Big UC News from Microsoft, Zoom, Avaya, Salesforce, and Node4

“While full of advantages, cloud phone systems still require connectivity to a PSTN network to make calls outside of a business. For companies with multiple sites in different geographies, this can be challenging, as it requires the ability to pick the right connectivity option and provision callers.    

“While Zoom Phone offers pre-packaged service plans across the globe, customers with more complex calling plans, coverage, and managed services can turn to our vast partner network to help address their needs.”

Zoom lists 48 “ZP Native Countries”, which include Argentina, Costa Rica, Estonia, and France. There are also 28 “Non-Native Countries”, such as Albania, Georgia, Kenya, and Malta. Finally, Zoom has shared six “Non-Native in progress” countries: Brunei, Iceland, Laos, Myanmar (Burma), Saint Martin, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. 

Insiders Sell $88m of Pirated Avaya Licenses 

The Western District of Oklahoma has indicted three individuals for selling $88m of pirated Avaya licenses.  

Avaya Direct International (ADI) software licenses were purportedly stolen and used to unlock telephone system features used by small and medium-sized businesses in the US and abroad.   

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The grand jury charged three people with 13 counts of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and two of the three received further charges of money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering.   

The United States Department of Justice, Office of Public Affairs, announced: 

“Brad Pearce, a long-time customer service employee at Avaya, allegedly used his system administrator privileges to generate tens of millions of dollars of ADI software license keys that he sold to Hines and other customers, who in turn sold them to resellers and end-users around the globe.

“The retail value of each Avaya software license ranged from under $100 to thousands of dollars.   

“The Pearces and Hines’ operation not only prevented Avaya from making any money on its stolen intellectual property but also undercut the global market in Avaya ADI software licenses because the Pearces and Hines were selling licenses for significantly below the wholesale price.”   

Avaya’s ‘IP Office’ was at the centre of the piracy operation. In order to use IP Office functionality such as voicemail or other telephony services, customers were required to purchase software licenses, which were generated by resellers and distributors. 

Salesforce Ditches Internal Chat App In Favour Of Slack 

Salesforce has replaced its own chat app and deployed Slack to its 80,000 employees after acquiring the collaboration firm. 

Employees had previously used Salesforce Chatter, but a Slack director told UC Today that Slack is transforming the way Salesforce operates internally. 

Karl Nicholson, Director, EMEA Executive Programs at Slack, explained that since the acquisition, there has been a learning curve for both companies. 

He said: “It is pretty amazing to be part of Salesforce, we’ve moved from a smaller organisation to a much larger one, and I think Salesforce has around 80,000 employees currently.  

“We’ve had to learn how to work better with Salesforce, but in terms of Slack specifically, it has been rolled out wall-to-wall at Salesforce, so we at Slack are helping to influence how Salesforce does its day-to-day operations. 

“Salesforce internally has turned off Chatter, the chat tool which was part of the Salesforce platform, and replaced it with Slack not only for the Salesforce core functions but also for higher business.

“We have seen a reduction in emails at Salesforce specifically, down 46% across the board, and we at Slack don’t do internal emails, so there is a ton of learning going on.  

“It’s huge because of the scale of Salesforce; we are marrying up roles internally, so we’ve changed the way that Salesforce operates, which is incredible.”  

Slack is not just influencing the company internally, but it has also been integrated into Salesforce’s customer relationship management (CRM) platform.