Got some new industry research to share, and the news is good. Back in late 2010, Metaswitch Networks did some ground-breaking research with SMBs to better understand their thinking around communications technologies, especially their phone systems. I produced a position paper for them based on the data, which gave me first-hand access to the detailed findings.
SMBs don't just buy on price, and we all have a lot to learn about this huge segement of the business market, especially UC vendors and service providers. Well, I'm happy to say that Metaswitch Networks has updated this research and am even happier to say that there's lots of upside for those who take the time to understand what really drives SMBs.
Metaswitch is just starting to get the word out, and I got the first analyst briefing about it last week. There's lots to digest, and they've done a nice job summarizing the key findings in a public document you can access from their website.
Before you do that, though, I'm going to steer you to my analysis of that summary, which has just been posted on the UCStrategies portal. UC wasn't in the mainstream vernacular in 2010, but it is now, and since UC is a key element of the research, UCS is the logical home for my writeup. So, please give it a read, share your thoughts with us, and if you want to learn more, give their research summary a read as well.
Wednesday, July 31, 2013
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
Smart Grid Future Outlook Webinar - Thursday, July 18
Back from vacation now - haven't been online much for a while and slowly catching up to things. Non-stop busy since returning, and I wanted to do a final shout-out for this webinar tomorrow. I've been doing a fair bit lately with Zpryme, and this webinar is going to be very well attended.
We'll be talking about where the smart grid is going, and along with myself, there will be presentations from eMeter, Bluebonnet Elecctric Cooperative, Arizona Public Service and NAESB. It's another strong lineup, and with five speakers, this will be a 90 minute event. I hope you can join us - we start at 1pm ET, and the full details can be found here.
We'll be talking about where the smart grid is going, and along with myself, there will be presentations from eMeter, Bluebonnet Elecctric Cooperative, Arizona Public Service and NAESB. It's another strong lineup, and with five speakers, this will be a 90 minute event. I hope you can join us - we start at 1pm ET, and the full details can be found here.
Friday, July 5, 2013
Zpryme Webinar - Future Solutions for the Smart Grid
Pretty busy here just before disappearing on a family vacation. Am happily wearing my smart grid hat now and donning my dual role of host and presenter for an upcoming Zpryme webinar. These events are getting great takeup and the last two I've done have been really good. First rate panelists, up-to-the-minute research and solid insights from leading companies in this space.
So, if the smart grid crystal ball piques your interest, you'll want to join us on Thursday, July 18 at 1pm ET. Joining me will be speakers from eMeter (a Siemens company), Arizona Public Service, Bluebonnet Electric Co-op, and NAESB - North American Energy Standards Board.
If you lived through the disruption of Hurricane Sandy, you'll know how vulnerable our aging power grid can be, and this is the place to be to learn how the smart grid will better prepare us for future disruptions.
The webinar is free, and runs 90 minutes - we have a lot of ground to cover. Here are the details about the topic and our speakers, as well as how to register. See you there!
So, if the smart grid crystal ball piques your interest, you'll want to join us on Thursday, July 18 at 1pm ET. Joining me will be speakers from eMeter (a Siemens company), Arizona Public Service, Bluebonnet Electric Co-op, and NAESB - North American Energy Standards Board.
If you lived through the disruption of Hurricane Sandy, you'll know how vulnerable our aging power grid can be, and this is the place to be to learn how the smart grid will better prepare us for future disruptions.
The webinar is free, and runs 90 minutes - we have a lot of ground to cover. Here are the details about the topic and our speakers, as well as how to register. See you there!
Merits of UC in the Cloud - EM360 Podcast/Article Now Posted
Enterprise Management 360 is a UK-based venture focused on thought leadership for IT executives from the analyst community. This is another entity that engages me on occasion, and my most recent involvement was an interview I did with Todd Abbot of Sonus back in May.
They do a good job of bringing industry leaders to the table, and a few weeks back, they had me lead a roundtable panel on the business case and reservations about putting UC in the cloud. It's a huge topic these days, and we had a great group on hand.
Joining me was Sanjay Bhatia of GENBAND, Richard Bennett of Avaya, and Jon Martin of BT Global. I really enjoyed having views from both vendors and carriers, as this presents major implications - and opportunities for each as they struggle to maintain ownership of the end customer.
We had so much to talk about that the podcast was broken up into three distinct segments. EM360 has just posted them here on their website where you can download and listen any time.
They've also included excerpts in their flagship quarterly glossy magazine. The Q4 edition is in distribution now to subscribers, and the digital version is now running live. Here's the link, and the transcript from part of our podcast runs on pages 12-15.
I hope you find this content helpful, and comments are most welcome.
