Next Stop - Metaswitch Forum, NOLA, plus my show guide essay

Bing, bang, boom. Week 3 of travel coming up. Was in La Jolla last week for the UC Summit; I was just in Phoenix for 2 days at Cisco's customer collaboration event; and on Monday I'm going to New Orleans for the Metaswitch Forum. Oy.

So, this is my shout-out for the 10th Metaswitch Forum. I've been to 5 of them - maybe more, and this one will be a big one to mark the occasion. They held the Forum in New Orleans back in 2008, and that one is still in my all-time top 5, so the bar is going to be pretty high next week, but I know we will not be disappointed.

If you're going, drop me a line if you want to connect - I'm not hard to find. This is especially true if you check out the show guide, which tells you everything you need to know about the Forum.

To commemorate the 10th anniversary, Metaswitch asked me to write a short essay to set the stage for the event. I was happy to oblige, and the essay is featured right after you open the front cover.

The essay is titled "Simplicity and Intelligence - Can You Have Both? How Can You Not Have Both?"

I can't share the entire show guide with you - gotta be there for that - but I can share the essay with you here, and I hope you like it! This will provide a preview of what the event holds in store, and your comments are welcome - either here or in NOLA.

As usual, I'll be blogging and tweeting as time allows, and you can follow my tweets here - @arnoldjon. To follow the play-by-play during the Forum, just track the event hashtag - #MForum14

UC Summit 2014 - Highlights and 7 Takeaways

We've completed the second full day here at UC Summit 2014 in La Jolla, and the final segment is underway this morning. This is my third summit, and it's clear that there's a great balance here between vendors and channels - with the analysts and consultants in the middle to keep everyone honest. The ground rules are clear, and this format seems to be working. The roster of vendors is solid, and this year there are new faces like Logitech and Nectar, which speaks to how the UC ecosystem is evolving.

The content has been solid, with a mix of perspectives from both vendors and our tribes, and any channel attendee I've talked to feels this is a great forum for learning and sharpening their business focus. I'm not going to rehash the panel sessions - after all, this is what the channels are here for. However, in addition to posting some photos of the sessions, I'll share seven high-level takeaways:

- Telephony is definitely dead, at least on the desk - IP PBX has been referred to here as a CLM to be supporting - career limiting move. Enough said.

- Cloud is for real and getting better. Complexity isn't going away, and the harder it becomes for IT to manage what UC is turning into, the more sense the cloud makes. Not many are quite ready yet for a full migration, though, and the hybrid model is the leading preference for now.

- Adoption for mobile UC applications isn't happening much, so until further notice, the desktop rules. End users don't think of these devices as vehicles for UC - simultaneous ring is more what they're looking for.

- We saw some pretty comprehensive tools for measuring CEBP and productivity, and they're getting better all the time. This is a key development, not just for helping businesses make the case for UC to management, but also for where and how the channels can make money.

- The expected showdown between Cisco and Microsoft is pretty much here. We saw current survey data showing how Lync has leapfrogged Avaya, and there's no question now who the #1 and #2 UC players are, at least in North America. Oh, and by the way, Google and Skype are ranking ahead of several well-known names in the UC space, and that takes me to the next point....

- Millennials will inherit the world sooner that we think - we were told that by 2025, they'll be 75% of the workforce. They're not making the big economic decisions yet, but that's coming, and their idea of collaboration is quite different from what most of us can relate to.

- Continuing this theme of who will rule the world, Dave Michels tells us to watch out for Amazon Workspaces. It's not ready for prime-time yet, but think about the first generation versions of just about everything we live and breath with, and this won't be a big leap of faith. When the term DaaS hits your radar - desktop as a service, you'd better own Amazon stock, because they'll be well on their way to owning a big part of the collaboration space.

Jim Burton kicking things off in style - reading his notes off Google Glass - cool!

Dave Michels telling us that we're all wrong - and Michael Finneran thinking up his comeback for that

Jim Davies, Mitel CTO - telling us how Avaya is worried about Cisco, how Cisco is worried about MSFT, how MSFT is worried about Google, how Google is worried about Facebook - and how everyone is worried about Apple. Darwin would be impressed by his understanding of the UC food chain and how things are evolving.

Even on one leg, Dr. Joseph Williams is smarter than just about everyone in the room - except of course, Dave Michels

Blair Pleasant talking about the growing importance of analytics in the contact center and how difficult social media is to manage in that environment

Marty Parker, Stephen Leaden and Bill MacKay covering issues such as E911, how to sell UC's business value across the enterprise and right down to personal productivity, and why telephony has zero value today when businesses are planning their technology investments

ITExpo Preview - Session #1

TMC's ITExpo is now just 12 days away, and there are lots of loose ends to manage as usual. I'm moderating three sessions, and am doing separate posts for each. They're all different, and I hope to see you at some or all of 'em.

As you probably know by now, this year's West event is in Las Vegas at Mandalay Bay. It's a pretty hot time of year to be in the desert, but that's the story. This is actually TMC's 3rd locale for the West ITExpo in 4 years, so we're all looking forward to seeing how they've changed things up. Los Angeles was their base for several years, but they pulled roots and had the last two Expos in Austin. I loved it there, but it's not really a Western spot and I guess it just didn't pull right, so off to Mandalay Bay we go.

I'll be there the full time, and my first session is Tuesday, August 27 at 10am. This will be a topic I really enjoy researching, and it's going to be fun. It's called "Solving the Customer Experience Equation", and we'll be exploring the relationship between communications technology and contact center agents, and how best to marry those for providing great service.

Joining me will be Steve Brubaker from InfoCision Management Corporation, Steve Chirokas - VoltDelta, John Cray - Zeacom, and Ann Sung Ruckstuhl - LiveOps. With four speakers, the time will fly, but you'll definitely hear some pretty sharp perspectives.

If you want get regular updates on the show, follow my twitter feed, and along with TMC's - @arnoldjon and @ITExpo.

Do You Have a Mobile Strategy?

That's a fair question, as well as the focus of my latest article for Internet Telephony magazine. I've been writing a monthly column there for a while - Rethinking Communications - and in the current issue, this is the theme I'm exploring.

