News & Viewson Unified Communications & Collaboration

PAGE 1

Less than one year after its merger with Sweden-based Unified Communication Sweden AB, UK-based MeetingZone has acquired conferencing services provider Confy, based in Malmo, Sweden. Confy has operations in Sweden and Norway and provides services for Telenor clients in Sweden in partnership with Telenor.

Confy also has a reseller in Denmark, so combined with Unified Communication’s Scandinavian coverage, MeetingZone

now has all of the Nordics covered. Since its inception, MeetingZone has made a large number of small acquisitions — each acquired typically for less than 1M GBPs. While not announced publically, WR estimates Confy may have cost MeetingZone just over 1M GBPs, potentially making it their largest acquisition to date. MeetingZone offers conferencing services via offices and operations in the UK, US, Canada, Germany, and Sweden,

and provides a French service (though there is no office or operation in France).

What Marc thinks: After MeetingZone’s acquisition by GMT Communications Partners just one year ago (August 2011), we thought we would see more MeetingZone-led acquisitions. But everything takes longer than expected, and not nearly as many small independent CSPs are available today as there were when PGi and InterCall were on the prowl for anything that moved earlier in the last decade. MeetingZone has taken a patient and methodical approach to everything from operations, sales, and client engagement, so it makes sense that acquisitions follow a similar strategy. We would not be surprised to see one to two new acquisitions before the end of the year, and three to four more in 2013. WR still views MeetingZone as one of the best managed CSPs worldwide, with extraordinary financial discipline, a simple yet empowering customer experience, and a carefully crafted strategy.

Adobe Now Goes “Anywhere”Steve Vonder Haar, svonder@wainhouse.com Adobe has taken the wraps off its most aggressive effort yet to weave hosted software capabilities into its flagship video production applications. At the IBC Expo held last week in Amsterdam, the company announced its new “Adobe Anywhere” initiative that aims to make it easier for far-flung video professionals to collaborate on content production in the Adobe Premiere video editing program, the After Effects graphics creation

Volume 13 Issue #18 12-September-12

MeetingZone Digs Deeper into the NordicsMarc Beattie, mbeattie@wainhouse.com

Adobe Anywhere logo

Countries in the Nordic Region

PAGE 2Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

on Adobe solutions would be a viable strategy for content creators seeking to streamline their collaboration with other video producers using Adobe solutions.) At IBC, Adobe worked to remove other barriers to winning converts for its video production solutions by offering discounts to customers willing to switch from competing video production tools to Adobe-branded solutions.Even with these advantages, however, Adobe Anywhere does little to advance efforts in making video production a commonplace tool for creating streaming video content for business communications. For now, the window of opportunity for upstart rivals to sell their hosted video content production solutions into the enterprise remains wide open.

News in BriefUnified Communications

• Cisco Systems quietly announced in an August 30 blog post that it is modifying the licensing approach for its UC portfolio. The major change is that the company will no longer tie all licensing of its UC to Cisco IP phones, essentially separating the software licensing from the telephone handsets. Customers can choose from three software-only licenses: Standard for mainstream information workers; Enhanced / Enhanced+ for mobile workers; and Professional for power users who need it all. Each level now has added social-networking tools; users at all levels will get access to Cisco Jabber and the Professional level now includes WebEx Social (formerly known as Quad) at no extra cost. Other changes include a new free Enterprise Licensing Manager application that gives customers and partners better visibility of licensing usage — in theory the ability to modify licenses if need be.

• Up-and-comer UC provider Nextplane has announced support for Isode’s M-Link instant messaging platform on the Nextplane Federation Cloud service. Isode’s M-Link customers now can federate with Microsoft Lync 2010, OCS 2007 R2 and OCS 2007 R1, and IBM Sametime 8.5.x using the NextPlane federation service. M-Link’s IM customers can now exchange presence info, exchange IM’s with colleagues on OCS, Lync and Sametime, and initiate and invite those colleagues into multi-user chats and group chat sessions. Isode M-Link is known for providing secure messaging in highly secure

program, and the Adobe Prelude video ingestion solution.

With Adobe Anywhere, users can upload media assets to a centrally, Adobe-hosted server and then use their client-side Adobe applications to edit or develop video content from those centrally stored assets. The content changes are then stored on the central server, making it easy for video professionals to share their work with other remote video producers also using Adobe’s video creation tools.

