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viernes, 8 de noviembre de 2013

La Eternidad es Demasiado Corta


La Eternidad es demasiado corta: Una rápida y convincente introducción que muestra los beneficios empresariales de trabajar con Avaya y Operaciones Integradas, S.A. de C.v. implementando una solución de colaboración móvil

http://www.youtube.com/v/IZWBS5JKc3U?version=3&autohide=1&feature=share&autoplay=1&autohide=1&attribution_tag=muQqxyvJgcuEvkl-lCno2A&showinfo=1

miércoles, 24 de julio de 2013

ACCEDA A LA INFORMACIÓN MÁS RÁPIDO, REÚNA A LAS PERSONAS MÁS FÁCILMENTE, TOME DECISIONES DE FORMA MÁS RÁPIDA... COMUNÍQUESE A TRAVÉS DE DIFERENTES DISPOSITIVOS.




No hace mucho tiempo, escuchamos acerca de cómo mejoraría el mundo, cómo funcionarían mejor nuestros negocios, cómo trabajaríamos de manera más eficiente, si tan solo pudiéramos liberar toda la información contenida del mundo y hacerla disponible. Si todo mundo tuviera toda la información que necesita, la promesa indica cómo nuestra vida sería mucho mejor.

Algunos elementos de dicha promesa ya se han llevado a cabo. La era de la información ha abierto nuevas posibilidades. Pero también ha generado todo un conjunto de nuevos desafíos.


La restricción en los negocios ya no es el acceso a al información: es la habilidad para conectar entre si a las personas adecuadas, con la información adecuada, en el momento adecuado, para tomar decisiones de manera más rápida e inteligente, en tiempo real. La verdadera colaboración es el elemento faltante necesario para atravesar la sobrecarga de información y así ofrecer un verdadero progreso en los negocios. Habilitar una colaboración eficaz es la diferencia entre un negocio que prospera, y uno que se estanca.


Hoy, tenemos la tecnología y la innovación adecuada, en el momento cuando más se necesitan.





miércoles, 19 de junio de 2013

VIDEO COMUNICACION


La comunicación por vídeo facilita el establecimiento de relaciones entre culturas distintas. Por ejemplo, entre personas procedentes de China, Japón u Oriente Próximo, con las de Alemania, Suecia y Dinamarca. En el primer caso las jerarquías son mucho más rígidas y eso se deja ver en las relaciones comerciales, mientras que en el segundo, los países se caracterizan por su enfoque de las "distancias cortas", de forma que los compañeros suelen relacionarse entre sí como iguales, con independencia de sus cargos formales. Cuando personas de culturas de distancias cortas interactúan con las de culturas en la que la jerarquía es mucho más rígida el vídeo puede ofrecer unos signos no verbales de respeto que aminoran los efectos de esas diferencias.

"Los factores que contribuyen al éxito durante las comunicaciones por vídeo tienen que ver con los individuos y sus mentalidades, con la forma en que los equipos son dirigidos por sus responsables, y con el modo en que la empresa puede crear una mentalidad que respalde estos aspectos", indica Stuart Duff, director de desarrollo en Pearn Kandola. "Hemos observado el valor de las pistas visuales en reuniones fructíferas, y las tecnologías de vídeo que las amplían al máximo, como la telepresencia, son ideales para mantener unas excelentes relaciones. No obstante, las personas que llegan a las reuniones con una actitud positiva, los jefes que comprenden y apoyan las diferentes personalidades y culturas de sus equipos, y las empresas que proporcionan los recursos y la capacitación para convertir las comunicaciones por vídeo en algo normal, son también elementos esenciales para conseguir la máxima eficacia en las reuniones con vídeo".