Mobility is ubiquitous and becoming even more so.There are many things you could do - and should do - but more importantly, you need a plan. This can be a huge topic, and my article touches on three aspects of that - BYOD, BYOI and service providers. All are different, and the mix will depend on your environment, as well as where you want to take mobility - which of course is all about having a plan.

I welcome you to read the article, and hopefully that will help focus your thinking on mobility. Following that, I hope you continue reading my future articles there.

ShoreTel Partner Conference - Quick Highlights

Thursday was the core day for ShoreTel's 2012 Partner Conference, and they sure covered a lot of ground. In short, the event gets bigger and better - over 1,300 here - mostly channel partners, who seem very happy to be here. There are about 25 analysts here, and for the first time, they've also invited consultants, who also number about 25.

Lots of good messaging here, and the ShoreTel story is pretty strong. Still not making money, but basically, they're investing in growth, and if things go to plan, the profits will come. There are three key areas where that investment is happening - first, building the Sky brand, which takes both time and money. They still need to build out their cloud footprint for North America with full 1:1 redundancy, and in time, to support global customers. The upside for cloud was clearly articulated here, and if you buy into that, they're on the right track. Perhaps more importantly, they have rightly noted that the cloud market is highly fragmented and up for grabs, so there's no reason why ShoreTel cannot emerge as a market leader, or even the market leader.

Second is their investment in the channel, and we heard about new programs that are coming to help partners sell both cloud and premise. This is new territory and will take time to mature for sure, but at least this gives partners a chance to address the entire IP telephony opportunity. Premise business is on a slow growth curve, and that's where the market is today; cloud is the fast growth market, and by 2015, they expect it will be 42% of the market.

Third is R&D, and we saw some new things that look pretty cool. We can't talk about the details yet, but let's just say their mobility story is catching up to the market, and the partners clearly liked what they saw. They're also moving along in the areas of virtualization, contact center and video, and it's fair to say they've moved well beyond being a low cost IP phone vendor for SMBs.

That's all I have time to write about for now, but will have a longer recap coming early next week on the UCStrategies portal, so look for that then. Otherwise, as usual, here are some photos from yesterday.

Who is this lady? Pretty campy, but fun, working the crowd with corny jokes. If you weren't here, nevermind...

CEO Peter Blackmore

 David Petts, SVP WW Sales

Dan Hoffman, new title: President and GM, Cloud Division (ShoreTel Sky)

Pej Roshan, VP Product Management

Mitel Business Partner Conference - Highlights

This year's Mitel Business Partner Conference is a bit on the short side for the invited analysts, as Wednesday is the only full day here, and we leave today around noon. So far, it's been very good, with a strong turnout on all fronts - about 1,500 partners and customers, and about 60 exhibitors. The morning was a series of executive updates for all attendees, and the afternoon had special sessions for analysts, including a customer panel and personal executive interviews.

Overall, lots of positive messages, and it's clear that Mitel is on the right track. There was some timely news as well, but the general sessions were not analyst-friendly - no Internet access or power bars - and I wasn't able to tweet then. Too bad, but I'll share my takeaways here.

CEO Rich McBee set the tone with a clear, realistic vision of where Mitel fits in the comms market. He established that a strong foundation is in place on all fronts - the products, the people, the culture and the channels. They know they'll never be as big as Cisco or Avaya, but that's not their target. They're happy to be #3, and more important, they want to be the best. Good plan. He surrounded that with lots of examples, and the main thing is that they're paying down debt ahead of schedule, the financials are strong and they're growing in all the right places. There's money in the bank, and he says Mitel will be ready for whatever changes/consolidation comes next. I don't see the need to follow ShoreTel's steps to acquire a hosted provider - they have plenty of virtualization capability via VMware - so it's not clear if that means Mitel will be a buyer at some point, or will just react to what others do. After all, they've pretty much digested the InterTel acquisition, and am sure they're happy with what they have now.

Two other notables from Rich's remarks. He touched on the fact that the market still doesn't really know all that Mitel has to offer. If the customer wants hosted, they can do that via virtualization, and of course they can do premise-based all day long. After hearing him talk about things they want to do to strengthen Mitel's mindshare, a lot of these messages sounded spot on to what ShoreTel was saying at their last industry event. These two companies really are in a dogfight for the #3 spot, and each will take any angle they can to get a leg up. I've noted in the past that Mitel has bet pretty heavily on virtualization, and it sounds like that's starting to pay off nicely now. Each company is chasing a similar type of customer with similar channel partners, so at minimum, Mitel has to be telling a story that's just as good as ShoreTel to keep the partners onside. I'd say it is, and technically, it sounds like they're a bit stronger, especially after talking to various partners who sell both.

The second notable comment speaks to the culture Rich is trying to build. He stated that for the first time, all Mitel employees will be in on profit sharing. Well, that's one way to gain an edge on ShoreTel, given that they're not making money these days. Regardless, it's a great way for Mitel to build loyalty and motivate all employees to go the extra mile to make the company strong. That's a big change considering how poorly their IPO came off, when many doubted whether InterTel was a good move.

CFO Steve Spooner gave more detail on their financial performance, and it's a good story. I thought they'd be a billion dollar company by now, but $670 million is just fine, especially when gross margins are at 50%, and they've paid down $100 million of debt in the past 3 years. The other metric I liked was about how diversified their revenue base is. Mitel's top 10 customers only account for 4.7% of sales, and their top 10 partners only tally 12.8% of sales. That's a nice mix. In short, Steve made it clear that Mitel's financials are just fine, and that matters when you consider how challenged some of the other vendors are. That's a pretty important message for channels to hear, especially when weighing Mitel against other vendors they're selling.

Lots of other strong messages throughout the day, but the biggest item was from Jim Davies and the launch of their new device, the UC360 Collaboration Point. Tech companies aren't known for coming up with sexy names for their products, and this is no exception - it's pretty clunky. He did the big reveal, like on a reality TV show - see photo below - so it was new for all of us. Reminded me a bit of how Cisco unveiled the Cius, which really was the first of its kind - but also the first exit of its kind too. Video is really just making its way into Mitel's story, and with this, it becomes a central driver for UC and collaboration.

