revenue

UC Market Rebounding and Prospects Looking Good

This is a short post just to highlight two stories I saw today which seemed to fit well together.

The first one reports that the UC market had its first quarter of growth since Q3 of 2008. The growth was modest, but significant given the impact of the economy on all IT sales.

The second is a report projecting that the UC market will grow at compound rate of just under 39% from 2009 to 2014, generating $87 billion in revenue over the 5 year period.

Taking thw two pieces of information together, it looks like UC might be recovering from the economic downturn and that the UC market has a very promising future…at least for tne next 5 years.

Remember ROI?

Ah, the ‘Good Ole Days’. Remember when business decisions and investments could be made based on ROI (return on investment). If a business invests $1 million in new manufacturing equipment that helps them produce higher quality widgets faster, thereby increasing output and bringing in $200,000 a month more in revenue, then the investment pays for itself in 5 months and after that its all gravy. Simple enough.

The problem is that many of the business decisions and investments on the table these days do not fit into ROI calculations. Investing in network security does not generate revenue. It just (hopefully) protects you from losing money. Investing in process automation does not generate revenue. It (hopefully) makes processes more efficient resulting in cost savings per process execution which reflects back to the bottom line. Unified communications is sort of in the same boat.

In and of itself, UC won’t generally make money. What it will (hopefully) do if implemented properly is allow employees to work more efficiently and be more productive. It will allow employees to collaborate more effectively and help to generate team synergy where it wasn’t possible before. It will enable the business to respond to market pressures and customer needs more agilely. UC is a tremendous investment, but companies need to understand the big picture and both implement and use the tools effectively. Oh, and don’t try to justify the investment with a straight ROI measurement. Your CFO probably won’t cut a check based on that argument.