Outsourcing UC management

Paying someone to do gruntwork is one of the more satisfying aspects of running a business. And for some small and medium businesses, outsourcing is the best way to deal with managing a unified communications (UC) deployment.

UC makes a bevy of promises that sound great. But what if you can’t spare the staff necessary to run a UC system?

For many, the happy answer is “get someone else to do it”. This is the principle behind managed UC. For a fee, a service provider can take charge of your UC system, making sure things run smoothly and making any necessary adjustments to hardware and software as time goes on.

Some organisations take the idea a step further, outsourcing their entire UC operation — including equipment — by embracing UC as offered through the cloud.

Let’s take a look at these two ideas, how they differ and what they can each offer.

Managed on-premises UC

On-premises UC systems all start out the same way. First of all you employ a vendor or systems integrator to install a set of UC equipment, into either your place of business or your data centre. Once everything’s installed, you have the option of handling management duties in house. One of your IT staff will be using the management tool that shipped with your UC system, configuring and making changes as needed.

Mark Magill, from UC equipment vendor Alcatel-Lucent, explains: “The management tool is a graphical user interface application that’s designed to allow easy and efficient management of the entire environment — whether it’s the UC or the IP telephony platform.”

Alternatively, you could contract a third party to manage your UC system. This third party could be your vendor, one of their partners or someone else entirely. It’s worth noting that this administrative service is an entirely separate product from the initial installation, one that you can pick up or drop as needed.

Pricing structure

Pricing for outsourced UC management generally takes the form of a monthly fee, on top of whatever else you’re already paying. So all up, you’re forking out for hardware, installation, design, licences, any line-leasing, some other bits and pieces, and then the administration fee.

Note that you’re just paying for someone to administer your UC system — you’ll still have to pay for any equipment or software upgrades that take your fancy. Similarly, if you decide that you need videoconferencing licences for another 50 staff, you’ll have to pay for those extra licences. When you outsource management, that’s really all you get: management.

Who is it for?

According to Magill, outsourced UC management is a good fit for companies that want the benefits of UC but don’t have IT staff with the specialised skills required to manage a UC system.

Cloud-based UC

Cloud-based UC — also known as network-based UC — offers the same benefits as CPE-based systems but delivers them as services through the network. Service providers run these services from their own UC hardware, meaning customers don’t need to deploy UC servers of their own.

Telstra Enterprise Group (TEG) offers both on-premises UC and a cloud-based service. According to the company’s Paul Geason, the two delivery methods offer the same applications, so you’re achieving the same productivity benefits regardless of which delivery method you choose.

Pricing structure

The pricing of cloud-based UC services is simpler than that of on-premises solutions. While premises-based systems involve a mix of up-front and ongoing costs for hardware, upgrade and administration, cloud-based services tend to involve just a monthly fee. This fee is based on the applications you want and the number of users that require them.

While premises-based solutions entail a capital expenditure and a recurring operating expenditure, cloud-based services involve only operational expenditure. This provides a degree of flexibility, and a good deal less risk.

So cloud-based UC offers the same productivity enhancements as on-premises solutions, is more convenient and carries less risk. If cloud-based UC is so great, why would you ever deploy a premises-based UC system?

Cloud-based UC customers aren’t just moving CAPEX into OPEX — they’re also paying a premium for the extra conveniences. TEG’s Geason explains: “If a customer’s prepared to take a longer-term view on the value of CPE, and they’re prepared to write it down over longer periods, that can obviously have an impact on the return on investment.”

But a pure ROI analysis doesn’t give the full picture, Geason says. Workers who would have been looking after the UC deployment can be reassigned to other duties, increasing overall productivity.

Who is it for?

According to Geason, cloud-based UC systems are a good fit for companies with several branch offices.

“Instead of having to install expensive CPE or routing equipment in each branch, you can simply bundle up an access service and literally the only CPE requirement for those branch offices would be the phones themselves,” he says.

Cloud-based UC could also be suitable if you don’t want to make a capital investment in a technology you’re not sure about — an investment that on-premises UC systems demand.

On the other hand, if you have oodles of capital and a bunch of UC specialists sitting around doing nothing, you’ll probably save a few dollars by bringing UC management in house.

As always, business needs should dictate adoption of technology.

*Andrew Collins is a freelance writer.