Jim did a very smooth demo showing how the device has the convenience of a touchscreen with intuitive features that allow any tech-challenged SMB end user to launch and manage a collaboration session from one device. The demo worked across all screens - PC, tablet and room-based system - so, it's ideal for ad hoc needs that anyone can run with. The list price is around $2,000, which seems high, given that Cius could not compete with the iPad's price point. Of course, it does a lot more, but we just don't know if it's solving problems that are pressing enough among SMBs to warrant the investment. Mitel is basically taking the approach they can disrupt the market with a new category device, and hats off if they're right. Apple sure had success this way, but I'm not so sure that this really is the "new way to collaborate", as Jim was telling us.

On the whole, my impression is that Mitel is in a good spot. They certainly have come a long way from their IPO, and Rich McBee seems to be the right man for the job. Got to give them credit for trying to shake things up with the new product launch, as well as continue pushing the virtualization option. They're certainly getting good validation, as they showed that virtualization deals are coming in bigger than premise-based sales. They seem to know their sweet spot - we didn't hear much talk about chasing the enterprise market, and so far, not much about social media - it's just not on the radar of their customers. There was a little talk about contact center, but they know that's not their forte. For now, there's better upside for them with virtualization, and as they grow internationally, this could really pay off since this is a global trend. As the first photo below shows, "it was a busy year", but the results seem to be there for Mitel. Let's see if they can keep it that way in the second half of 2012.

CEO Rich McBee

CFO Steve Spooner

Philip Keenan, EVP NA Theater

Steve Beamish, VP Corp Marketing/Bus. Dev., hosting a customer case study

CTO Jim Davies revealing the UC360 Collaboration Point

Jon Brinton, GM, Network Solutions

UC Summit - Day 2 Highlights

The day started with what I found to be the best presentation of the summit. UCStrategies Expert Phil Edholm gave a very balanced and insightful keynote on the business value of video. Phil is fairly new to the UCStrategies team, and he brings great expertise to a space that is transforming UC more than anything else. One key idea to define the video opportunity is to distinguish between three types of workers – Knowledge, Information and Service. 

Phil gave great examples of each, and clarified how Knowledge workers derive the most benefit from collaborative video because they require the most engaging modes of communications to be effective. Going the other way, Phil talked about meeting tourists – employees who join meetings where attendance is optional. He showed how video will cut down on this activity considerably, and along the way provide a fast ROI by virtue of reducing the time lost by meeting tourists who could otherwise be doing their jobs.

There were other strong takeaways from Phil’s keynote, but hey, if I spent all morning writing them up here, you wouldn’t need to attend, and that doesn’t bode well for the long term survival of the summit.

Instead, I’ll move on to another interesting panel – the analyst roundtable, which I participated on.  This session was led by Blair Pleasant, and joining us was Samantha Kane, Art Rosenberg and Steve Leaden. We each spoke briefly about specific trends, and my focus was on the post-PBX world, and how the channel could adapt for clients that are ready to move on from having a phone system. We covered a lot of ground in an hour, and the audience wasn’t lacking for good questions.

One of the better vendor keynotes came in the afternoon from Wayne Baines of Microsoft. He made a strong case for how well MSFT is leveraging its huge installed base around Lync and cloud based services. With 1 billion Office users, there’s a major market opportunity for them with UC, and even without mentioning Skype, Wayne painted a pretty promising picture for Microsoft’s prospects.

Finally, Jim Burton hosted a panel of consultants, and that generated some good dialog about how they could work more effectively with the channel to support them in UC. Together, these groups represented most of the people in the room, and it was a great forum for paying attendees to share ideas about how to make their business more successful.

All told, the summit fully met my expectations. I was happy to have a chance to speak, and based on comments later on, it sounds like our session was well received. It was a great chance to hear first hand about how UC is being deployed, and of course what the vendors are focusing on at present. I’m of the view the nobody really knows where the market is going, and nobody really owns it, and in my mind, these ideas were validated at the summit. At least I came away with a greater sense of confidence that my ongoing research is picking up the right vibes about the state of UC. 

So, kudos to Jim Burton and his supporting cast for putting on a great show in such a relaxed setting. I think attendees got their money’s worth, and I’m pretty sure most will be back. I count myself in that circle, and if you want to share your thoughts on the event, the floor is now yours…

UC Summit 2012 - Highlights

This is my first UC Summit and so far it's been great. Things started Sunday afternoon and we had a full day yesterday. There's a nice mix here of channel partners, UC vendors, IT consultants and a handful of analysts like me.

So far, the presentations have been two basic types - keynotes by vendors, and market analysis by UCStrategies Experts. The keynotes have been good, including some nice demos, especially from Cisco. It's fair to say the audience  got more out of the market analysis sessions, which have covered a lot of ground already. Dave Michels and Marty Parker had a thought-provoking Show Me The Money session, where they drove home the message that disruption is coming to the channel in a big way. As Dave said, "it's been a tough millennium", and there's lots more disruption on the way. From there, Dave and Marty provided ideas for how the channel can adapt and reinvent themselves - or  exit if they aren't prepared to go with the flow.

Blair Pleasant joined Marty and Dave for a great roundtable discussion of the UC vendor landscape, which provided a good counterpoint to the vendor keynotes. Also of note was Michael Finneran's colorful discussion about mobility, and the challenges around integrating it with UC.

Overall, the content has been very good, and the program is nicely paced. It's not overwhelming, and there's lot of opportunity for people to mingle, especially around the grounds, which are very zen-like. It's hard not to be relaxed here, and that makes it easy to chat with just about anyone you see.

I'll have another post tomorrow about Day 2, which is well underway as I write this post. Below are a few photos from Day 1, which are ok, but Dave Michels has a real camera, and you can check out his photo gallery here.


Marc Inderhees and Rich McLeod during their demo of how Cisco and Jabber works across multiple devices and modes.

Michael Finneran during a quiet moment of his mobility overview.

Marty Parker, Blair Pleasant and Dave Michels during the UC vendor landscape session.

The Business Value of Mobility for Collaboration

I’m continuing the mobility theme here for my series of posts to support the CIO Collaboration Network. My last post served as an introduction to my role in this program, and to explain that while Avaya is the sponsor, I won’t be writing about them, or any other vendor for that matter. These posts are just thought leadership about trends I’m seeing in the collaboration space.

This month my focus is on mobility, and each post looks at a specific aspect of that topic. Last week’s post addressed some issues around the impact of consumerization, and now I’m going to shift over to the business value of mobility.