Al final las “redes visuales” pueden ayudar a las empresas a llevar la productividad a un nuevo nivel.




viernes, 7 de junio de 2013

TENGA CONSIGO SUS PROPIAS COMUNICACIONES UNIFICADAS


Vamos a decir esto de la siguiente manera: "Traiga su propio dispositivo" no va a ahorrar dinero a su empresa. Claro, BYOD le permite a su departamento de TI evitar los costos iniciales y la molestia de armar a sus empleados con los teléfonos inteligentes y las tabletas (que, basándose en el historial pasado, probablemente Avaya Flare no hubieran gustado, de todos modos). Pero todavía hay gestión y software de seguridad para implementar las redes Wi-Fi para actualizar y potencialmente nuevos miembros del personal para contratar TI móviles inteligentes. Ninguno es barato. Según Aberdeen Group, podría costar a su empresa un extra de $ 170 por equipo por año para ir con BYOD en comparación con un despliegue interno.

Sin embargo, no va a detener la invasión móvil de la empresa. No cuando Windows, que tan recientemente como en 2005 celebró el 96 por ciento del mercado mundial de dispositivos de computación, ahora tiene sólo un tercio. iPhones, iPads y dispositivos Android como el Samsung Galaxy S3S acaparan casi la mitad, de acuerdo con super-analista Mary Meeker.

Así que en una era post-PC, ¿Cómo debiera estar su negocio en el juego? No es mediante el empleo de una mentalidad defensiva, es decir, fijarse en maneras de minimizar el gasto. En vez de ello, piense en cómo puede transformar su organización con las capacidades latentes de estos cohetes de bolsillo con el fin de obtener el mayor retorno de la inversión. Así es como se juega para ganar.

Veamos el ejemplo del Hospital Deventer en los Países Bajos. Cuando centralizó varias ubicaciones en un nuevo hospital en 2008, Deventer también desplegó una red robusta, escalable en torno a una red virtual de equipo Avaya. Eso no solo alojó firmemente la repentina afluencia de visitantes y empleados médicos con iPad, sino también aprovechó este dispositivo de dos maneras. En primer lugar, los médicos y las enfermeras ahora pueden ser localizados rápidamente en sus dispositivos móviles en cualquier parte del edificio. En segundo lugar, los médicos y las enfermeras pueden usar una aplicación en sus iPads para tener los registros médicos de los pacientes lo cual ayuda en la explicación de los síntomas y otros problemas de salud a los mismos. Estos puntos ayudan a estimular la calidad de la atención en grandes formas.

"Hace dos años, una configuración como esta no la hubiera pensado", dice Ko Takema, jefe de las TIC en el Hospital Deventer.

Según el Grupo Radicati, la movilidad es el "principal motor para la innovación y la adopción en el mercado de la Comunicaciones Unificadas". Los teléfonos inteligentes de gran alcance estan "impulsando la demanda corporativa de soluciones de comunicaciones unificadas para apoyar una fuerza laboral cada vez más móvil", mientras que funciones como correo de voz a texto, la convergencia fijo-móvil, y presencia móvil se han convertido en "las características populares y fiables" para los usuarios finales.

El Analista de COMMfusion, Blair Pleasant, está de acuerdo. "El crecimiento de la fuerza de trabajo móvil ha dado lugar a la necesidad de trabajadores para comunicarse sin importar su ubicación o dispositivo", dice. En parte debido al crecimiento de la UC en las tabletas, Pleasant prevé que el mercado mundial para los equipos basados en UC pasará de $ 12,23 mil millones en 2011 a $ 20,76 mil millones en 2016, una impresionante tasa de crecimiento anual compuesta (CAGR) del 17 por ciento.


No es de extrañar que el 57 por ciento de las empresas que no utilizan UC hoy están planeando o considerando una implementación de UC móvil, según un informe de 2012 de Frost & Sullivan, mientras que el 82 por ciento de las empresas con las comunicaciones unificadas planean hoy mantenerlas o aumentar su uso para aplicaciones unificadas móviles.

Oportunidades para la Transformación

Un ejemplo aún más impresionante que el Hospital Deventer es la Academia Essa, una escuela secundaria urbana en el Reino Unido cuyas aulas centralizadas de tecnología han retornado grandes ganancias debido a los impresionantes estudiantiles y está siendo aclamad como "una de las mayores revoluciones en el aprendizaje que el sistema educativo estatal ha visto en décadas ", según el diario The Independent.

