Investment in unified communications (UC) among local organisations is low, as most businesses are still recovering from the economic downturn that affected them two years ago.
This is according to Mike Hamilton, managing executive, unified communications, at Gijima. Hamilton points out that in the wake of the recession, organisations are simply attempting to build patchworks of services just to meet demands.
“With the economic pressures over the past two years, UC slipped to the backburner, as it offers no clear ROI, and is only seen as a nice to have, but not critical,” he says. He notes that SA lags international UC standards, as most enterprises have multiple point services or solutions, and have not yet embraced an integrated unifying approach.
To find out about the trends in the local UC market, ITWeb, in partnership with Gijima, today unveiled the Unified Communications Survey.
According to Hamilton, due to the mediocre investments in UC, SA has slipped as a competitive player globally. “Our levels of productivity and returns per resource are low. There is a great opportunity to improve the agility and responsiveness of organisations by strategically focusing on exploiting the potential of UC,” he says.
He explains that effective communications and collaboration that facilitate more agile and effective decision-making and service response will go a long way to improve company competitiveness and enhance differentiation. “As more and more companies compete with the same products, same offerings and same price, the only real differentiator is service, and this is underpinned by UC,” he stresses.
Hamilton believes the majority of UC players locally are still struggling with respect to coverage, performance and costs associated with both fixed last mile and mobile data services. “It is still difficult for an enterprise to fully address UC requirements without the complexity of integration, and diverse and rapidly evolving offerings from multiple OEMs [original equipment manufacturers].”
However, he notes that these limitations will be overcome in the next year or two, as competitive pressure and regulatory focus mounts. “The Consumer Protection Act may also have a positive spin for users, as mobile providers are forced to allow the carrying over of unused data bundles.
“OEMs are consolidating offerings and acquiring missing elements to build an integrated solution set. Over the next year or two, we will see strategies being clarified by major OEMs, including Microsoft and Skype, Google etc.”
Click here to complete the survey.
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