In terms of improving our ability to collaborate, the business value that mobility brings should be obvious. Fair enough, but let’s look beyond that, since business value can mean many things. The financial impact is the logical starting point, but this is actually a bit complicated. In most businesses, the financial challenge around mobility is managing costs. Unlike fixed telephony, where IP is bringing costs down, mobility costs can easily spiral out of control, especially for global travelers.

Of course, with smartphones and tablets, mobility costs have two main components – voice and data. Until 4G and LTE become the norm, telephony costs will remain high with mobility, and we just have to accept that as a fact of business life. Data costs are driven by bandwidth consumption rather than minutes and connectivity, and deliver a wider range of collaboration capabilities. Enterprises have more leverage here to negotiate volume deals with carriers, and for the most part, bandwidth costs are coming down. As such, the cost of supporting mobility is not that straightforward to calculate, let alone manage.

To get a more complete picture, you also need to factor in various other costs to support mobility as well as extend PBX-based features/functions to those devices. I’m thinking here about network-related costs to address things like FMC integration, data backup, storage, security, privacy, bandwidth prioritization, etc. Conversely, the associated costs here can be offset by BYOD, whereby employees are bearing the cost to acquire these devices. This will likely become a fluid area, as enterprises evolve policies around the cost and ownership of smartphones and tablets. There is much more to consider here, but this will suffice for purposes of my post.

Cost is one side of the business value equation, and however you define what’s being spent on mobility, the “value” is all relative to the benefits that accrue in return. I would need many posts to explore all the benefits that mobility brings to collaboration, and for now, I’ll just cite a couple to illustrate the scope of what’s possible. First would be the immediate benefits, and then there are the longer-term results to consider.

The initial benefits are more evident for smaller scale forms of collaboration, either for 1-to-1 situations or addressing imminent needs. In these cases, voice-based collaboration will usually get the job done, and the business value of mobility comes from basic things like higher availability, accessibility and responsiveness. The underlying benefit comes from the fact that employees are increasingly not tethered to their desks, and mobility allows them to be equally productive away from the office.

I view the longer term benefits as having far greater business value to enterprises. By longer term, I mean the normalization of mobility as a productive work mode. Collaboration aside, mobility has many other benefits for the enterprise, especially for remote or even outsourced employees. In this broader context, the key to collaboration is the ability to replicate all the desktop tools using a mobile device.

We’re not there yet, but as operators upgrade to 4G and LTE, and as mobile applications mature, employees will go well beyond voice to collaborate. Full-featured, multimodal UC will soon become mobile-ready, and help make full use of what smartphones and tablets can offer in a business environment. That’s a much richer form of business value than voice alone, and no matter how you measure it, the price will be worth it.

This post sponsored by the CIO Collaboration Network and Avaya.

Ontario IT Buyers Forum - Toronto and Ottawa - Up, Up and Away

Earlier this week I posted about a mini road show I was about to go on, with events in Toronto and Ottawa. Well, am back now, and I'd say it was pretty successful all around. This was the 2012 IT Buyers Forum, sponsored by the Ontario Ministry of Economic Development, with some help from the Export Development Corporation and Invest Ottawa.

It's a good example of a government program designed to support local tech companies and bring international buyers to their doorstep. So, in both cities, there was a group of representatives from five countries - China, Japan, Mexico, Brazil and Turkey. The speakers were from various operators, private companies and industry groups, and all told, we got a solid overview of what's happening in those markets in terms of carrier deployments, tech adoption and the growing role of IT.

On the local side, there was a wide range of Ontario-based vendors who would love to do business in these markets, and we had a good mix of small companies and more established players who are already selling internationally.

My role in all this was to set the table and provide an overview of key trends I'm seeing in telecom and IT, and from all the feedback so far, my commentary was well received. I certainly made my share of new contacts with both local tech companies and the international contingent, so I have some promising follow ups to make now. I also have some intriguing overseas opportunities now that need exploration, so who knows where that could go? All in a day's work.

Waving the Canadian flag, I'll just leave you with this thought. We need programs like this to help companies grow, especially globally. Most of the companies here were pretty small, but seem to have good technology. This is pretty typical, especially for Canadian companies, and there's a host of reasons why most stay small, despite bigger aspirations.

After a lot of hallway and table-talk, there's no doubt these companies aspire to be on a big stage, but there's a cautionary tale here. Canada hasn't had much success creating Tier 1 world beaters in the tech/telecom space. We had Nortel for a while, and it wouldn't be impossible for RIM could slip away. That's not the plan, but they have a pretty big hole to dig out from.

Anyhow, the Ontario government is doing the right thing here, and am glad they're not overselling the future. It must be hard for small companies to set a realistic growth goal - we just can't seem to create really big ones here. Of course, the Ottawa event was right in the shadow of Mitel's offices, and in my books, they'd be the biggest fish in our pond if RIM were to fall. I really like Mitel, and maybe that's about as big we as we can make them these days. Nothing wrong with that, of course, and for now let's just focus on getting some deals done with the participants who came from so away. At least we gave them some balmy weather, and that just might fool them into thinking it's like that all year round.

Well, probably not, but as per the title of this post, up, up and away is still the vibe I got from the experience. So, kudos to the hosts, and I hope the international visitors came away with some great relationships that will help put some of our homegrown companies on a bigger map.

Coda - this was a private event, so I couldn't take photos of the sessions. Instead, I have another take on the up, up and away theme that came from an unusual confluence of events that took place over the past couple of day. Hope you like it...





8am, Tuesday - looking up AT the CN Tower from the 35th floor, shrouded in the Toronto morning fog


7pm, Tuesday - looking down FROM the top of the CN Tower, the highest observation point you can get to in North America. It's not a skyscraper, but tops out at 1,815', well ahead of the Willis Tower (nee Sears Tower) in Chicago, at 1,450'. Both will be surpassed by the new World Trade Center in NYC, but for now, Toronto is tops.


4pm, Wednesday - I'm not done yet going up. Now I'm flying to Ottawa for part 2 of the trip. Not sure of my elevation here, but am definitely higher up than the CN Tower. Really tried to get a shot from here looking down on the CN Tower, but couldn't get the right view - dang.