Además de la transformación de sus aulas, Essa quería transformar la comunicación entre su personal. Después de haber invertido en 1500 iPads y dispositivos iPod para estudiantes y profesores, así como una red Wi-Fi mejorada, líderes Essa vieron que podían cambiar a una nueva y poderosa plataforma de comunicaciones unificadas y ahorrar dinero.

El uso de Avaya ® como base, y la aplicación Avaya one-X ® Communicator y one-X Mobile SIP para aplicaciones de iOS para ofrecer servicios de voz sobre Wi-Fi para dispositivos profesores, Essa fue capaz de reducir sus costos de telefonía y mejorar la colaboración, dice el Director de Essa Abdul Chohan.

"Cada miembro del personal tiene su propio número y puede ser contactado en el mismo dispositivo por lo que la necesidad de líneas fijas desaparece", informa. "La belleza de esto es que el personal puede ser contactado por uno de los padres directamente en su iPad ... También significa que tenemos algunas conversaciones extraordinariamente productivos. Los profesores pueden llamar unos a otros, sin costo durante todo el día ".

Además de estos softphones, Essa está lanzando Flare de Avaya para todos los estudiantes y maestros para que tengan fácil acceso a las herramientas de comunicación esenciales, con un solo “toque de dedo”, como la videoconferencia, mensajería instantánea, presencia, gestión de medios sociales, correo electrónico, y más a través de sus dispositivos móviles.

Esa es la clave. Video móvil de alta definición de hecho puede llegar a ser la "killer app" del móvil UC. La voz, mensajería instantánea, redes sociales y otros canales también ven que su valor se dispara cuando se extiende a "cualquier momento y lugar" en cualquier dispositivo. Así que si es una Empresa Móvil, asegúrese de  invertir en todos los canales de colaboración. Los beneficios que Usted cosechará le sorprenderán.


martes, 4 de junio de 2013

¿Cuál es el Futuro de la Colaboración en Video?



martes, 19 de marzo de 2013

Avaya Cloud Vision Shifts to a Portfolio of Credible Offerings



Quick Take

Competitive Positives
• Avaya enhances partner standing with service providers
• Offering virtualized, multitenant cloud solutions for UCaaS, CCaaS and VaaS
• Inter-enterprise federation will allow interoperation across the cloud
• UC/CC cloud offering allows multitenancy management on single Aura platform
• Utility subscription model helps partners scale with usage on demand
Competitive Concerns
• Cloud UC and CC offerings not offering full enterprise feature set
• Cloud UC and CC platform functionally separate from video platform
• Cloud CCaaS capped at 500 concurrent agents
• Avaya Live Connect small business collaboration still restricts federation to intra-enterprise interactions
• Avaya current managed cloud services for large clients could cause channel conflict
Event Summary
Avaya announced cloud versions of the company’s unified communications, contact center and video enterprise offerings, as well as a managed private cloud contact center offering to serve the cloud service provider (CSP) marketplace. The offerings are designed to give the CSPs the ability to provide a choice of options for enterprises to implement Avaya’s UC, contact center and video services. The video and UC & CC offerings will be delivered via the CSPs and the contact center managed service will be delivered by Avaya directly or as a co-branded solution with a CSP.

Analytical SummaryPerspective

• Positive on Avaya’s announcement of UC, contact center and video cloud solutions as well as the roll out of a managed private cloud offering, because this provides a look at an overall Avaya cloud strategy that is long overdue. If implemented successfully, the portfolio will quickly fill a gap in enterprise product offerings and satisfy a desire among service providers to offer credible cloud offerings across the UC, CC and video markets.
Vendor Importance

• High to Avaya, because the action will counteract a competitive weakness that has been used against Avaya by major adversaries, as well as meet the needs of partners and end user customers and prospects with a desire to move to the cloud and that have a product preference and allegiance to Avaya. Without this announcement of a cloud strategy and portfolio Avaya was in danger of losing a considerable share of the UC/CC and video markets to other vendors that have already introduced cloud portfolios to facilitate sales through SP partners.
Market Impact

