Microsoft Kills Response Point IP-PBX

By Tom Keating, Chief Technology Officer and Executive Editor

Originally posted on VoIP & Gadgets Blog, here: http://blog.tmcnet.com/blog/tom-keating/microsoft/microsoft-kills-response-point-ip-pbx.asp.

Sources informed me a few months ago that Microsoft's (News - Alert) SMB IP-PBX called Response Point was in trouble. Then my Microsoft contacts Rex Backman and Richard Sprague, who were integral parts of the Response Point team were let go around May of this year which told me things were not looking good for the Response Point product. I really liked the Response Point product, though I did think it was a bit pricey when compared to other solutions. Still, it had a nice TCO since it was so easy to manage.

Sources have told me that Microsoft has indeed killed Response Point product. In addition to my complaints about pricing, I always thought that Microsoft should have taken their OCS 2007 product and offer it as a turnkey appliance. OCS 2007 is not an easy product to deploy into the enterprise, has complex licensing, various hardware servers required, needs Exchange integration for unified messaging, etc. -- but is a very feature-rich unified communications platform.

Thus, if Microsoft could offer a turn-key, or nearly turn-key OCS 2007 (2010?) appliance they could really take the SMB market by storm. They could offer it inexpensively by locking down various advanced features with a license key which can be later activated when the customer needs the features. For instance, they could start with basic PBX (News - Alert) functionality, but have software license keys for unified messaging, speech recognition dialing, video conferencing, audio conferencing (conference bridges), etc.


I'm sad to see Response Point go, but at the same time I'm hoping this means Microsoft will take the freed up resources to concentrate their efforts on making the future release of OCS 2007 a much easier install with less hardware requirements and a much lower TCO. One can only hope Microsoft listens and doesn't abandon the SMB telecom market entirely. We shall see...

Tags: ip-pbx, microsoft response point, ocs 2007, uc, unified messaging, voip Related tags: response point, point product, unified messaging, microsoft, response, point

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(source: http://news.tmcnet.com/news/-microsoft-kills-response-point-ip-pbx-/2009/07/10/4267942.htm)

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