Enterprise Workers Ready to Ditch Their PCs for Smartphones?

Something rather unusual seems to be happening in the enterprise mobility space. According to a recent survey taken by iPass, 63 percent of mobile employees prefer to use a smartphone, not a laptop, as their primary mobile device, for trips of any length.

For trips of up to five days, 59 percent of respondents prefer to carry a smartphone, while 41 percent prefer a laptop. For trips lasting longer than 30 days, 64 percent prefer a smartphone to a laptop.

That likely is testament to the high value traveling workers place on voice and text communications, as well as the increased capabilities smartphones now offer, including email and Web access.

But the findings also suggest that some enterprises are over-investing in laptops and software and might need to look at scenarios where mobile or traveling workers can get along just fine with smartphones.

There is another and possibly darker view here as well. Industry suppliers have been touting mobility investments as a driver of productivity. As it now appears, enterprise workers do not even want to carry laptops with them when traveling. So what is the value of all those investments in remote access?

Granted, most enterprises likely are trying to get a better handle on mobile phone expenses, so indiscriminate replacment might not be wise. But the survey also suggests the near-universal embrace of the BlackBerry has "soft" support from users.

According to the iPass survey, while 32 percent of mobile employees ranked the BlackBerry smartphone as their mobile device of choice, 54 percent of BlackBerry smartphone users would switch to an Apple iPhone if it was supported by their enterprise.

"Mobility" also once was an issue of supporting traveling workers. Today every employee
is a potential mobile employee, iPass says. While many mobile employees have some business travel, many more are logging in from home.

About 68 percent of iPass survey respondents did not travel during the last quarter of 2009, but  45.8 percent of mobile employees logged in from home at least twice a month, and 16.8 percent logged in more than ten times a month.

Excluding home and the office, mobile employees most often log in from hotels (42.6 percent), airports (27.2 percent), retail outlets and restaurants (27 percent).

According to the iPass survey, while 32 percent of mobile employees ranked the BlackBerry smartphone as their mobile device of choice, 54 percent of BlackBerry smartphone users would switch to an Apple iPhone if it was supported by their enterprise.

Business Prepaid Wireless Heats Up

Business customers have not been big users of prepaid mobile services. But that could be changing. Compass Intelligence expects growth of about 10 percent over each of the next three years.

Estimated to represent approximately five million of the 57 million prepaid subscribers by the end of 2010, prepaid business users make up a small part of the prepaid market at the moment, and is a recent trend.

About 60 percent of of decision-makers offering employees prepaid devices say they have done so far one year or more,” says Kneko Burney, Chief Strategist of Compass Intelligence.

One would be tempted to suggest that a new frugality caused by the recession is the reason business prepaid is picking up, and that likely is part of the explanation. But one might also suggest that more businesses are trying to control fast-growing mobile expenses. Shifting to prepaid is one way to do so.

“The real finding here is that the 'corporate liable' segment of the overall wireless market (representing roughly 14 percent of all wireless subscribers) is expected to change as a result this increase in business prepaid," ays Burney. Contracts will need to become more flexible and carriers will be wise to find a way to accommodate business needs for “prepaid-like” options in contracts, particularly for mobile broadband and possibly even push-to-talk.”

Decision-makers are most likely to provide prepaid devices to “sales people,” executives, business owners, IT or telecom staffs.

For many, the primary reason that prepaid is attractive is because it is “less of a hassle compared to a monthly contract.”

Prepaid mobile broadband also is getting traction. Many respondents to the Compass Intelligence survey say they will be buying nearly as many prepaid mobile broadband devices as prepaid mobile phones in 2010.

Junction Networks Adds Standard Conferencing Features

Junction Networks has added new features to its business voice service packages at no additional cost, providing users features they have asked for, the company says.

“Our goal is to deliver the most cost effective, business-class phone service for 5-100 users. Now, our customers benefit from more features like conference bridging for 15 people and acd queues while still paying under $20 per user, monthly,” stated Michael Oeth, CEO of Junction Networks.

The "Small Business" OnSIP package, which costs $99.95 a month, now includes 15 voicemail boxes; four attendant menus; four groups; a conference bridge and an ACD (automatic call distributor) queue.

The "Medium Business" package, selling for $199.95 a month, now includes 50 voicemail boxes,
six  attendant menus, six groups, five conference bridges and two ACD queues.

The OnSIP Conference Bridge has also been reduced to only $19.95 per month, with a 15 user limit.

The changes are based on customer feedback, especially demand for conferencing features.

The enhancements are examples of two fundamental trends. First, IP telephony providers continually strive to provide more value to their users, often at no incremental cost, sometimes at low cost.