• Moderate on the cloud-based UC and contact center markets, because the disclosure of a more complete cloud strategy by Avaya will relieve the pent-up demand that has existed for such an Avaya solution on the part of service providers and end users. However, since major competitors such as Alcatel-Lucent, NEC, Siemens and especially Cisco have already made similar full or partial cloud strategy announcements, and are already capturing business with those products, it remains to be seen if Avaya’s portfolio will have a significant impact.
Competitive StrengthsCompetitive Positives
• The addition of Avaya cloud platforms for service providers to build hosted offerings to their end users that are seeking Avaya brand and quality standards will enhance the partnership standing with partners that have pent-up demand for Avaya UC, CC and video services. In addition it will offer a broader choice of quality options to service providers not yet standardized on a cloud solution.

• Avaya’s service provider offerings of virtualized, multitenant cloud solutions for UCaaS, CCaaS and VaaS will be well received by service providers looking to simplify and economize on its data center resources by utilizing existing IT platforms and systems to serve cloud-based customers with UC, contact center and video services. It will distinguish the Avaya offerings from competitive offerings that do not yet have fully virtualized software platforms.

• Avaya is emphasizing inter-enterprise federation on its cloud platforms, which will allow interoperation across the cloud, will enable UC, CC and video interoperability beyond the local enterprise and open up functionality that can enhance collaboration between enterprises and business partners. This is a strong, potentially differentiating position in a market for cloud UC services that is still confused and complex at best.

• Avaya’s Cloud offering for UC and contact centers allows multitenancy management on a single Aura platform that will simplify the operations of cloud service providers offering both UC and contact center services to its end users, helping to drive efficiency.

• The utility subscription model offered by Avaya to service providers using the Avaya platforms should prove attractive to those partners looking to minimize their up-front license investment. The “pay for only what is used” approach is still somewhat unusual in the marketplace today and will likely be popular with service providers seeking to enter the market with limited financial risk. It also demonstrates that Avaya is willing to share risk with partners on the timing of the cloud revenue opportunity.
Competitive WeaknessesCompetitive Concerns
• The Avaya Collaborative Cloud portfolio enters a cloud UC/contact center market that is increasingly well defined. Cisco and Siemens Enterprise have hosted UC/CC service offerings that are more mature and established in the marketplace. Mitel has long been actively selling hosted UC services to SMBs, and a range of service providers already offer UC on a hosted basis. Avaya will have its work cut out establishing a presence in this increasingly crowded market, either for services it hosts itself, or for the new multi-tenant platforms. 

• The Avaya Cloud UC and Contact Center service provider offerings are not offering the full enterprise feature set included in the current Avaya premise-based solutions. Although it is unclear what is included and not yet available in the cloud solutions, this could limit acceptance by service providers seeking specific functionality found in the premise-based solutions as well as put potential end users in a waiting mode until full functionality is offered in the cloud.

• The Avaya Cloud UC and CC offerings, although unified on a single platform, are distinctly separate from Avaya’s video as a service (VaaS) platform. This will require service providers looking to provide UC, CC and video cloud services to acquire, implement and maintain two distinctly separate offerings, which will likely be more expensive and time consuming than a unified cloud suite offering.

• The Avaya Communications Outsourcing Solutions (COS) Express, a single tenant contact center managed service, is capped in scalability at 500 concurrent agents. While this will certainly cover the SMB and mid-range enterprise contact center marketplace, it will not be sufficient for larger contact centers wishing to implement a cloud solution from a service provider with an Avaya platform. In addition, it may eliminate the offering from the short lists of mid-range centers with plans for future growth.

• Despite the ability of newly announced Avaya UC and CC platforms to offer federation on an inter-enterprise basis, the original Avaya Live Connect collaboration offering for small businesses continues to restrict federation to intra-enterprise interactions which will limit its effectiveness to serve customers wishing to include partners and customers in collaboration networks.
Response & Recommendations
• Avaya should emphasize its triple play (UC, CC and video) of cloud offerings with a single, centralized administration overlay, as well as its private managed cloud contact center offering through the service provider channel as an advantage over other platform providers that emphasize one or two cloud offerings as a method of attracting more service providers to its offerings.