While Adobe has deployed beta versions of the Adobe Anywhere solution with a handful of customers, commercial release of the service is not expected until 2013. Pricing for the Adobe Anywhere service has not been set, but company officials say customers will pay an incremental fee to use the service in addition to the up-front investment made to purchase Adobe’s client-side creation tools.

What Steve thinks: The launch of Adobe Anywhere represents a tentative, timid step by Adobe into the world of cloud-based video content production. No actual video editing capabilities will be made available on a hosted basis. Instead, central servers only will be used to share video production updates on a near real-time basis.

In the evolving world of hosted video editing solutions, this still leaves Adobe short of the capabilities offered on a SaaS basis by emerging rivals, such as WeVideo and Mixmoov. Both start-ups feature hosted solutions in which the entire editing workflow can be accessed by users on a hosted basis. Typically, the hosted solutions cost far less than client-side video editing programs, such as Adobe Premiere and Apple’s Final Cut Pro.

The affordability and accessibility of hosted video solutions makes them a viable tool for enterprise video content creators who have needs for basic video editing capabilities without the cost of advanced client editing solutions typically used by video content creation professionals.

With Adobe Anywhere, the company infuses some of its flagship product offerings with a smattering of hosted capabilities that enhance their usefulness for existing customers — primarily video production professionals — already using Adobe’s client-side software. In the process, the company also offers content creators now using competing software solutions greater incentive to make the switch to the Adobe universe. (Standardizing

PAGE 3Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

environments, including military and government enterprises, and is approved for use by the United States Defense Information Systems Agency.

Web Conferencing / Team Workspaces / Learning Management

• Podio — which you may recall was acquired by Citrix for its hosted team workspace service earlier this year — has released a new iPad app that enables Podio-created apps built using its App Builder to work on the iPad just as they would on a PC or iPhone. Meanwhile Citrix has updated ShareFile with that nifty management tool anyone who must work with multiple mobile devices knows and loves: the ability to wipe a device of contents should it be lost or stolen. The capability also generates a log that reports if any files were compromised. And finally in Citrix-related news, Avistar has announced it has achieved a delivery milestone in its Citrix videoconferencing software integration project, the availability of the Citrix HDX Real-Time with Optimization Pack for Microsoft Lync 1.0. This software integrates and leverages the Avistar C3 Integrator solution.

• Saba Software has gained mightily on the stock market, surging 18% in late August after IBM announced it was purchasing HR management vendor Kenexa for $1.3 billion. The assumption is that Saba will be a takeover target for some other big gun envious of its cloud-based Learning Management

System / HR management software (which includes a revamped Centra web conferencing we wrote about earlier this year), much as Oracle purchased Taleo ($1.9 billion) and SAP purchased SuccessFactors ($3.4 billion). Meanwhile, Saba reportedly was struggling to meet U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission reporting requirements after its board had acknowledged the need to restate earnings for its fiscal years 2010 and 2011. Those restatements of earnings remain “in development” and the company is threatened with being delisted unless it delivers in the next month or so. Stay tuned.

• The Learning Management System space is hot, as is collaborative-centric educational and training technology in general. Desire2Learn has closed an $80 million strategic round of financing from New Enterprise Associates and OMERS Ventures. The investment will bolster Desire2Learn’s customer service and cloud infrastructure, support global growth, and accelerate its development of industry-leading education technologies as it continues to tackle Blackboard aggressively in education markets while going after corporate and governmental markets as well.

Podio for iPad app

Upcoming WR Speaking Appearances & Events

13 September, Chicago25 September, New York, NY18 October, Tampa, FL30 October, Anaheim, CA

Andrew W. Davis, AVI-SPL, Collaboration Expo 2012

9 October, 2012, Boston

WR CSP Summit, Hotel Commonwealth

24 October, Monterey, CA

Bill Haskins, VCI-Group 3rd Annual Conference

1 November, San Antonio

Alan D. Greenberg, WCET

28-29 November 2012, Singapore

WR UC&C Summit, Conrad Centennial Hotel

28-29 January, Amsterdam

WR UC&C Summit, NH Barbizon

16-17 July 2013, Santa Clara, California

WR UC&C Summit, Hyatt Regency Santa Clara

Other Analyst Travel to Industry Events

16-17 October, Los Angeles, CA

Ira Weinstein and Andy Nilssen, Cisco Collaboration Analyst and Consultant Summit