Collaboration, mobility and a whole lot more - posting for the CIO Collaboration Network

I’m pleased to be joining this community, which appropriately is focused on the power of collaboration. This has become a powerful word in the communications lexicon lately, and on a basic level, my writing here is part of a broader collaborative effort to provide some objective thought leadership around the topic.

This is my first post in support of the CIO Collaboration Network initiative sponsored by Avaya, and some housekeeping is in order. First off, you won’t see me talking much here about Avaya or their specific offerings. For that matter, I won’t be citing other vendors in the collaboration space either. I’m here to talk about the trends I see that pertain to collaboration; some enrich or enable collaboration, while other trends benefit the other way by virtue of association.

Second, this is not new for me, and is totally in my comfort zone. For those who follow me, you’ll know I post in other places under similar conditions with sponsors. I’ve been doing this long enough, and know how to keep my analysis objective, and vendor-neutral. Finally, for this particular initiative, most of my posts will be here on my blog, but I’ll also be submitting posts that will run solely on the CIO Collaboration Network. The setting doesn’t matter, though, and my analysis will always be independent.

I should add that I'm in good company here, as colleagues Dave Michels and Art Rosenberg will both be regular contributors. Furthermore, Dave serves as the Community Manager here, so along with his posts, he'll be vetting my writing to make sure it's on-target for this audience.

With that out of the way, I’m going to start with the big topic of mobility, which will be explored over the next few posts. For collaboration to be truly effective, the tools need to be accessible where the people are. Up until recently, that wasn’t much of a problem in the workplace since most employees were desk-bound. When you needed to reach someone, a call to their desk phone would do the job, and failing that, an email would get them engaged to work with you.

Mobility has completely changed the dynamics of where we work, and after adding broadband to that, everything else changes, namely how we work and when we work. Not only are employees spending less time at their desks, but they’re spending less time in the office, and increasingly working from remote locations. Without mobile broadband, these trends would not be welcome developments for businesses.

The value of collaboration continues to increase, and never before has the need to share knowledge and expertise been greater. With globalization, business becomes more complex and we live in a world of specialization. Knowledge generalists remain valuable, but very few people have enough broad expertise to help a business grow on their own. This is where collaboration becomes a strategic differentiator, as businesses can perform at a higher level by pooling the expertise of specialists to work on tasks with a common goal.

In that context, mobility is a key driver for collaboration, since specialized knowledge or expertise will not readily be found at a workstation. Not only does mobility allow you to find people when you need them - wherever they are - but it also helps the collaboration process move faster. This is another key factor as the speed of doing business keeps accelerating, and by extension, agility becomes a source of competitive advantage.

So, how should enterprises leverage mobility to collaborate more effectively? I’ll explore this over the next few posts, but let’s start in an unexpected place – our home life. As much as mobility is becoming a lifeline at work, its impact is even greater for personal use, especially among Millennials. The “consumerization of IT” is very real, and employees are increasingly asking IT why they cannot deploy the applications they use back at home here in the office. This is particularly true with mobility, which is where most of the energy from application developers is focused.

The explosion of applications for smartphones and tablets has given consumers many options for collaborating on a personal or social level. These needs may not be as complex as the workplace, but that’s beside the point. Consumer-friendly mobile applications are easy to access and easy to use, and as a matter of course, we’re collaborating without really thinking about it. This may be a user-defined form of collaboration, but the process is no different than in the workplace. In these settings, people are sharing content, using multimodal communication, and reaching consensus around a common goal.

This sure sounds like workplace collaboration to me, and the good news is that consumer-based collaboration helps get people familiar and comfortable with using these tools in the office. I think of this as an unintended consequence, and it’s certainly a benefit so long as IT can make workplace collaboration as easy to do as at home. Not only does this help employees collaborate in the office, but when adding mobility to the equation, they can do this anyplace, anytime. In that regard, mobility and consumerization have an additive effect to collaboration that’s pretty hard to beat, and if IT isn’t thinking along these lines, they should be.

This post sponsored by the CIO Collaboration Network and Avaya

Metaswitch launches Accession at MWC

This is Super Bowl week in the wireless world with Mobile World Congress, and everyone there is trying to get and keep your attention. I'm not at MWC, and I don't usually post about launches tied to the event, but I got an advance briefing of Accession, Metaswitch's latest value proposition for mobile operators.

It's a heady word, and a lot of interesting ideas to kick around, but the overall spin for Accession is pretty good from what I can tell. The goal is clear, and operators know they can't drop the ball with mobility - the field is shifting too fast to stand on the sidelines and watch subscribers figure things out without their carriers coaching them along. If you happen to drop by Metaswitch's booth, you'll know why I'm saying these things - otherwise, let's just punt this para and move on.

So, if you want to get into the details, go straight to the Accession website, and the easier-to-digest press release that ran this morning. There are lots of new acronyms in this tech-heavy announcement, but the standout for me is IMT - Immersive Multimedia Telephony. Ultimately, this is about delivering a mobile experience that is as close as possible to what we get on our PCs or video monitors in the conference room.

That's asking a lot, I know, but Metaswitch understands the pain points of carriers, and mobile operators have a distinct set of challenges. Mobility delivers so much more utility than most fixed environments, and wireless operators know they have to move on from simple voice to keep subscribers happy. End user expectations are so high now, and the smartphone explosion has put operators in perpetual catch-up mode to upgrade their networks and deliver the services that make these must-have devices so popular.

As such, Accession is all about enabling an IMT experience so carriers can stay relevant with their subscribers. At the end of the day, operators really just have two things that matter - a phone number to assign subscribers and their trust. That number can be incredibly valuable if you can wrap all these other services around it - much like designating your favorite website as your home page. Accession does this in many ways, and I'll just cite a few examples.

One is how their platform is RCS and IMS-based, meaning that the subscriber's phone number can seamlessly connect across various mobile networks, screens, and support the modes we're used to on the PC - messaging, IM, presence, video, etc. Nothing really new here, but Metaswitch is positioning this in a way that makes the phone number more valuable. They've had good success with Thrutu, which now has 28 options to make the in-call experience richer. This adds a lot of stickiness and value to what once was an ordinary phone call, and provides the caller with the aforementioned IMT experience.

