{"id":112791,"date":"2020-02-21T17:10:07","date_gmt":"2020-02-21T22:10:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rbach.net\/?p=112791"},"modified":"2021-08-15T16:21:42","modified_gmt":"2021-08-15T20:21:42","slug":"the-future-for-avaya-is-cloudy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rbach.net\/index.php\/the-future-for-avaya-is-cloudy\/","title":{"rendered":"The Future for Avaya is Cloudy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The<\/a>Back in 2017 former telephony giant Avaya<\/a> (AVYA<\/a>) declared<\/a> bankruptcy<\/strong>. Since then there has been a number of attempts to break up the firm. Extreme<\/strong><\/a> bought the Avaya network division<\/strong> in 2017. In 2019 there were rumors<\/a> that Mitel<\/a> was going to attempt a leveraged buyout of Avaya<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"RingCentralEventually, Avaya made a deal with Unified Communications as a Service <\/strong>(UCaaS<\/a>) vendor RingCentral<\/a><\/strong> (RNG<\/a>) to save its bacon. With the deal, RingCentral will pay Avaya $500M and will be Avaya\u2019s exclusive provider of UCaaS solutions. The two firms announced the “strategic partnershi<\/strong>p<\/a>” in October 2019.<\/p>\n

It’s February 2020 and the Avaya – RingCentral collaboration will start to show some results – next quarter. The beleaguered vendor announced at its Avaya Engage<\/a> love-fest that beginning March 31, that in the U.S. the unimaginatively named Avaya Cloud Office by RingCentral<\/strong><\/a> (ACO) will be identical in features to the product RingCentral sells<\/strong> today. The rest of the world will have to wait – because RingCentral UCaaS is only available in seven<\/a> countries.<\/p>\n

\"additional<\/a>It is reported<\/a> that a few additional Avaya features will creep into the offering<\/strong> through 2020. The first two are targeted for release this summer are bridged appearance, and call park and page. Bridged appearance lets two desk phones maintain separate and shared lines, a feature typically used between assistants and their bosses. With call park and page, when a person places a call on hold, the system will automatically send a page to another department or user to pick up the call. The feature is particularly useful to retailers.<\/p>\n

Towards the end of 2020 or later<\/strong>, the vendor expects to deliver features that include line appearance, call appearance, hotdesking, and support for the venerable Avaya Audix<\/a> voicemail service.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Initially, Avaya Cloud Office by RingCentral will only work with three models of Avaya’s J series desk phones<\/strong>: 139<\/a>, 169<\/a>, and 179<\/a>. Avaya will work with RingCentral to certify B series conference room phones<\/a>, L series headsets<\/a> and the CU360 video conferencing<\/a> system. However, most IP Office customers are likely using older devices, given that Avaya launched the J series only one year ago<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Avaya is also developing software to automate the process of migrating settings and users from its legacy gear to the cloud<\/strong>, although that tool won’t be available until later in 2020.<\/p>\n

rb-<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

No Jitter<\/a> points out<\/a> that faced with the threat of its large installed base that goes back to legacy Nortel platforms, dumping Avaya – Avaya needed to do something.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>To me this looks more like a win for RingCentral. For a relatively small investment ($500M on a market capitalization of $10.5B), RingCentral becomes the preferred UCaaS provider for the large Avaya installed base (100M+ seats) likely planning on a move to the cloud. Meanwhile, Avaya picks up a fully developed UCaaS to sell – if it can execute. Which has been its problem all along.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

Can Avaya hold on long enough to develop the promised automation tools move complicated things like CMS to a cloud interface? – we will see.<\/em><\/p>\n

Related article<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n