19-20 September, Santa Clara, CA

Andy Nilssen & Alan D. Greenberg, Citrix Industry Analyst Meeting

7-8 November, Denver, CO

Alan D. Greenberg, Educause

PAGE 4Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

• In another investment round, ClearSlide, a San Francisco-based developer of a communications platform for salespeople, has raised $28 million in new funds from Bessemer Venture Partners, Greylock Partners, and Felicis Ventures. This adds to $11 million raised in Series A Funding in September, 2011, and will be used to expand operations, open a New York sales office, and double its team of 110 employees. ClearSlide’s customers include CareerBuilder, Expedia, Gannett, and The Weather Channel, who use its technology that allows salespeople to share documents via a single URL and use the same URL to initiate phone or chat sessions. Cocktail party trivia: one of the company’s co-founders, Al Lieb, previously co-founded Evite in 1998.

• Brainshark has “slid” its SlideShark iPad app over to the iPhone. This new, free app provides users with the ability to view and show PowerPoint presentations properly on the iPhone or iPod touch, zoom in to better view content, share and track presentations, and connect to projectors or TVs for presentations to larger audiences.

Audio and Video Conferencing

• TenHands has announced the availability of its integrated group video conferencing service as a Facebook app to enable Facebook’s 800 million users to connect with friends via real-time, high-definition video. This application takes TenHands’ browser-centric, HTLM5, cloud-based architecture as a delivery platform for real-time communications. The TenHands Facebook app lets users see when friends are avail-able and launch free, HD “group” video calls of up to 20 users, seamlessly from within Facebook. Word is that TenHands intends to help Facebook go after Skype.

• Dialogic tells us that an independent testing agency, The Tolly Group, has awarded its performance certification to the Dialogic PowerMedia

Extended Media Server (PowerMedia XMS) Release 1.1. PowerMedia XMS is a software media server that enables real-time audio and video communications solutions for mobile and broadband environments on common data center server infrastructure. The Tolly Group testing confirmed that PowerMedia XMS 1.1 meets or exceeds criteria in areas of media server density, host CPU and memory utilization, call processing, media latency and voice quality as defined by the ITU.

• Polycom has just announced at the American Telemedicine Association Fall Forum its latest medical cart, the Polycom RealPresence Practitioner Cart 8000. Built on Rubbermaid Healthcare’s mobile platform, the cart is equipped with an HDX 8000 unit, Polycom EagleEye camera, and StereoSurround technology. Besides including AES encryption, the new cart also satisfies the latest U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Class I Medical Device Data Systems (MDDS) requirements.

• Last week IOCOM introduced Visimeet Mobile for iOS-enabled devices. Visimeet Mobile is a cloud-based video collaboration platform that enables face to face meetings from iPads and iPhones. The application allows users to receive PowerPoint presentations, share URLs for collaborative web browsing, send snapshot images from mobile cameras, and instant message with other meeting participants. Visimeet can connect with different endpoints simultaneously, including room systems, desktop PCs, notebooks, and mobile devices as well as telephone, ISDN, SIP, and H.323 connections. In late August IOCOM also announced Linux support for Visimeet.

• Video Guidance announced last week also that it can now provide integrated video conferencing to consumer-grade Skype and GoogleTalk video users, giving its customers additional ways to videoconference between their desktop PCs, mobile devices, and high-end video conferencing room systems. Meanwhile Providea also announced

Polycom Practitioner Cart 8000

PAGE 5Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

its Providea Gateway Service, a new cloud-based service designed to allow B2B connectivity between standards-based group systems and consumer-grade endpoints.

• Whitlock has launched its v-Scheduler managed services solution, which enables enterprise customers to schedule meeting rooms and automate video meetings from a simple user interface anywhere, anytime, and from any device. Whitlock’s v-Scheduler is powered by software provider MyVRM.

• PingTone Communications is now offering an always on, MeetMe HD B2B Video Conferencing service, available in “Office Share” and unlimited plans.

• Compass Business Solutions is in overdrive mode. In addition to being a Cisco Specialist Learning Partner, Compass is now a Cisco Business Learning Partner, providing sales training to Cisco and their Partners. Its sales training is also now included in Cisco’s EASE program, which is designed to assist resellers with obtaining training across Cisco’s architectures. As an equal opportunity training organization, Compass has launched new technical training, Video Communication Fundamentals, which provides entry level network, protocol and standards training that helps students prepare for Polycom’s CVE test. It’s also launched two new electronic courses related to TANDBERG TMS to expand its on-demand training portfolio.