Second, end user demand for conferencing features illustrates the more-important role one-to-many and many-to-many communications now are assuming in the business world. Though much voice and email communications continues in one-to-one mode, lots of other activity has moved to one-to-many channels. Blog posts, microblogging, social network updates and podcasts, for example, are augmenting traditional one-to-one communications.

Hardware Sales Flat, Software up 4.8%, Telecom up 2.3% in 2010, Says Gartner

Providers of information technology solutions likely will have to emphasize customer retention more than customer acquisition in 2010 and 2011 because of a sales environment that will remain challenging, says Richard Gordon, Gartner Research VP. That said, sales of IT hardware and software will grow about 3.3 percent in 2010, about in line with telecom service provider revenue growth of 3.2 percent.

Enterprise hardware sales, for example, will show zero growth in 2010, compared to 2009, Gartner forecasts, in part because hardware lifecycles have lengthened.

Software sales, on the other hand, should grow 4.8 percent, says Gartner.

What Will Enterprises Buy in 2010?

It always is dangerous to make predications about what enterprises will do when extrapolating from what they did last year, and what executives say they will do in the coming year, and doubling difficult at transition points, which is where enterprise IT managers likely will find themselves in early 2010.

As IT spending clearly was under pressure in 2009,. the issue is how much growth will happen in 2010 as postponed projects must be started, and how much top-line revenue growth enterprises actually can eke out, since it is hard to see a sustained increase in IT spending without top-line revenue growth. Up to this point in 2009, profitability increases at most enterprises have come because of cost cutting, not revenue growth, and that cannot continue indefinitely.

Investments for cost cutting for that reason appear to have been a big priority for enterprises in 2009. About 24 percent of those polled say cutting telecom and network costs were a critical priority, and 48 percent say  it was a high priority.

But some underlying trends likely will re-emerge in 2010. Data center consolidation has been a high priority for cost and disaster recovery reasons, with 24 percent of respondents. saying that is a “critical” priority and 43 percent saying it is a “high” priority.

About 40 percent of enterprise executives say mobility, collaboration and voice over IP continue to be high or critical priorities.

Desktop IP telephony migration continues, while other VoIP technologies of high interest also will get attention. Some 34 percent of enterprises say they already have implemented or are implementing desktop VoIP, and an additional 14 percent are expanding or upgrading their VoIP environment.

IP conferencing, including Web, video, and audio, while not yet implemented widely, have high interest as well. 

Cost savings, faster communication, and decision speed are values that drive UC adoption, says Ellen Daley, Forrester Research analyst. UC adoption continues to see traction, as well. About 21 percent of firms report that they are already, or are currently implementing, a UC solution, while nine percent are expanding or upgrading their current UC solution.

About 15 percent say they are piloting one. An additional 39 percent of firms are interested in or are considering UC solutions.

The top motivation for adopting UC is cost savings, followed by increasing communication between users. It appears enterprise executives are more comfortable with UC as well.

Some 51 percent of executives say they understand how UC will affect the way their companies do business. Still, about 32 percent of respondents say they still have some questions about UC value.

Integrated voice, email, and instant messaging top the list of the most desired features for UC.

Web conferencing and audio- and videoconferencing capability come in second while presence, allowing others to see coworkers’ status, comes in third.

Almost half of enterprises buy managed services, and though cost savings are a factor, freeing up time to focus on core business issues has grown as a driver of perceived value.

About 62 percent of respondents say that they have already purchased or are interested in purchasing managed or outsourced telecommunication services.

Unlike in past years, the top reason isn’t cost savings, although it is still high on the list. Instead, firms are opting for managed services to enable them to focus on their core business competencies.  

Telecom and network buyers are also interested in managed services beyond physical networks and telecom services like multiprotocol label switching. Web conferencing and or collaboration are the most popular managed services among respondents.

About 52 percent of those polled say they are very or somewhat interested in the technology.

Firms also are interested in network-based security services (46 percent), storage and backup services (44 percent) and data center services (43 percent).

About 51 percent are using IP technologies for contact centers. About eight percent are piloting IP contact center implementations, 31 percent are implementing now and

12 percent say they are upgrading or expanding their existing IP contact center capabilities.

So far, though, enterprise executives have lukewarm interest in hosted contact center solutions, Daley says.

Close to half of firms (49 percent) expect their overall number of contact center seats to remain about the same over the next year, with similar portions either increasing (23 percent) or decreasing (24 percent) seats.

Outsourcing of contact center seats is a different matter, though, says Daley. About 30 percent of firms report planning to outsource more of their contact center seats, while 51 percent of firms anticipate no change.

Both MPLS and Ethernet wide area networks are popular. About 36 percent of those polled say they already have completed their firm’s migration to MPLS. Ethernet adoption is which is growing fast as well, but has not yet reached use of MPLS, Daley says.