• Avaya should move as quickly as possible to merge its UCaaS and CCaaS platforms with its VaaS platform so that service providers can service all cloud customers with a unified and tightly integrated Avaya platform. This will allow service providers to take advantage of the inherent economies offered by a single platform with multiple functionality in terms of cost, ease of implementation, maintenance and serviceability.

• Avaya should emphasize its relatively low cost of entry for hosted UCaaS/CCaaS/VaaS with virtualized platforms and “pay-as-you-sell” utility pricing of licenses (no pre-buy) as a strong competitive advantage against competitors requiring usage minimums and those that do not offer virtualized platforms.

• Siemens Enterprise should stress its better established OpenScape Cloud offering for UC and contact center, positioning it as a more mature offering and similar in scope to Avaya’s new cloud offerings.

• Aastra, Alcatel-Lucent and other developers of UC solutions should monitor the progress that Avaya, Siemens Enterprise, Interactive Intelligence and Mitel make in attracting customers to their respective cloud UC services. Though a sizable market for cloud services has yet to materialize, adoption of the existing cloud UC and contact center services (vendor direct and service provider delivered solutions) should demonstrate if the UC cloud market is truly becoming more attractive and marketable to end users.

• Service providers already utilizing Cisco’s HCS platform (e.g., Vodafone, BT and Verizon) should leverage Cisco’s considerable brand equity in the marketing of their respective hosted services based on Cisco’s hosted UC platforms. Cisco’s value to service providers is that the company brings enterprise customers to them.
Analytical Perspective
We are positive on Avaya’s Collaborative Cloud strategy announcement, which includes cloud enablement for service providers wishing to offer unified communications (UCaaS), contact center (CCaaS) and video (VaaS) applications as cloud based services, as well as a new contact center managed service offering. Avaya has been overdue in its delivery of cloud versions of its Aura unified communications and contact center platforms for resale by service providers, and this announcement fills a competitive gap. In addition, Avaya’s UCaaS and CCaaS utility-based pricing model allows CSPs to pay only for what customers are using on a monthly basis. This will allow SPs to enter the cloud services market using Avaya Aura platforms with minimal financial risk, and grow the services as their end user customers’ requirements change. The new offers also enable SPs to evolve and augment enterprise communications services with cloud-based solutions as well as provide greater interoperability by federating communications across vendors, domains and protocols. The inclusion of a UCaaS, CCaaS and VaaS package to service providers is a strong and comprehensive offering that will make it unique in the marketplace. Overall, this announcement will be positively received by SPs and end user customers alike, and will satisfy a pent-up demand for Avaya solutions in the UCaaS and CCaaS markets. 

However, Avaya’s delay in delivering a telephony and/or contact center cloud option to end users and service providers lags other marketplace leaders, such as Cisco, Mitel, NEC and Siemens Enterprise in the UC market, so Avaya will have its work cut out for them to catch up in market perception and mind share in the cloud services market with both service providers and enterprise users. In fact, the service provider selection process of the platforms used to provide cloud services is getting crowded and many have already selected technology partners, which may hinder Avaya’s partner seeking process in the coming months and years. Although Avaya talks of pending deals with more than 20 partners, few have been made public to date. Also, upon introduction the announced UC and contact center solutions do not offer the full feature complement of the Avaya premise-based offerings which could hinder acceptance of some end users requiring specific capabilities in their telephony and customer care platforms. Finally, the Avaya Cloud UC and CC offerings, although unified on a single platform, are a distinct and separate platform from Avaya’s video cloud offering platform which is based on Radvision technology. This will require service providers wanting to offer the full complement of Avaya cloud services to acquire, implement and maintain two distinctly separate offerings, which will likely be more expensive and less efficient than a unified cloud suite offering.


lunes, 2 de julio de 2012

Avaya Aims New Low Cost/Higher Value Compact Switches at SMBs, SMEs & Branch Offices



Quick Take

Competitive Positives
• Enterprise class features at a very aggressive price point
• Stacking architecture offers greater scale at a lower cost
• IP Office integration simplifies deployment of both switches and VoIP
• Chassis-like flexibility for a fixed form factor price
• Early strong demand indicates an unmet need in the market segment
Competitive Concerns
• Avaya suffers from poor visibility in the market
• Avaya has been slow to create synergies with VoIP/UC products
• Executive churn causing channel concern
• Cisco fields a broader portfolio in this market segment
• How to displace HP switches among Avaya VoIP customers?