• Vaddio has introduced a newly redesigned Hot-Shot Camera Controller. This device adds control for Vaddio’s ClearVIEW HD-Series PTZ cameras, and will support up to 16 presets. It can be used in conjunction with Vaddio’s preset trigger devices including the MicVIEW Mic Mixer / Switcher, StepVIEW Mats, AutoVIEW IR sensors, PresenterPOD and TouchVIEW. Triggering one of these devices will automatically send commands through the Hot-Shot to move the camera to a specified preset (wide-shot, lectern, whiteboard, etc.)

• In news of the weird, a RADVISION-commissioned survey determined that 40 percent of Americans have participated in a video call or video conference (note: not the same as uses video on a regular basis). Anyway, the weird part: one in ten employed adults do not view a bathroom as off-limits for work-related video calls. Reportedly those older than 35 are more likely to deem the bathroom as off-limits for these calls. Hmm … next thing you know we’ll see the “under 35 crowd” conducting work video calls while getting tattooed. Send an email to editor@wainhouse.com if you have an opinion on the matter.

Vaddio Hot-Shot Preset Camera Controller

Introducing one of the WR Bulletin Sponsors

Take control of your videoconferencing network.

VQ provides Conference Manager Software that boosts productivity in video operations. Our service enables operators to manage large volumes of calls from a single screen. Simple user tools allow self-service scheduling, automated call launching, and reporting. VQ Conference Manager means MCU’s from multiple manufacturers can be integrated to work together and managed centrally. A powerful API allows the creation of custom solutions. Whether you are a Service Provider or an Enterprise running a large video estate come join our global installed base.

Learn more at www.vqcomms.com

The WR Bulletin would like you to join us in thanking our sponsors:

Get your company’s name & link here! Contact Sales.

The fine print: Sponsorship of the WR Bulletin in no way implies that our sponsors endorse the opinions expressed in the WRB. Nor does it

imply that the Bulletin endorses their products or services. We remain an equal opportunity critic.

PAGE 6Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

International

• FreeConferenceCall.com has expanded its global presence by introducing service to Brazil, Italy, Poland, Belgium, and Bulgaria. Presumably these new countries — and we may have missed one or two — will add to the more than 20 million callers a month who use the company’s reservationless, free services.

• A little Hangzhou, China vendor, iSmart Video, has indicated it now offers an HD Lock & Track lecture camera that includes 20x / 1080p camera or a separate Sony EH6300 HD module. The camera is meant for classrooms, conference rooms, and security applications.

• Vitec Is now distributing StarLeaf in the German market, as well as ZTE products, while CommsPlus Distribution has been signed by Vidyo to serve as a distributor in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, and Papua New Guinea.

WR Collaborate! Web Seminar: SME’s Crash into the UCaaS Market

The hosted telephony market is undergoing a rapid shift from standalone telephony to hosted UC services. Small & medium enterprises (SME’s) are gobbling up these new services, quickly piloting and deploying them at a much faster rate than their counterparts in large enterprises. Office 365 with and without telephony, ShoreTel / M5, 8x8, Mitel, and a few others are dominating

the conversation. Telephony, instant messaging, email, office suites, and conferencing — all served up in the cloud for one low per user price. How does this trend impact premium collaboration services? Does personal

& web-based collaboration find a place? This session will explore these themes and provide a context for you to understand and address the upheaval UCaaS is creating within the SME telecom and collaboration market. Presenters: WR’s Marc Beattie and Bill Haskins. September 18, 2012 10 AM EDT. Register now!

Videoconferencing Hardware Shipments Hit the SkidsAndrew W. Davis, andrewwd@wainhouse.com

It’s hard to tell whether it’s the economy, the confusion around cloud, or just plain interest in BYOD, UC, HD web conferencing, and software solutions, but the fact is that this is now two quarters in a row of negative growth for the traditional appliance-based (read hardware) video conferencing room systems market. One thing we can say for sure after publishing our VC Spotcheck Q2 2012, however, is that the problems are not vendor-specific. It is not as if some vendor or two is messing with the channels or incompetent. The growth problems cross all product lines and all regions of the world. In fact, seven out of the eight top vendors reported negative growth in our quarterly collection of detailed shipment data. (If you can’t guess who the 8th one is, see the clue at the end of this story.)

