For a long time Cisco have been leading the business communications market, and with the acquisition of BroadSoft confirmed earlier this year, their dominance extended into the cloud. Today at BroadSoft Connections 2018 Cisco have made a series of announcements that they hope will reinforce their position as the market leader. The various announcements are all aimed at helping Cisco customers choose whether moving towards to cloud based solutions is the right path for them.
UC Today are covering the event at The Diplomat Beach Resort in Miami, Florida, and during the conference we caught up with Cisco’s Tom Puorro, Vice President and General Manager of the Unified Communications Technology Group, and Mark Straton, Director of Marketing for Cloud Calling, to bring you the inside track on all the latest news.
Full PBX Within Webex Teams
Webex Teams has taken the mantle as Cisco’s primary collaboration and now communication application. After re-branding from Cisco Spark, Webex Teams is now the primary platform for Cisco’s single pane approach to UC solutions.
This week at Connections 2018, Cisco have announced that BroadCloud Calling will now be available, through service providers, as part of Webex Teams. Puorro explains some of the reasoning behind the new integration.
“Our goal is to unify those experiences so it is as seamless as possible for users. With the addition of BroadCloud Calling we can now provide a complete UC solution within the application. It’s all about lining up the end user experience.”
BroadCloud Calling is BroadSoft’s cloud based phone system proposition. Offering all of the benefits of a more traditional on-premises PBX system, BroadCloud Calling will be made available as part of Webex Teams to create a holistic UC system. Cisco Webex Teams will now be able to offer customers fully functioning meeting, collaboration and communication solutions within one single application.
BroadCloud Calling Added to the Flex Plan
Flex Plan is Cisco’s one stop shop for subscription services. Flex Plan offers customers and partners software subscription options that are fully customisable and cover all of the various areas of the Cisco portfolio. The premise of Flex Plan is to make buying decisions as simple and relevant as possible, giving service providers the ability tailor bespoke solutions for customers. Operating as a per user, per month model Flex Plan provides the flexibility and elasticity that makes cloud models so appealing to the modern business. Straton explains some of the huge benefits that Flex Plan can now offer BroadSoft customers and partners.
“Coming from a PBX, VoIP background, one of the big impediments in moving to UC was the complexity of buying solutions. With Flex Plan the ability to buy exactly what you need, as a customer, is so much easier.”
As part of the Connections 2018 announcements BroadCloud Calling will now be added to possible Flex Plan solutions. Puorro tells us why the addition to Flex Plan was designed to help their partner community.
“It was an easy decision for us to add BroadCloud Calling to Flex Plan. Our big challenge is making sure that transition from perpetual based licenses to subscription based licenses keeps our partners profitable. Flex Plan enables that smooth process for partners.”
The new BroadCloud Calling Flex Plan will only initially be available through select partners in the United States, including NWN and Orange. However Cisco have revealed that the new offering will be expanded to support global locations across 19 countries during the remainder of 2018, with the rollout continuing globally through 2019.
New Cisco Calling App
Cisco have also taken the opportunity to announce a new calling application that will be made available to customers and service providers. Service Providers who transition to sell BroadCloud Calling, through the newly available Flex Plan, will be able to re-package the application with their own branding.
The application will be made generally available over the next few months. It will include all of the standard features you would expect from a UC application like mute, park, transfer and click to dial but Cisco have also included some additions to try and differentiate its offering.
“These are important capabilities, especially the calendaring features. For the modern mobile user, features like these are going to be vital”
As Stratton explains above the Cisco Calling App features will offer users great enhancements including Outlook integration. This will allow users the ability to seamlessly leverage both directories to find contacts and connect more easily. As well as calendar integration the application will also offer some other innovative features including the possibility of making HD video calls, enabling a more modern UC experience. There will also be the option to utilise the cellular data network for calls but display a published business phone number, rather than a secondary detail, creating a professional consistency for business users.
More news to follow this week from UC Today at BroadSoft Connections 2018.