Managed MPLS is also popular, with 30 percent of firms already using it, and 22 percent of firms using managed Ethernet service.

Cost is the most important criterion when choosing landline data service providers, respondents say. About 60 percent of buyers say that is a very important consideration.

Service level agreements are important to 49 percent of respondents. Vendor pricing models, especially clarity on service elements and options, are very important to 43 percent of buyers.

Nearly 65 percent of respondents say they have, or are implementing, wireless local area

networks. And while SMB respondents generally are not that interested in public data networking, enterprise executives are much more interested both in fixed WiMAX (23 percent) and mobile WiMAX (25 percent) of respondents.

The majority of respondents have deployed wireless email or BlackBerry applications. Customer-facing applications dominate, though there is interest in line-of-business apps as well, though little buying as of yet, says Daley.

The majority of enterprises buy vendors’ mobile versions of existing packaged applications (41 percent), but a large portion also are developed in-house (35 percent) or are custom-built by third parties (33 percent).

Cost is the most important criterion (68 percent) for choosing a mobile network service provider, followed by domestic coverage (56 percent).

83% of Enterprises Have Deployed Unified Communications

About 83 percent of 745 North American enterprise and mid-market executives have unified communications capabilities in place, or are planning to, while 17 percent report they still are not interested, says Henry Dewing, Forrester Research analyst.

Web conferencing and collaboration services, though, are seen as a priority by 55 percent of SMB respondents, as well as storage and backup services, also seen as a priority by 55 percent of SMB respondents.

Integrated communications that unify voice, email and instant messaging are the most-wanted capabilities, with twice the number of executives saying that is important, compared to other features such as presence, integration with business applications, can conferencing capabilities.

That isn’t to say there is little or no interest in features such as desktop call control or mobile integration, but that demand for those features is about 2.5 times less important than unified handling of voice, email and IM traffic.

And while demand for specific features is relatively unevenly distributed, the business value drivers are fairly broadly distributed. Saving money, providing better customer service, improving communication flows and saving time all are cited as key values.

At a time of very-tight information technology budgets, more than a third of respondents say they are hiking spending on hardware, servers and desktop software. About 15 percent report they are increasing spending for managed UC services.

The situation at small and medium-sized businesses and organizations is a bit different, as you might suspect. Where 83 percent of enterprises have unified communications projects in place or in progress, only about 24 percent of SMBs say that is the case at their organizations.

And about 20 percent of SMB executives surveyed say they really have no interest in UC.

And though it seems logical to many of us that SMBs remain prime candidates for hosted services that avoid major capital investments, most SMB executives say they are more interested in premises-based solutions.

When asked how interested they are in buying a managed UC solution sometime in the next 12 months, 56 percent of SMB executives say they “are not interested.”

About 21 percent say they are “somewhat” interested while four percent say they are “very interested.” About 11 percent of SMB executives surveyed by Forrester Research say they currently are using a hosted UC solution.

So it appears industry advocates have some ways yet to go in convincing SMB executives that hosted UC solutions are a better approach than premises solutions.

Recent surveys of IP telephony adoption by SMBs have suggested a similar attitude towards hosted IP telephony as well. About a quarter of SMB executives say they would consider a hosted IP telephony solution, while about three quarters still say they would be more comfortable with a premises-based solution.

Call it habit, inertia or lack of trust. SMB executives still have not embraced hosted IP telephony at rates many of us expected. Some have suggested that fear about making a mistake with a mission critical tool is compounded by fear of choosing the wrong supplier.

Extreme fragmentation of the supplier base, as also is typical of the information technology support business, means no single name generally stands out—in the service provider space—as a “logical” supplier of IP telephony or unified communications.

On the other hand, buyers seem more familiar with the brand names of the firms supplying them phone systems, which then are likely vehicles for a move to IP telephony or unified communications as well.

So far, the hosted IP telephony industry does not seem to have tipped the scales, though one might argue that 25 percent penetration of the customer base for a relatively new solution is not shabby.

Will Telecom Markets Grow in 2010?

Worldwide telecom spending will decline four percent in 2009 with revenue of nearly $1.9 trillion. In 2010, telecom spending is forecast to grow 3.2 percent, say researchers at Gartner. The question lots of people logically will have is what pattern growth in U.S. enterprise and smaller business markets will take.

Qwest provided some anecdotal evidence during its third quarter earnings report. "As far as the activity in BMG and wholesale, I would say, yes. we are seeing some quicker decision making," says Teresa Taylor, Qwest COO. "Quicker decision making" is a sign of more buying intent and activity, as longer decision cycles represent less intent and activity.

Qwest's business markets group sells to enterprises, so the anecdote suggests enterprise demand, at least for Qwest, is growing. Business markets segment income of $409 million was flat, compared to the second quarter, but increased 11 percent year over year.