An interesting result of the market share arithmetic is that a vendor can have a revenue decline and a market share increase at the same time. This is one of the reasons we never predict or forecast market shares. We try to report the news, not to make the news.

WHEN: September 18, 2012 10 AM EDTPresenters: WR’s Marc Beattie and Bill Haskins

Register Now uQ1 2008 – Q2 2012 Group VC Endpoint Revenues

Total Endpoint-Revenues$700

$600

$500

$400

$300

$200

$100

$0Q1-08 Q3-08 Q1-09 Q3-09 Q1-10 Q3-10 Q1-11 Q3-11 Q1-12

PAGE 7Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

Have friends? Want to make more friends? Forward this issue of the WR Bulletin and encourage them to read it and subscribe. Anyone can sign up for a free subscription at www.wainhouse.com/mail.

Clue to the puzzle above regarding which vendor did not see negative growth: begins with a P and ends with a “com.”

People & Places• LifeSize, Ray Villarreal, VP of Sales, Americas

• Polycom, Barry Morris, VP Federal Operations

• StarLeaf, Brian Musgrove, Americas Sales

• Video Guidance, Adam Anderson, Senior Account Manager Healthcare Markets

Endpoint Units

Polycom40%

Others17%

TeamChina

Cisco27%

Other TC9%

Huawei7%

Q2 2012 Group Videoconferencing Unit Market Share

WAINHOUSE RESEARCH

CSP SUMMITFALL 2012

Q2 2008 – Q2 2012 Group VC Sequential Revenue Growth

Sequential Growth Endpoint Revenues

30%

20%

10%

0%

-10%

-20%

-30%

Q2-08 Q4-08 Q2-09 Q4-09 Q2-10 Q4-10 Q2-11 Q4-11 Q2-12

CSP Summit October 9th, Boston! If you are a conferencing / collaboration service provider or technology partner involved in UC&C, this is the one event you must attend to prepare for 2013. WR analysts and vendors and service providers will cover every corner of UC&C. Three WR analysts are on the agenda. Hear Marc Beattie’s talk: UC & Personal Web-Based Services Muscle into CSP Territory — Will CSPs, UCaaS, and SI’s Fight it out or Collaborate? Andy Nilssen will talk about Going from Meetings-at-a-Distance to Working from Anywhere. Bill Haskins will cover UCaaS — Cloud-Based UC and whether there are viable alternatives to Microsoft Lync.

Al Balasco of Radisys will explore Over-the-Top (OTT) video calling and collaboration: opportunity or threat? Consumer OTT services are changing user expectations and habits about video, while setting expectations about the value of these services.

Conferencing service providers, who initially viewed OTT as a threat, are actually well positioned to exploit these new user adoption trends. In this session, Radisys will outline the new growth opportunities for CSPs to extend existing infrastructure and applications, through adding ubiquitous access for mobile and OTT clients. Compunetix and Cisco Systems also will be speaking, and we’d love to see you at the lovely Back Bay’s Hotel Commonwealth on October 9th. For more details and to register, visit wainhouse.com/cspsummit.

Al Balasco, Radisys

DIAMOND SPONSOR

SILVER SPONSORGOLD SPONSORS

PAGE 8Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

1:1 with Edgewater Networks – Dave Norman, CEO

WR: Briefly, what is Edgewater Networks? What do you do?

DN: Edgewater is focused on the network infrastructure needed for real-time communications such as video conferencing and VoIP. We manufacture Enterprise Session Border Controller devices that address the challenges that enterprises and service providers face in deploying secure and reliable Unified Communications. These challenges include device and protocol interoperability, security and policy management, troubleshooting and QoS. Our customers use our products to reduce operating expenses and simplify the management of their IP-based communications. We have more than 175,000 systems deployed today and we estimate our market share at about 25%.

WR: Are session border controllers (SBCs) your only business?

DN: Enterprise SBCs (ESBCs) are our principal business but the complete solution includes VoIP diagnostic, monitoring, and reporting software that reduces the overall cost of operating converged networks.

WR: SBCs became well known with the migration to voice over IP. How important are they in video and UC deployments?

DN: While video conferencing over IP has been around for a long time, it is only recently being recognized as a strategic or critical business asset for reducing costs, improving efficiency and creating more meaningful interactions with customers and partners. As video becomes more tightly integrated with UC systems and workers become increasingly mobile, it is more important than ever to apply standard corporate

policy to these communications, such as security. It is also important to ensure that there is interoperability between diverse devices and systems. ESBCs were developed to address these challenges and to facilitate B2B videoconferencing. If B2B is important to your readers, they should be looking at SBC solutions.

