those organizations understand the productivity and cost benefits that a move to IP and unified communications could deliver, concerns about upfront costs and how such a change could impact opex can be significant roadblocks to moving ahead on such initiatives.

However, there is a solution that can enable your organization to overcome these barriers and advance on the communications front. It’s called XO Enterprise Cloud Communications.

This new offer from XO Communications (News - Alert) allows businesses of all sizes to enjoy a wide range of IP telephony features, including local and long-distance calling, enterprise-wide HD voice and video services, and more – and without the burden of buying and managing new phones, hardware or software. Instead, all required infrastructure is provided as part of the cloud-based service.

The network infrastructure that delivers all this IP communications capability is housed, managed and maintained by XO Communications. That means your business doesn’t have to deal with the headaches and human resources costs of managing all of this internally.

What’s more, businesses like yours needn’t be concerned about service costs. XO Enterprise Cloud Communications is sold based on a specified per-user pricing model.

“Our innovative, cloud-based enterprise IP communications platform will help businesses contain and reduce capital expenditures at a time when budgets are tight, while giving them the ability to introduce new productivity-enhancing communications capabilities that future-proof their networks and corresponding investments,” says Mike Toplisek, chief marketing officer for XO Business Services at XO Communications.

XO Enterprise Cloud Communications includes IP telephony and unified communications applications; free local and site-to-site calling within the enterprise; long-distance calling plans; enterprise-wide HD voice and HD video; MPLS IP-VPN network services; and business continuity capabilities. All of the above have attached to them robust service level agreements.

Also as part of the offering, businesses can select from IP phone sets from Cisco and Polycom (News - Alert). XO Enterprise Cloud Communications also includes access to a web portal to enable business customers to manage services for each of their locations and to do their own quality of service monitoring, if they so choose.

And it’s a tested and proven offer that addresses the needs of organizations of various sizes.

“XO Enterprise Cloud Communications represents the next evolution of our award-winning IP communications portfolio, which today supports 30,000 business customers and more than one million end users,” says Mike Toplisek. “This solution is ideal for mid-market businesses and larger enterprises with distributed operations by helping them solve important business issues of controlling costs, improving employee productivity and increasing their competitiveness in the market.”

Toplisek adds that businesses with multiple locations of varying sizes typically have a wide range of different telephony infrastructures that not only inhibit efficient and seamless communications but also the integration of telephony infrastructures with applications that enable unified communications. By delivering a single, cloud-based IP/UC communications solution across the enterprise, XO Enterprise Cloud Communications lowers organizations’ overhead costs while clearing the barriers that once stood in the way of truly seamless, whole-enterprise unified communications.

“XO Enterprise Cloud Communications solution can help distributed organizations save costs through a common architecture and enhance employee productivity through advanced communications and collaboration applications delivered across geographically dispersed locations,” adds Elka Popova, program director for unified communications & collaboration at independent research firm Frost & Sullivan (News - Alert).

The Benefits of XO Enterprise Cloud Communications

·         eliminates capital investments in PBX (News - Alert) infrastructure and reduces operational costs;

·         frees up valuable IT resources and capital for use on more strategic business priorities;

·         hands off upgrades and maintenance costs associated with in-house communications;

·         delivers new productivity-enhancing collaboration and communications tools;

·         provides business-grade HD call quality across the enterprise wide area network;

·         delivers advanced IP PBX functionality using the XO nationwide network;

·         leverages advanced technology from BroadSoft (News - Alert);

·         includes IP phones from Cisco and Polycom;

·         offers the ability to handle day-to-day administrative tasks, such as setting up and reconfiguring users, via an easy-to-use web portal.