The caveat here is that Qwest believes it has been doing better than AT&T and Verizon over the last couple of quarters. All Taylor will say that trends are "positive."

Email Remains Enterprise Collaboration Killer App

Email remains the enterprise collaboration "killer app," according to a new Forrester Research survey of some 2,000 enterprises (click image for larger view).

And despite the hype, most "Web 2.0" applications are not widely adopted, the survey finds. In fact, email, word processing, Web browsers and spreadsheets are the top four applications used by information workers, the survey finds.

But even among those apps, the level of involvement or expertise varies widely. While 60 percent of employees use word processing daily, only 42 percent actually
create documents.

Most other applications are used by only a minority of information workers.

One clear area of demand, though, is smartphones. The survey suggests that only about 11 percent of information workers actually use smartphones now, but 33 percent of respndents say they use a personal mobile phone for work purposes.

About 21 percent of respondents would like to get email outside of work, and 15 percent would like email on a smartphone.

· Collaboration tools are "stalled out", says Ted Schadler, Forrester Research analyst. Collaboration tools are important for people on a team, particularly if that team is distributed across many locations, he says. But the tools are not widely adopted.

Only 25 percent of enterprise information workers uses Web conferencing and
one in five uses team sites.

That leaves email with 87 percent adoption as the default collaboration tool for most people.

Forrester surveyed 2,001 U.S. information workers as part of the study, focusing on
employees of organizations with 100 or more employees. About 44 percent of respondents indicated they work at organizations of 5,000 or more employees.

Still, it’s really location flexibility that matters most to employee productivity, and laptop users at
companies with wireless access and secure network access benefit from that.

Telework is on the rise, poised to grow to 63 million U.S. information workers by 2016, says Schadler.

Federal Telecom Spending $47 Billion in 2009, Growing

Federal information technology spending on IT reached $129 billion in 2008, and will increase in the mid single-digits through 2013, when spending will reach $159 billion, say analysts at Compass Intelligence.

The largest category of Federal IT spending is in the telecom segment, which will receive a big boost due to new Federal policies regarding broadband.

Telecom spending by the Federal government will reach $47 billion in 2009, ramping up faster than many other categories to reach $59 billion by 2013."

Enterprise iPhone, Courtesy of Avaya

Avaya's one-X Mobile client software, expected to be available in Europe in the first quarter of 2008, will enable the iPhone to be integrated into most enterprise IP telecommunications networks.

From the first quarter of 2008, an easy-to-use, downloadable interface will convert mobile devices from Apple, RIM, Palm, Motorola, LG, Nokia, Samsung, Sanyo, Sony Ericsson and others into another endpoint on the corporate network. From the iPhone, users will have iPhone-optimized access to the Avaya one-X Mobile interface, making the iPhone their personal remote control for enterprise communications.

Enterprise IM Shift: What to Do with the PBX?

Though we take it for granted that businesses "must" use a business phone system, that might be quite so true in just several years. In fact, Gartner predicts that by the end of 2011, IM will be the de facto tool for voice, video and text chat at the largest global enterprises.

Gartner estimates that 95 percent of workers in leading global organizations will be using IM as their primary interface for real-time communications by 2013. If that proves correct, we may now be witnessing the last wave of business phone system upgrades, as lucrative as the IP phone business, in its managed, hosted and premises-based incarnations, now appears to be.

There are other possible changes in store. Voice has been a one-to-one sort of communications pattern; mostly real time but with an ever-increasing asynchronous format. But with wikis, blogs, Plaxo, Facebook and other tools with a social and "push" updating capability, more forms of communication shift to a one-to-many, asynchronous mode.

One sort of "broadcasts" what one is doing, working on or needing help with, and the network just sort of responds as appropriate. Not good for control freaks, the ego-obsessed, the self-absorbed or mildly incompetent. People who are more respected, more trusted, more helpful, more knowledgeable and open will get more help than those who are in some significant ways "non-social." Winners and losers will be produced by the shift of communication modes.

As AOL's third IM survey shows, "everybody" now uses IM in their "consumer" life roles. The issue is how that will play out in the business context.

And though one might not yet see the change in the small business market, IM systems have moved from the fringe to become a key part of an enterprise’s collaboration infrastructure and increasingly are displacing existing forms of communications from ad hoc telephone calls and emails to pre-planned meetings and video conferences, says Gartner.

For many knowledge workers, instant messaging (IM) is as critical as having access to a telephone or to e-mail and enterprises that haven’t already done so should start incorporating IM into their critical business processes immediately, say analysts at Gartner.

“Although consumer IM use has been predominant in business, we expect penetration levels for enterprise grade IM to rise from around 25 percent currently to nearly 100 percent by the end of the decade,” said David Mario Smith, Gartner research analyst.