Another way they do that is enabling the operator to centralize the storage of the subscriber's contacts. So, whenever you update your contacts, those changes are propagated to all your other devices associated with your mobile number. Now things get interesting with FMC-type handoffs from mobile device to desktop softphone - or even other mobile devices - smartphone to tablet. Related to that is what Metaswitch calls the "new twisted pair", the idea being to twin your mobile device with your softphone for any screen, anywhere communications - but with the mobile number being the driver.

These capabilities are really important, not just to play in the emerging world of LTE, but also to co-exist with the OTT interlopers who are siphoning away minutes and revenues like never before. Savvy operators need to find a way to partner with those who are really in demand with subscribers, but also to add their own value and participate in the new revenues that LTE will make possible. Again, this is where that phone number has value, since all the subscriber's data and history are attached to it. So long as operators use that data responsibly, trust will be retained. That's other key asset they have, and it makes all the difference for getting subscribers to adopt new services.

There is a lot more to consider there, but the main thing for operators is that Accession can provide all this now, without the need to invest in new/costly hardware. OTT is both a threat and opportunity, and Accession opens up new possibilities, not just for operators to keep their fingers in more revenue pies - both from subscribers and advertisers - but also in creating new business models built around private labelled offerings that could in fact be done in partnership with OTTs. With the right moves, mobile operators can get the best of both worlds here - theirs and what OTTs are getting - and on that front, Metaswitch has a good story to tell with Accession.

Rogers One Number Service Launched - UC for Consumers

Yesterday was the official launch of the Rogers One Number service, and I was on-hand for the analyst briefing hosted at their HQ in downtown Toronto.

This was the second day in a row that Ronald Gruia from Frost & Sullivan was with me at an event - that's never happened before, and go figure, we both started working there the same day 11 years ago this week. Time flies, huh? I mention that because during the briefing we saw that the new service is dubbed RON for short. Had to smile, thinking maybe Ron is so influential they named this after him, but I don't think us analysts have quite that much currency. I digress.

So, what is Rogers One Number? Well, aside from the press release, and the Rogers One Number website (where you can sign up now), I'll steer you to my post from almost two months ago, when I got an early heads-up about it. Beyond that, I'll add some takeaways based on yesterday's briefing and demo.

First, the demo was held at their "Connected Condo", which is exactly as it sounds. They've carved out some office space at HQ, and dressed it up as a one bedroom condo to showcase how the perfect Rogers customer would live. So, you name the Rogers service, and this condo has it - TV, Internet, cordless phones, a tablet, a very cute kitchen counter mini-tablet for their Home Monitoring service, etc. We should all be so lucky, huh? My photos below provides a bit of that flavor. Anyhow, it's a great way to demonstrate residential services, and to make it even more realistic, they had an actual One Number user speak about how nicely the service ties together so many apps he uses all day long.

Second - let's get this straight. One Number is free for - and among - Rogers wireless subscribers. Based on what I've seen so far, they need to get that message across more clearly, as the mainstream market may have enough trouble just understanding the concept - and if it seems complicated, my guess is they'll assume it costs money, at which point, you'll lose them. This is a great service for early adopters, and anyone who recognizes the potential to really cut back on their wireless LD and roaming costs when calling other Rogers wireless subscribers. Once you understand what RON is, and that it's free, the value proposition is pretty strong, even for a light mobile user like myself. And, yes, I DID sign on for the service after the demo. If you do the same, let's try it out together!

Third - for now, RON is basically a bridge that makes your PC an extension of your wireless phone - and vice versa. I think of RON as UC for consumers with nice FM/FM and FMC capabilities. In my initial post, I explained what CounterPath brings with the softphone client, which is a key enabler for RON, and if it provides a reliable, high quality experience, this could be a very sticky application. To me, that's a pretty big deal for a few reasons - see below.

Sticky factor #1 - by bringing your mobile contacts into the PC environment, these modes become interchangeable. Think about that - not only is mobile call quality very uneven (and it doesn't matter how much you spend on the service!), but smartphones are pretty stupid when it comes to being used for phone calls. The latter is one of my biggest pushbacks against mobility - these devices are great mini-PCs, but the telephony experience seems like an afterthought. Anyhow, you can save a lot money making these calls on the PC, and that's good news for any mobile subscriber. Even better if you get a better calling experience, which PC-based VoIP can deliver, especially if your alternative is making a mobile call while walking down a busy street (and really, how many people doing that do you think are actually talking to somebody?)

Sticky factor #2 - if you haven't already figured out, RON is a Skype-killer. In my book, whoever owns the contact directory owns the customer, and once you import your mobile contacts, there will be less reason to use Skype - either for voice calls or video calls. This is a pretty good flanking move for Rogers, just in case any of the other IM-based/OTT services - MSN, Yahoo, Google, AIM, etc. - want to ramp up efforts to siphon minutes off the Rogers network.

Sticky factor #3 - I asked about extending RON to tablets or even Apple TV, but neither are in the mix yet. It's too early for those interfaces, but I had to ask, since those are the only screens not supported by RON. At some point I think both will happen, so if you think RON is sticky now, wait until you can use it on those screens.

Sticky factor #4 - don't forget the landline! I don't know what their business case models look like for RON, but you have to figure they'll lose some wireless LD and roaming revenue from subscribers who shift these types of calls to the PC. Fair enough, but Rogers also has quite a few Home Phone subscribers. Now that there's an official CRTC plan to phase out the PSTN in the next couple of years, all landline providers face the same endgame. Rogers, of course, has the least to lose since they don't have a legacy infrastructure, and the landline business is really gravy. Since it's VoIP, they can make some hay by grabbing more PSTN subscribers from the telcos, and with RON, they have an even stronger value proposition to get those wins. Think about how strong that bundle will look compared to what the incumbent might be offering. Coming back to the business model, however, there will also be some lost revenues to consider. If RON really works as advertised, the value proposition for Home Phone will diminish, perhaps to the point where it's simply not needed. Right?

We were told this service is the first of its kind in North America, and I can't counter that - so it must be true! Not only is this good to see coming from a Canadian operator, but from a cableco nonetheless. This is very much in line with the innovation issues we talked about the previous night at MobileMonday, and serves as another example of how changes in telecom are not being driven by the telcos. When successful innovation comes from the outside, the rules change, and they're no longer being made by those on the inside. It's hard to say if One Number is a game-changer, but in my mind, Rogers has the right idea here - now let's just see if the market gets it.