They do a good job of bringing industry leaders to the table, and a few weeks back, they had me lead a roundtable panel on the business case and reservations about putting UC in the cloud. It's a huge topic these days, and we had a great group on hand.
Joining me was Sanjay Bhatia of GENBAND, Richard Bennett of Avaya, and Jon Martin of BT Global. I really enjoyed having views from both vendors and carriers, as this presents major implications - and opportunities for each as they struggle to maintain ownership of the end customer.
We had so much to talk about that the podcast was broken up into three distinct segments. EM360 has just posted them here on their website where you can download and listen any time.
They've also included excerpts in their flagship quarterly glossy magazine. The Q4 edition is in distribution now to subscribers, and the digital version is now running live. Here's the link, and the transcript from part of our podcast runs on pages 12-15.
I hope you find this content helpful, and comments are most welcome.
Ziff Davis Webinar - Evolution of Fax
I'm a regular contributor to Ziff Davis for UC thought leadership, and when the stars line up, they engage me with their webinars.
Got a new one coming soon to tell you about. This webinar is about the evolution of fax, with the main focus being the virtues of cloud-based offerings. The evolutionary path taken by fax has parallels to telephony, and I'll be talking about that during my presentation.
The webinar is on Tuesday, July 16 at 1pm ET, and full details about the topic and how to register are on this web page.
I need to get the word out now as I'll be on vacation next week and won't be blogging again until I'm back on the 15th. Hope you can join us!
Got a new one coming soon to tell you about. This webinar is about the evolution of fax, with the main focus being the virtues of cloud-based offerings. The evolutionary path taken by fax has parallels to telephony, and I'll be talking about that during my presentation.
The webinar is on Tuesday, July 16 at 1pm ET, and full details about the topic and how to register are on this web page.
I need to get the word out now as I'll be on vacation next week and won't be blogging again until I'm back on the 15th. Hope you can join us!
Friday, June 28, 2013
If I was a channel, would I partner with Mitel?
There's a pretty direct question, huh?
Am just back from Mitel's 2013 Business Partner Conference, and yesterday I posted my initial thoughts and takeaways. You'll have to read that to get my take, but there's a longer sequel that's running now on the UCStrategies portal, where I contribute a monthly thought leadership piece.
As the title of this - and that - post implies, I'm putting myself in the shoes of channel partners, a community that accounted for the vast majority of attendees at the BPC. I think it's an important question for them, and from Mitel's perspective, maybe even more so important for the partners who were not there and perhaps represent the future for Mitel. After all, the channel drives the business, and it's becoming a real challenge to find the right partners who are both willing and able to sell UC, especially as the cloud obliterates legacy business models.
That's what I'm exploring in this writeup, and is based on my BPC impressions on what Mitel has done to turn things around. They're definitely on the right track, but there's still plenty of risk out there and more needs to be done before they can realize the vision their management team mapped out for us this week. I invite you to read my post, and as always, your comments are welcome!
Am just back from Mitel's 2013 Business Partner Conference, and yesterday I posted my initial thoughts and takeaways. You'll have to read that to get my take, but there's a longer sequel that's running now on the UCStrategies portal, where I contribute a monthly thought leadership piece.
As the title of this - and that - post implies, I'm putting myself in the shoes of channel partners, a community that accounted for the vast majority of attendees at the BPC. I think it's an important question for them, and from Mitel's perspective, maybe even more so important for the partners who were not there and perhaps represent the future for Mitel. After all, the channel drives the business, and it's becoming a real challenge to find the right partners who are both willing and able to sell UC, especially as the cloud obliterates legacy business models.
That's what I'm exploring in this writeup, and is based on my BPC impressions on what Mitel has done to turn things around. They're definitely on the right track, but there's still plenty of risk out there and more needs to be done before they can realize the vision their management team mapped out for us this week. I invite you to read my post, and as always, your comments are welcome!
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Mitel Business Partner Conference - First Thoughts
Seems like I just got here, and I'm going home in about 3 hours. This year's Business Partner Conference has flown by, and that's an indication of a well run event. Well, it's also because Mitel has done a great job with the program and the news has generally been good - surprisingly good.
I'm just going to share some quick takeaways here, and in the next day or so, I'll have a longer piece about BPC 2013 on UCStrategies.
Outside In - that's the theme this year, and it's all about being more customer-centric. It's an about-face from convention where the business is done from the inside out. In other words, you do things based on what works for you, which is fine when you have a lot of market power, but very few companies truly have that any more. So, Mitel has definitely glommed on to the idea of being customer-centric, and it sure looks like there's a cultural shift happening with them.