Event Summary
Avaya launched a new line of compact Fast and Gigabit Ethernet switches for SMBs, SMEs and remote branches that promise lower operational costs, offer aggressive pricing and deliver integration with Avaya’s IP Office collaboration offering. The six new ERS 3500 switches also support more flexible and scalable stacking to allow customers to start small and easily expand.


Analytical SummaryPerspective
• Positive on Avaya’s new ERS 3500 compact Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet switches, because Avaya has created a compelling package of aggressive pricing, enterprise class features, good integration with its IP Office collaboration suite and greater stacking capacity and performance in the new switches. That combination of benefits should help it gain the attention of new prospects, and it gives IP Office users a compelling reason to use Avaya switches, rather than rival switches.
Vendor Importance
• Moderate to Avaya, because the new ERS 3500s complete Avaya’s Ethernet switching portfolio refresh and adds a compelling alternative for SMBs and SMEs compared to more costly market leaders. At the same time, Avaya is finally creating synergies between its compact switches and Avaya’s IP Office collaboration suite.
Market Impact
• Low on the compact Ethernet switch market, because Avaya does not have as large a presence there as some rivals, and it is still taking time and will require consistent execution to recruit its IP telephony-focused channel partners to take on selling its Ethernet switches. In addition, rivals have moved fast to refresh their compact switch lines, and there has been good innovation in the space over the last 18 to 24 months.

Competitive StrengthsCompetitive Positives
• Avaya included enterprise class features in the new ERS 3500s at an aggressive price point, making it between 30% to 50% less than some comparable switches by Avaya’s reckoning, and over 50% less than Cisco Catalyst 2960 C switches.

• Avaya in the next software release for the switches will have very compelling stacking capabilities with the new ERS 3500 switches, enabling four times the performance and capacity available with Cisco’s stacking, and it won’t require a separate license to take advantage of it. The Resilient Stacking feature will allow up to eight units to be stacked for a virtual backplane capacity of 80 Gbps, delivering high performance in a compact form factor.

• Avaya has created a compelling bundle combining the IP Office collaboration suite and the new compact switches, making deployment of both very quick and simple. A built-in configuration script allows a simple “Run IP Office” command to enable the Avaya IP PBX and VoIP phones to be discovered and configured, along with the appropriate QoS services on the switch ports. The combination has also been pre-validated for interoperability and includes a solutions guide for best practices to make it easier for voice-focused channel partners to add switching to their sales and expand their share of wallet.

• The ERS 3500 switches deliver great flexibility, enabling chassis-like features for a fixed form factor price, and the ability to operate in fanless or fan mode, depending on the power budget (60 watts or greater requires a fan, less than 60 watts doesn’t).

• Initial interest in the new ERS 3500 compact switches appears to be stronger than Avaya initially anticipated, but the company is prepared to meet that demand. This likely reflects a market need greater than being satisfied today by the vendors in this space.

Competitive WeaknessesCompetitive Concerns
• Avaya is battling the perception that it is becoming irrelevant in the Ethernet switching market. Vendors that are natural rivals say they never see Avaya in competitive deals, and at least one quantitative analysis house claims that Avaya has lost market share over the last couple of years. Avaya claims otherwise, but the dispute is not helping it.

• Avaya has been slow to create synergies between its data networking and UC products, and it is just now promoting combined solutions bundles a good two years after the Nortel acquisition closed.

• Avaya has seen some significant churn in the executive ranks, and it’s caused some real concern and hesitancy among channel partners, who worry about whether the current strategy will remain in place. At the same time, partners have not been happy with the margins that Avaya has enabled, and the company pared back a number of channel partners, even while it was looking to recruit in other areas.