MobileMonday roundtable - where's the innovation?

Last night was MobileMonday Toronto's annual Meet the Analysts event at the MaRS Discovery District facility. I was invited to moderate, and fortunately, the weather co-operated. Last week I was at the ITExpo in Miami, and my flight back to Toronto yesterday came off without any delays - phew!

Joining me on the panel was my Frost & Sullivan pal, Ronald Gruia, and Mike Abramsky from RBC Capital Markets. We were there to talk about our outlook for the mobile market in 2012, and we could have gone on a long time. The turnout was solid - I'd say about 200 attendess, and Jim Brown's team at MobileMonday Toronto has done a great job to organize this community.

The event was not recorded, but there was plenty of on-the-fly commentary on their Twitter feed - #momoto - so, check that out to see what you missed. I'd say the big theme last night was innovation, and my concern was where it was going to come from.

We all agreed that the incumbents are not really driving this in Canada, and a lot will have to come either from the handset vendors - as per Mike Abramsky's view - or the developer community, which was where I was going. Ronald, being a globetrotter, added an international view, citing examples where operators overseas are doing all kinds of interesting things, especially with the two-sided business model. If you don't know what that is, you'll need to start following folks like Ronald and me more closely! Otherwise, if you missed it, you missed it, but if this space is on your radar, at minimum, you should plug into MobileMonday Toronto, and maybe you can make it next time.

MobileMonday Toronto - 2012 Outlook for Wireless

If you're local and interested in where mobility is heading in 2012 - and who isn't? - you'll want to join me at the next MobileMonday Toronto event. The date is February 6, and it's at the regular location - MaRS - not the planet, but the MaRS Discovery District downtown. If you don't know what MaRS is, then you should come out just for that. It's free, and aside from the program, it's a great networking opportunity for those active in wireless.

The theme is "Meet the Analysts", and I'll be moderating a panel discussion where we'll cover the big mobility themes happening now, not just locally, but globally. Joining me will be long-time colleague Ronald Gruia (Frost & Sullivan) and veteran analyst Mike Abramsky from RBC Equity Research.

I'll do another shout-out closer to the date, but if you want to book it in your calendar now, here's the event web page, along with the registration form. See you there!

Deloitte 2012 Predictions - Canadian tech outlook - some takeaways

Deloitte Canada has been running this event for 11 years, and yesterday's TMT Predictions 2012 in Toronto is the biggest one yet. I've attended and blogged about this event for a few years years now, and they had over 1,400 registered for this one. Pretty strong turnout, and they've built this up into a great showcase not just to share thought leadership about their TMT practice - technology, media and telecom - but also to brand Deloitte as more than just dull audit and tax advisory stuff.

Duncan Stewart is the star of the show, and this is his stage to be the public face of a worldwide team of research - mostly internal - who pull all this neat stuff together. Most of these trends are global, but he does his best to put it in a Canadian context to make it more relevant for the audience.

The presentation was built around 10 key findings, which is a subset of a more complete set of conclusions, but there was plenty there to think about for any business. No huge surprises for people like me, who follow these things closer than most of those in attendance, but well put together, nonetheless. I just wanted to pass on few notable takeaways here, and you can ping me if you really want to hear more!

- Tablets are really about the Internet of things. They're just the latest step along the way to ubiquitous computing made possible by cheap, mobile broadband. This speaks to the much broader trend of M2M, where we'll all be using multiple broadband-enabled devices - some of us with more than one tablet - to communicate with other broadband-enabled devices as much as we use them to connect with people. Scary.

- We appear to have moved into the "post-PC era", where the action has shifted to mobile devices. Duncan cited some nice data points showing how unit sales of the former have now eclipsed PCs. Fair enough, but to counter that, he also presented data showing that we still spend far more time on our PCs. So, we're not quite there yet for being in a post-PC world, and I think that speaks volumes about how important the end user experience is. In that regard, size matters, and the PC will never lose that tete-a-tete here.

- For all the flexibility we have to watch TV shows where we want and when we want, old habits are really hard to change. I found this data fascinating, and Duncan was sharing some very current findings. On average, we watch 33 hours of TV a week, compared to only 4 hours on the Internet. Of course this will vary by age - and applies to home-based use - not work-related - but TV still rules. More to the point, households are only watching about 2.5 hours of time-shifted TV per week, and less than 0.5 hour watching Web-based video programming. Bottom line - over 90% of all TV content is viewed within 24 hours. Say what you want about TV networks being on the decline - that's where the advertising dollars go - and stay - simply because that's where the viewers are. Sure, teens aren't watching TV like they used to, but in broad strokes, TV audience behaviors are not changing compared to the way our behaviors are with mobility usage. The world of online advertising and branding still has great potential, but it's a different world than TV (which Duncan touched on later in the presentation).

- It's good time to be in the tech business. This is a trend that I've been attuned to for a while now, and am glad to see it presented in this environment. In terms of how consumers spend their money, tech products and services provide high utility, and are relatively affordable. I've been saying this for a while. Despite our no-growth economy, people always seem to find money for the latest iPad, Android device or notebook. We've become so addicted/dependent on these things, we'd rather drive our cars another year, keep wearing last year's boots, put off that home renovation project, etc., in order to stay current to enjoy the latest YouTube videos and share Facebook updates virtually every waking moment. Surely, this is the sign of an advanced civilization...

Enough takeaways, and I'd better stop there - this is no place for a rant about how the Internet makes us stupid. :-) Let's end on a high note and just say that Deloitte's research shows that innovation is alive and well, and Canadian businesses need to pay attention - things are moving too fast these days, and the stakes are getting higher if you bet wrong or simply stay still.

Rogers Wireless "One Number" Launch - Upping the Stakes

At its core, Toronto-based Rogers is a cable company, but wireless is where the action is, and that's where they're doing the most interesting things. They bet right on GSM - which begat their iPhone monopoly until recently - and through some shrewd moves, have become Canada's #1 mobile operator. They really are a one-of-a-kind entity, as no major MSO I know of has their mix of assets, all of which make money.

Along those lines, Rogers Wireless is set today to launch their beta of a new service called One Number. It's exactly what you think - one number to manage all your communications. If there's one key to success with consumer services - especially technology - it's simplicity. Skype taught us all about that and they haven't looked back since. Doesn't get much simpler that this - one number - that's all you need to worry about. It's the same mentality that goes with bundling, which they've been very successful at. If you like the bundle, you'll probably like One Number.