You can see it in how they're doing business now, what they're talking about, how they're engaging with channels and some moves they've made on the management front. Most notable for this last point is the addition of Martyn Etherington as their CMO. He's a solid marketeer and really knows what needs to be done. Some pretty exciting initiatives underway on that front, and if they execute well, you should expect to see Mitel register much more often in converstations about UC, cloud, contact center, mobility, video, etc.
Underlying all of these good vibes is a solid performance on the financial front, and we heard about this from CFO, Steve Spooner. Compared to a year ago, it sounded like Mitel was on the right track then, but it wasn't so clear how well things were going to go. Well, now we know, and the numbers bear this out. Top line still has a way to go, but they're profitable, margins are solid, they have money in the bank, a healthy line of credit, and they's been discplined paying down the debt they took on to acquire Inter Tel.
The numbers tell a good story both in absolute and relative terms. These days, anyone looks good compared to Avaya's financials, and alongside them, they selectively showed how things stack up against ShoreTel and Aastra. These companies are comparable in size to Mitel, but their numbers are weaker, so these are logical targets. If we're looking across the broader landscape, it's hard to ignore Cisco, MSFT, NEC, Siemens and even Interactive Intelligence, so if you want to take this comparative analysis down a notch, sure, this crowd would mute the story a bit. However, it's Mitel's show, and their job is to put the company in the best light possible to partners, upon whom their success largely depends.
Overall, there's no doubt that the vendors in general are struggling to keep up with the various technology changes that are disrupting things for everybody. Some are doing better than others, but it's certainly fair to say that Mitel is holding its own pretty well. For me, that's the biggest takeway from BPC, and the better they can get living the outside-in mantra, the more successful they'll become. This is definitely a challenging market space and there are no guarantees for anyone. Technology alone isn't going to be enough, and when you look at things like culture, leadership and go-to-market strategy, I like what Mitel has in place now. If they've fallen off the radar for you, they warrant a second look. You don't have to be the biggest to be the best - these days it's more important to be agile and in touch with what drives value for your customers, and that's what I'm seeing here.
I'm just going to share some quick takeaways here, and in the next day or so, I'll have a longer piece about BPC 2013 on UCStrategies.
Outside In - that's the theme this year, and it's all about being more customer-centric. It's an about-face from convention where the business is done from the inside out. In other words, you do things based on what works for you, which is fine when you have a lot of market power, but very few companies truly have that any more. So, Mitel has definitely glommed on to the idea of being customer-centric, and it sure looks like there's a cultural shift happening with them.
You can see it in how they're doing business now, what they're talking about, how they're engaging with channels and some moves they've made on the management front. Most notable for this last point is the addition of Martyn Etherington as their CMO. He's a solid marketeer and really knows what needs to be done. Some pretty exciting initiatives underway on that front, and if they execute well, you should expect to see Mitel register much more often in converstations about UC, cloud, contact center, mobility, video, etc.
Underlying all of these good vibes is a solid performance on the financial front, and we heard about this from CFO, Steve Spooner. Compared to a year ago, it sounded like Mitel was on the right track then, but it wasn't so clear how well things were going to go. Well, now we know, and the numbers bear this out. Top line still has a way to go, but they're profitable, margins are solid, they have money in the bank, a healthy line of credit, and they's been discplined paying down the debt they took on to acquire Inter Tel.
The numbers tell a good story both in absolute and relative terms. These days, anyone looks good compared to Avaya's financials, and alongside them, they selectively showed how things stack up against ShoreTel and Aastra. These companies are comparable in size to Mitel, but their numbers are weaker, so these are logical targets. If we're looking across the broader landscape, it's hard to ignore Cisco, MSFT, NEC, Siemens and even Interactive Intelligence, so if you want to take this comparative analysis down a notch, sure, this crowd would mute the story a bit. However, it's Mitel's show, and their job is to put the company in the best light possible to partners, upon whom their success largely depends.
Overall, there's no doubt that the vendors in general are struggling to keep up with the various technology changes that are disrupting things for everybody. Some are doing better than others, but it's certainly fair to say that Mitel is holding its own pretty well. For me, that's the biggest takeway from BPC, and the better they can get living the outside-in mantra, the more successful they'll become. This is definitely a challenging market space and there are no guarantees for anyone. Technology alone isn't going to be enough, and when you look at things like culture, leadership and go-to-market strategy, I like what Mitel has in place now. If they've fallen off the radar for you, they warrant a second look. You don't have to be the biggest to be the best - these days it's more important to be agile and in touch with what drives value for your customers, and that's what I'm seeing here.
Banging the drums - change is coming at Mitel. Nice Blue Man Group-styled opening routine to set the stage. How about catching the moment here by getting "rhythm" in my photo! :-)
CEO Rich McBee
CMO Martyn Etherington
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