CEBP Report: Unified Communications Market Will Reach $4.2 Billion in 2014

Earlier this fall, as Nortel and other major communications equipment manufacturers unveiled their most sophisticated unified communications products and services to date, the movement to merge IP telephony, voicemail, e-mail, conferencing and collaboration was well underway.

 

And as early as 2014, New York-based ABI Research’s (News - Alert) latest study, “Vertical Market Opportunities in Unified Communications,” reveals the UC market’s size will rise quickly to nearly $4.2 billion.

 

In the enterprise, UC is experiencing perhaps the steepest increase. 

 

“Companies have been buying only those component technologies that they think will deliver immediate value,” said ABI Research practice director Stan Schatt. “It’s only later that they start tying it all together as true unified communications.”

 

Schatt said that a company with UC capabilities has the ability to do messaging by voice and e-mail in multiple ways: Users can “see” voicemails and have e-mails read aloud. These are the kinds of synergies that deliver increased productivity and efficiency -- and greater customer satisfaction. 

 

ABI’s report comes just a few months as large communications houses, like Nortel (News - Alert), are unveiling UC-inspired product lines. At the heart of Nortel’s communications-enabled business products“Agile Communication Environment” software, or “ACE.” arm is a tool the Toronto-based company calls

 

The tool helps companies improve business agility, lower capital and operating expenses and yield higher productivity, according to Nortel.

 

“Our approach with customers is to give them the tools they need to understand how ACE applications can positively impact their business,” John Bednarek, the leader in alliances and business development for CEBP, told TMCnet. “We have an extensive set of ROI calculators that put customers in the driver’s seat and allow them to enter the business parameter that makes sense to them and to test those assumptions by changing the variables.”

 

It’s these same customers who will benefit most immediately from UC, according to ABI. However, because many vendors’ systems are not interoperable, there are still gaps where no standards exist.

 

ABI predicts that most vendors will transition to UC by attempting to integrate their offerings with the legacy components they find. That opens an opportunity in replacing older equipment.

 

“We foresee a booming market for managed services, simply because unified communications is tricky and many companies won’t want to spend the time and effort to do it themselves,” Schatt said. “That applies to the market as a whole, but particularly to smaller businesses.”