• Market leader Cisco sells a broader portfolio of compact switches, with separate lines for small businesses and SMEs, allowing it to segment the market to a greater extent. Cisco’s compact switches include a robust feature set, including innovative power pass through capabilities that enable downstream devices to take advantage of power available in other switches to power wireless APs, surveillance cameras and VoIP phones.

• Avaya’s existing UC/VoIP customer base relies fairly heavily on HP switches, which are also aggressively priced, and it won’t be easy to displace those switches.

Response & Recommendations
• Avaya needs to stop changing horses in mid-stream. The executive turnover is unsettling for channel partners, and gives them a reason to hesitate, rather than embrace the combined IP Office and ERS 3500 switch sales they’re promoting among partners and prospects.

• While Avaya claims that it is growing its data networking business, at least one quant house does not seem to agree. If that organization is incorrect in its figures, Avaya should work with them to correct the mistake. The perception that it is losing “relevancy,” as one trade publication put it, is damaging to Avaya’s reputation and momentum.

• As Avaya promotes cross functional selling among its voice partners, it should also demonstrate its commitment to their profitability. Partners have complained of squeezed margins, even as Avaya has worked to expand its channel. Channel partners have other alternatives, and their profitability should not be sacrificed for a planned IPO or debt reduction to private investors.

• Avaya is gunning for Enterasys’ sweet spot with these switches, and they could have a significant impact if Avaya is successful in getting its VoIP partners to sell the bundled solutions that include these new switches. Enterasys meanwhile has done little to create synergies with its Siemens Enterprise joint venture. The combined companies may want to create more cross-selling opportunities.

• HP has the second largest market footprint in this segment of the market and offers an aggressively priced portfolio of comparably featured products as well. HP should take action within its sizable channel to fend off this new competitive offering and ensure it achieves feature parity where it may be slightly deficient in order to strengthen the offering and eliminate an insertion point.

Buyer Actions
• The once-moribund campus edge switching market has seen significant new innovations over the last 18 months, and any enterprise looking to refresh the edge of these networks would do well to try to future proof those locations by taking advantage of the new innovations being made in compact switches.

• Enterprises using unmanaged switches on an ad hoc basis because of cost sensitivities would do well to evaluate the new Avaya 3500 series compact switches. Boardrooms, movable classrooms and other locations could benefit from using a low cost managed switch with enterprise features by reducing operational costs without sacrificing policy control or security features (among others).

• Avaya VoIP and UC customers using HP (or other vendor) compact Ethernet switches may want to examine the benefits of the solutions bundles Avaya is creating around the new ERS 3500 switches. Avaya has priced them aggressively, insured interoperability and made it simpler to deploy them together.

Analytical Perspective
The introduction of the new ERS 3500 compact switches for SMBs, SMEs, and branch offices completes a total refresh of Avaya’s entire switching portfolio over the last two years, demonstrating from a product portfolio perspective that Avaya is solidly committed to competing in the space and regaining its former standing as a top tier contender. The ERS 3500 line of six switches, ranging from ten to 24 ports and promising much greater stacking capabilities than more expensive market leaders, extends more enterprise-oriented features to smaller businesses while offering lower costs than leading rivals in the segment. From a price, performance and features standpoint, it has given prospects every reason to consider the Avaya compact switches along with much more widely recognized competitors. At the same time, it is finally creating product and sales synergies between its lower end switches and its IP Office products, enabling it to push Avaya VoIP channel partners to actively sell Avaya switching (and wireless) products as a bundle with the VoIP solutions. But it will have to do a better job of convincing channel partners that it is committed to its strategic direction, and to their profitability. Too much churn over the last two years in Avaya’s executive ranks has caused resellers to worry about whether initiatives begun by a predecessor would carry over with a new regime. Early this year Avaya appointed a new general manager of its data networking unit, naming former Cisco executive Marc Randall to the post, while it executed a reorganization that reduced the number of operating units from seven down to three. And as Avaya investors angled for an IPO, channel partners have seen their margins erode.

Still, Randall believes Avaya has the opportunity to grow its data networking business, and his aim is high: he was recently quoted as saying he’d like Avaya to be the third largest networking company in the world.