Flowroute Survey Reveals Cloud Communications is on the Rise

The ability to communicate freely without having to worry about technology is the end goal of hardware and software developers, as well as service providers. This is easier said than done because of the disaggregated ecosystem in information and communication technologies. With so many vendors and technologies, bringing them all together is still a work in progress, but cloud communications has created an environment that is making this possible. And a new survey by Flowroute has revealed businesses are eager to adopt cloud communications because it delivers on many different points.

Flowroute conducted the nationwide survey with the participation of more than 1,000 business users on the adoption of cloud-based communications services, including voice, collaboration tools and messaging. It should be noted Flowroute provides cloud-based communications.

According to the survey, the decision to adopt cloud communications instead of traditional services was based on lower total cost of ownership, the ability to scale quickly and greater system resiliency by 38, 19 and 15 percent of the respondents respectively. The flexibility of the technology was also an important point, because it allows businesses to add, remove or scale up or down compared to on premises systems.

In addressing the frustration businesses are facing when it comes to their communications solutions, Dave Rich, vice president of product at Flowroute, said, “The reality is that businesses are fed up with being dependent on legacy telco carriers to deploy and manage their communications services. Cloud-based communications puts control directly into the hands of the developers and makes it easy and cost efficient to incorporate services into applications that improve both the customer experience and the company's bottom line.”

Control is an important factor in today's digital ecosystem, and cloud communications gives businesses the control they need to make changes based on market and consumer demand without having to deal with rigid legacy telco delivery systems. And as more forms of communications become available to businesses and their customers, cloud platforms will be more relevant. This was highlighted in the survey as collaboration tools with video, audio and Web conferencing, messaging and voice/cloud-based PBX will be priorities for the respondents in their cloud communications investment.

When it comes to vendors, the respondents still have the same problem as in previous ITC technologies, with more than half or 60 percent choosing several cloud communications service providers and 37 percent of those stating they are using more than five service providers. But as Flowroute points out, the market is not yet mature, which will present opportunities for businesses to consolidate their services with market leaders.

Cloud communications provides more options, and in the survey close to half of the respondents said they “had not even scratched the surface of what they can do.” With unified communications set to grow to more than $95 billion by 2023, businesses will be able to use the full potential of the technology to capitalize on this fast growing market. 

Edited by Alicia Young