Unified Communications Featured Article

Vodafone's Cloud Based UC Solution Debuts in the UK

By Madhubanti Rudra
TMCnet Contributor

In an effort to expand its clientele among the U.K.’s large private and public sector players, Vodafone (News - Alert) UK has expanded its One Net unified communication (UC) solution portfolio.

Unified communications technology enables the consolidation of various traditional and Web-based communication channels. Businesses all around the globe are turning to UC technologies to increase operational efficiencies and cut costs. The technology reduces the companies’ dependence on hardware and related support. The rapid adoption of UC technologies has fueled the growth of teleworking and mobile workforce worldwide.

Vodafone’s One Net portfolio is geared toward this trend. By integrating voice and video communication, this cloud-based solution helps enhance enterprise-wide collaboration. It supports a variety of collaboration tools that are based on Microsoft (News - Alert) Lync and Microsoft Exchange.

Vodafone One Net portfolio has been designed for all types of businesses -- big, medium and small. Based on their sizes, the businesses can choose from three types of One Net solutions -- One Net Express, One Net Business and One Net Enterprise.

One Net Express solution is generally meant for the small business, while One Net Business is designed particularly for the SME’s with more than 10 users.

One Net Enterprise – Cloud is designed to deliver UC services to organizations with more than 500 users. The launch reflects the company’s aspiration to grow beyond the SMB markets and win large enterprise clients.

The solution is aimed at making your business more productive and more profitable. By helping integrate fixed, mobile and desktop communications in a single cloud-based system, the solution allows the businesses to plan ahead and scale up or down according to varying needs.

The greatest advantage of One Net Enterprise is that it can be implemented with little upfront investments for desk phones.

Vodafone One Net Enterprise solutions are hosted on the VONE-C platform, which leverages Cisco’s (News - Alert) HCS platform. This means organizations using the enterprise version of One Net would be required to purchase Cisco handsets, which are costlier than the SIP devices.

However, this extra investment can be treated as an organization’s CapEx costs that only add to the companies’ existing asset value, Vodafone reps noted.