SaaS Meets Unified Communications

What’s better than purchasing, deploying, configuring, administering and maintaining the various hardware and software components of a complete unified communications solution? Well, when I put it like that, what isn’t better?? It sounds like a lot of effort and not much fun. The return is good though assuming that users are provided with the knowledge and skills to realize the improved efficiency and productivity possible…but I digress.

What’s better than doing it all yourself? Letting someone else do it. For certain applications and for certain types of organizations, software-as-a-service (SaaS) makes tremendous sense. The SaaS vendor takes on the hardware expense. The SaaS vendor manages deployment, configuration, administration and maintenance. The expert administrator is paid by the SaaS vendor. The SaaS vendor stays on top of cutting edge technology and ensures that the solution is patched and updated as needed. All you have to do is pay the SaaS vendor and enjoy using your unified communications tools.

Unified Communications is a booming business. But, so is SaaS. According to an article on TMCNet regarding the market for UC via SaaS, “the Radicati Group predicts that yearly sales will rise from today’s $6.9 billion dollars up to $28.7 billion dollars.” If that estimate is correct, companies that provide unified communications solutions should explore delivering via the SaaS model, and companies looking to invest in unified communications might want to take a hard look at the SaaS option.