Successful companies are always on the lookout for ways to improve communications, save money and increase productivity, especially in uncertain economic times. One of the best ways to achieve all of these goals and more is to implement unified communications and collaboration solutions. These solutions have wide-ranging benefits, from keeping remote workers more closely tied into communication with colleagues and customers, to making interactions between and among geographically disparate offices more streamlined and productive.

But if these benefits are all realistic and achievable, then why aren’t more companies employing UC&C solutions?

Some decision makers are concerned about the large capital investment necessary to implement these solutions. Others might be nervous about the length of deployment time or the burden on already strained IT departments.

For those companies that are hesitant to deploy UC&C solutions should consider a hosted model. Hosted UC&C solutions offer the same functions as a premise-based approach but can be implemented rapidly and easily. Because hosted solutions operate on a pay per use (or month) model rather than a large up-front investment, the burden shifts from Capex to Opex and offers more predictable operating expenses.

Companies that are interested in learning more about hosted unified communications and collaboration solutions should attend a free webinar, co-sponsored by Sprint and Cisco (News - Alert). The webinar, “Hosted Unified Communications and Collaboration: Fulfilling the Promise,” will feature several prominent presenters, including: Zeus Kerravala (News - Alert) , principal analyst of ZK Research and an expert on tactical and long-term strategic business advice; Joseph M. Martin, Jr., direction of solution engineering at Sprint (News - Alert), whose team provides advances solution engineering sales support across all channels and segments; and Mike Velder, global sales manager, hosted collaboration solutions at Cisco, who is responsible for working with strategic Cisco Service Providers and System Integrators to bring value-added services to market.

For more information, or to register for the event, click here.

To find out more about SPRINT, visit the company at ITEXPO West 2012. To be held Oct. 2-5 at the Austin Convention Center in Austin, TX, ITEXPO (News - Alert) is the world’s largest technology and communications event. Visit SPRINT in booth #1119. For more information on ITEXPO West 2012, click here.