What ‘UC’ Really Means

One of the problems in today’s telecom marketplace is how loosely the term unified communications (UC) is used. True UC brings different technologies together to create one communications platform — instant messaging, e-mail, workflow applications, CRM, procurement, and widely used programs like Salesforce.com and Microsoft Exchange, along with homegrown applications. UC brings all the ways that a company or user communicates into one integrated platform.

Many providers call simple voice mail-to-e-mail applications “unified communications,” but the term really should cover much more than that. Make sure that whenever you evaluate UC, you understand how deep that unified layer goes. Does it integrate with your CRM? Can you integrate your phone status with your IM status? When you play a voice mail in your e-mail, does it change the status of your e-mail on your phone system to “read”? Same thing with deleting an e-mail. Many solutions really just pass data off and forget about it.

By integrating voice into data, UC is changing the VoIP industry. The UC concept is changing the way that VoIP works. It’s really been a reinvention of the technology. Alteva has always striven to provide the best technologies in the marketplace. Two years ago, it was VoIP; now it’s UC. Since that time we’ve worked hard to become one of the best providers of hosted VoIP, and as we evaluated these UC pieces and added them to our platform, our customers have embraced them in a way we couldn’t have imagined.

We’ve evolved from strictly a voice player with UC add-ons to a company seeing voice as one component of UC. It’s a natural evolution for a company like ours. Not because it’s VoIP or UC, just because it’s the best technology out there.

UC is the next evolution of the marketplace. Instead of diluting voice, we are finding ways to enhance it. As customers hear more about it and know that it’s coming, it should give a push to other service providers – especially hosted companies – to get onboard and start offering it as well.

William R. Bumbernick is president and CEO of Alteva LLC. He has more than 10 years of senior management and entrepreneurial experience in telecom, IT and managed services. Since 1994, William has been involved in executive levels of leadership within the technology and telecommunications sectors.