Microsoft Lync Deployments are Not Yet Getting Off the Ground

According to Jeff Wellemeyer, executive VP at West IP Communications, Microsoft is experiencing less Lync business distribution and widespread usage than expected. Currently, enterprises seem to only be utilizing presence, instant messaging and audio conferencing.

Wellemeyer puts this down to the fact that enterprises are confused by the complexity of using the Lync platform to connect their external communications networks with IP networks.

It makes sense then that West IP Communications provides a complete service to assist companies in linking on-premise components of Lync to off-premise telephony IP networks. West IP has adopted a hybrid method that enables businesses to manage their own on-premise elements of Lync, while taking advantage of Media Cloud for external connections.

Senior analyst in unified communications at Wainhouse Research, Bill Haskins, claims that while more than 80 percent of enterprises are using Instant Messaging (IM) solutions today for business communications, only 10 percent of those have also deployed a full feature set to include audio, video, and conferencing.

Haskins has suggested that the moves from Lync as a system for instant messaging to Lync as a system for conferencing or a PBX create increasing layers of confusion and complexity for IT organizations with each step.

Research firm Gartner has made a much more optimistic evaluation of Lync. In a 2012 report, Gartner states that Microsoft’s Lync 2010 provides a full set of UC functionality that is being continually improved upon with each subsequent release.

Gartner also pointed out that businesses that are considering making use of Lync video and telephony need to familiarize themselves with the system’s infrastructure requirements, its limitations, and what support is available when needed.

Time will tell how well Lync performs beyond instant messaging. Enterprises that are already utilizing a full array of Microsoft products might wish to give it a try. Those who are not convinced may want to give alternative UC platforms a test run. (CU) Link

2 Responses to "Microsoft Lync Deployments are Not Yet Getting Off the Ground" - Add Yours

Aiden Callaly 10/8/2012 9:43:44 AM

yes this seems to be what what we are seeing too. The customers that have deployed Lync and our Cloud PBX together are getting a far better return as they are using the PBX as their breakout for voice. All of these customers have deployed the on premise version of Lync but have gone to the cloud for their external voice and pbx functionality. Interestingly the ones that have deployed hosted Lync are only using it internally and thats primarily IM. Still a long way to go !!

Richard Webster 10/8/2012 11:24:02 AM

Parragraph 2 seems to sum it up, Presence and IM are easy to implement witn all businesses, but integration into the corporate legacy voice infrastructure and migration to Voice over IP are more difficult to achieve, these are tasks that the Sonus SBC1000 and SBC2000 are bult to take in their stride.