WR: How important to your revenue stream are video and UC deployments?

DN: Very important. Video conferencing is growing quickly; in addition the increased use of mobile clients running on phones, tablets, or laptops are additional drivers for growth as our customers use our products to securely extend their Unified Communications systems to these users.

WR: Besides voice, video, and UC, are SBCs used for other applications?

DN: Voice, video, and UC are the principal applications. Additional drivers for our growth are the increasing adoption of cloud services such as Hosted PBX and SIP Trunking.

WR: What other solutions are available to solve the problems that SBCs solve? Are there competing technologies?

DN: Other solutions include firewalls — however, traditional firewalls were designed for

very different traffic. As such, they are challenged to address the interoperability issues between video and voice devices, as real-time communications move to IP. Enterprises have found that these latency-sensitive applications require a dedicated solution that will ensure

As video becomes more tightly integrated with UC systems and workers become increasingly mobile, it is more important than ever to apply standard corporate policy to these communications, such as security.

PAGE 9Volume 13 Issue #18 / 12-September-12

© 2012 Wainhouse Research34 Duck Hill Terrace, Duxbury, MA 02332 USA Tel +1 617.500.8090

Editor: Alan D. Greenberg: agreenberg@wainhouse.comComments and PR news to: wrb@wainhouse.com

Feel free to forward this newsletter to colleagues. Free subscriptions: www.wainhouse.com/bulletin

Since the beginning of the company more than 10 years ago, Edgewater has been focused on the service provider (carrier/MSO) market and providing a solution for them to deploy to their enterprise customers. In many cases, we’re white labeled behind the service provider logo. In addition to that, we have distribution channels for the enterprise through one of the top video conferencing companies, three of the top 10 PBX manufacturers, and a network of over 150 leading VARs.

WR: What would you say is the distinctive competence of Edgewater Networks?

DN: Edgewater Networks is the only solution purpose-built to connect, protect, optimize, and monitor today’s voice and video traffic over IP networks.

WR: What do you see is the main competitive threat to the company — i.e., what keeps you up at night?

DN: We see the overall market as growing very quickly and feel that we are well positioned to capitalize on this growth. While there are other strong players in this space, the market growth (previous and forecast) has lifted all of them. One challenge for the category is the traditional reliance on service providers that purchase the ESBCs and deploy them on behalf of their enterprise customers. Service providers understand the value of an ESBC in reliably connecting their customers to cloud services but the industry needs to do a better job of educating enterprises about the benefits so that they can make the ESBC choice independent of their service provider. We are starting to see this happen in our larger enterprise deployments where there are often services from multiple service providers in use and a need by the enterprise to manage their own security policy as it relates to real-time traffic. As awareness around the security issues of real-time communications grows this trend will accelerate and drive adoption of ESBCs directly by small and medium business as well.

the highest levels of service for end users. Additionally, as UC takes off, many enterprises are struggling with the security aspects of extending their headquarters-based UC solutions to remote employees. Traditional firewalls are not ideal for supporting UC’s real-time protocols and enterprise IT is reluctant to make changes to the sometimes hundreds of firewall policies that have been handcrafted over years to support new voice and video devices. As a result, the true value of costly enterprise investments in UC applications is not always extended beyond the corporate headquarters to branch offices. ESBCs are typically deployed as another security layer working in conjunction with existing perimeter security devices to protect the enterprise.

WR: What is the connection between SIP trunking, hosted PBX, and Edgewater Networks?

DN: Our solution is used by service providers to deliver these cloud services while ensuring the business-class reliability that enterprise customers demand. Interoperability, security, traffic management, survivability, diverse routing, and visibility into the performance quality of these communications are some of the key functions we provide.

WR: Ok, if I’m an end user customer, how would I get an SBC installed, and who would I call. So tell me about your channels and go to market strategy. Do you sell direct?

DN: There are two options: 1) work with your service provider to install the ESBC they offer, or 2) work directly with one of the ESBC manufacturers to install their equipment independent of the service provider. The former has been the prevalent model for the past several years, however this is now changing. More and more enterprises are now seeking to take control of this strategic element of their network infrastructure and are deploying ESBCs independent of their service provider.