Introduction

Unified Communications is the emerging technology which integrates telephony and computing systems.

Today, the communications world is split in two - between the things you do on the telephone and the things you do on the computer. The split exists because most real-time (synchronous) communications like telephone calls and voice mail depend on one network, while message-based (asynchronous) communications like e-mail depend on a separate, incompatible network.

The split creates many problems. Phones aren't as intuitive as they should be. Just try to start a three-way call without hanging up on someone. On a computer, you can check your e-mail, but not your voice mail. And then there's the enormous cost of purchasing, maintaining, and upgrading two complex infrastructures.

Microsoft unified communications technologies bridge the divide between computers and telephones with two integrated servers: Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007. They integrate with your company's existing phone system and deliver complete communications services using your existing data network.

Emantra's Unified Communications Vision

At Emantra, we believe unified communications will transform business in the coming decade in the same way e-mail changed the business landscape in the 1990s.

We see it as our opportunity to distill the complexities and break the early ground in managing this new technology so we may deliver it as an outsourced service to our customers commencing in 2008. We plan to turn this from a technology into a solution.

Microsoft Exchange is often a step too far for many companies to manage internally in terms of maintaining high levels of reliability, security and performance. Hence, outsourced services like Emantra's Hosted Excxhange 2007 are very popular. The real-time OCS service is indeed a few more steps out of reach. This software needs high-level skills and infrastructure to sustain enterprise level service.

In December 2007, Emantra became the first Australian company to offer Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 as a managed service, either stand-alone or integrated with Hosted Exchange 2007.

We work with specialist partners to deliver in one service bundle the best of Australia's Microsoft Software as a Service, Hosted IP-BBX gateway technologies and enterprise VOIP capability. Emantra has also embraced selected new desktop hardware built for OCS 2007 by Polycom, LG Nortel and Microsoft including the devices shown below which are available as a hardware purchase from Emantra.

You'll see further announcements in this direction as Emantra build Australia's best value, most competent Unified Communications managed services.

How Will Unified Communications Benefit Business?

With Microsoft unified communications technologies, the computers on your network gain the functionality of advanced VoIP phones. Users can click to call any contact in their address book. A simple phone call can become a conference call or a video conference, on the fly. Voice mail and faxes move over the network like e-mail. They arrive in your Microsoft Office Outlook inbox where you can sort, prioritize, and forward them, just like any piece of e-mail. And when you're on the road, you can dial in over any telephone to hear your e-mail messages and your calendar. You can even access your Outlook address book and call anyone in it just by speaking his or her name.

When phone services become software, are managed by a server, and are delivered to desktop applications, many interesting things happen.

The computer starts to work like a phone

To call someone, you just click on his or her name. The computer places the call. It doesn't matter whether you see their name in e-mail, inside Microsoft Office Word, or on a Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services site: their contact information and the ability to reach them is always present.

Presence is one of the key benefits of unified communications because it unites all the contact information stored in Active Directory with all the ways people communicate: phone, conferencing, instant messaging, e-mail, calendaring. People’s availability, their contact information, and the ability to communicate with them are integrated and always just a click away.

The phone starts to work like a computer

Try this with a standard office phone: call someone, then add someone else to the call. Okay, now add ten people. Now, turn it into a live video call. Could you do it? Is it even possible?

With Microsoft unified communications technologies, you click to call. Click again and you can launch a conference call. Need video? It’s a click away. It’s that easy.

Voice mail becomes e-mail

Voice mail arrives in your Microsoft Office Outlook inbox, right beside your e-mail. That might not sound impressive, but have you ever tried to forward voice mail using the touchtone keypad on a telephone? When voice mail becomes e-mail, you can forward it just like any e-mail: to one person, a work team, or an entire department.

Phone calls become digital assets

Just like e-mail. Which means they can be logged, reviewed, published, and archived. Having a complete record and recording of every phone call is increasingly critical as businesses struggle to comply with stricter federal and international regulations.

Flexible and future-ready

By using a software solution to deliver unified communications, your business can stay flexible and embrace innovations as they come. The Microsoft unified communications platform of powerful APIs enables developers to extend that software solution with security-enhanced and productivity-enhancing applications that span all modes of communications. When emerging technologies and changing business needs require your communications infrastructure to adapt, all you have to do is extend or upgrade your software, not your hardware.

VOIP Integration

Software-powered VoIP is the next generation of business voice communications. By enabling communications over an IP network and integrating these capabilities with the applications used most, voice communications can be integrated with e-mail, calendaring, voice mail/unified messaging, instant messaging, and Web conferencing to provide a streamlined experience rather than the disconnected experience provided by legacy systems today.

Emantra provides an integrated Managed VOIP solution that provides streamlined communications to information workers, enabling them to initiate voice communications from the context of the application they are working in, as well as receive calls when connected to a wide range of networks without a VPN.

Software-powered VoIP supports voice mail and auto-attendant capabilities through integration with Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging. Office Communications Server 2007 also works with legacy enterprise telephony systems either natively over SIP, or via a media gateway and public switched telephone networks.