This is hardly a new concept, and anyone in Unified Communications circles would yawn. They shouldn't, though. UC is really for the business market, and the telecom piece is built mainly around the desk phone. The twist with One Number is that it's built around the mobile phone, which is pretty much where consumers live, breath and sleep these days. Rogers Wireless has read the tea leaves right, and to make their bundle even stickier, One Number basically integrates mobility with your desktop. So what? So this. Now you can hand off mobile calls to your PC - or vice versa - as some people do with Skype. Same for texting and messaging - what you do on your mobile phone you can now do on your PC. And of course your contacts will synch between the devices so the experience is seamless.

Pretty cool, pretty easy and pretty familiar. Sounds like Google Voice, huh? Problem is you can't get it here in Canada - something to do with how the big 3 operators like to do things. Anyhow, it's very much a Web 2.0-meets mobility-meets VoIP mashup, and I think consumers will love it. Most people under 30 have long moved on from a landline, and with One Number, their PC simply becomes an extension of their smartphone - you just don't need anything else. Clever, huh? If you can find a way to use Google Voice, there's no need now. Skype. Well, it's always there, but hey, if most of your everyday contacts are in your smartphone directory, it will just make more sense to call them from your PC that way, especially since those calls are largely free.

There are some other twists to this, but I'll leave those details to the real geeks. I just find it very telling how this is all being driven by wireless now, and One Number is a neat way to marry this with the PC. Of course, all of this will depend on the end user experience - if handoffs drop, or call quality is crappy, One Number will quickly and quietly disappear. In that regard, there's a nice Canadian angle, as the PC platform is from CounterPath, a company I have followed for some time. Their Bria soft client is quite good - I trialed it recently, and the company is doing well - their Q2 numbers were just released today. At a time when 6 of Canada's 7 hockey teams are mired in total mediocrity, it's great to see some good news coming from these companies.

As a coda, I should note that there's more to consider than just making the Rogers bundle stickier. Last night I was at a holiday party for one of the new wireless entrants, and it's very interesting to hear their take on the competitive landscape. Canada's wireless market has some challenging dynamics, and the regulators are doing everything they can to legislate competition. The new operators are pureplay mobile services, and One Number is another way for Rogers to differentiate and keep their ARPU up where investors are happy.

Not everybody needs or wants to integrate mobility with their PC, but those who do are pretty valuable customers. Rogers gets that, and One Number will help keep those customers under their tent. If this works, I have no doubt that TELUS and Bell will soon offer similar services, if only to keep their customers from going to Rogers. Until then, it's Rogers out in front again, and I'm sure CounterPath is hoping that everyone wants it.

Metaswitch Forum - do you Believe in Magic?

Great song, huh? John Sebastian at his best - bet you can't get it out of your head now. That's the idea. Now, close your eyes, hum along and then say, "damn, I wish I was at Metaswitch in Vegas this week".

Well, if you can't be here, then keep reading my posts, and pick up the Twitter feed (#mforum11) - it's been pretty active. I just wanted to share some thoughts from Day 1. This is my fifth Metaswitch Forum, and it keeps getting bigger and better every year. Attendance is close to 1,000, and it's a great testament to their loyal customer base. They really have a great balance between sharing their roadmap and providing quality content with Vegas-style showmanship. The production quality and visuals are first rate, and a special kudo goes out to uber-host Steve Gleave. I think he's got another career waiting in this town - the man knows how to work a room!

Actually, Steve set the table by talking about the 7 M's, which define their vision for this market. In short, they are: Moments, Multimedia, Mobility, Management of sessions, Migration, Mosaic and Metaswitch.

Each of these are laden with meaning, but I'll leave that to your imagination. I couldn't make a living if I spelled it all out for you here, but suffice to say, I like where they're going, and think they are very much in synch with what the market needs. With a bit of effort, mind you, you'll get another layer of understanding by sifting through the tweets.

Otherwise, Day 1 had a good mix of public and NDA discussions, and it all reinforces my sense that they know what they're doing. The business continues to perform well, they keep adding customers, and they are proactively fine tuning their value proposition to reflect what's happening today. As smart as they are, even they concede it's a very daunting task, and frankly nobody has got all this figured out - well, maybe Apple or Google on a good day.

Regardless, among the telecom vendors, Metaswitch is as well positioned as anybody, and being private, they have more freedom to innovate without the time-sensitive pressures of meeting quarterly targets. Their market won't keep growing at current levels - even they know that - but as long as they keep innovating and responding to today's disruptive technologies, they'll hold their own just fine.

I could go on a lot about the details and memorable observations, but will save that for another post - pretty busy here now. In short, when you hear about the future they're envisioning, you really wonder if it's all magic, esp being here in Las Vegas. Well, to an outsider, it may look like magic, but when you see the quality of people and thinking that Metaswitch has, it looks pretty real to me.

Just a few photos to share here. Unfortunately, the analysts and media had special seating out in the bleachers during the morning sessions, so the best photo opps were off the video screen instead of stage - it's a big room!

Steve Gleave - funny, clever, but delivering a strong vision about the Power of M




Execs Kevin DeNuccio and Graeme MacArthur - very different styles, but more strong messaging about their growth story and roadmap





The chocolate lover in me couldn't resist making this connection - coincidence? I think not....

Mobile VoIP Webinar Archive Posted

Just a quick note to say that the replay for last week's mobile VoIP webinar is posted now on the USTA website. In case you missed it, the webinar was focused on new ARPU opportunities for mobile operators using VoIP and HD.

I shared the presentation with Media5, and GIPS was cited as the lead sponsor. They were supposed to present as well, but with last week's acquisition news, things changed, and they had to take a lower profile.

Mobile VoIP ARPU Solutions Webinar - May 20

Just a quick shout-out about our webinar this week. It's being sponsored by GIPS - Global IP Soluions - and I'll be presenting along with Media5.

It's a hot topic, and should be of interest to any mobile operator or developer with big ideas about how to drive revenues with mobile VoIP. In short, the webinar is this Thursday from 1 - 2pm EST, and you can get all the details here. Hope you can join us.