Good question.  First of all, there is nothing mandating you as a business owner to upgrade your internal systems.  You can decide what you want to do with your business communications infrastructure.   I am just pointing out that the networks these analog end points communicate on or with have been or are soon going away, or are going to cost you a lot to operate. 

So, you can certainly just leave everything alone and hope that everything still works.  That is certainly an option – one that if you have not done anything yet about is the course you are on.  If you choose this option, you may run afoul of some compliance issues at some point, or as I wrote above the system may just not work someday.  If you have an analog door alarm, and it doesn’t work, what would that mean to your business? 

You can also replace your analog communication systems.  If you had a PBX circa 1998 and you replaced it, then you replaced one of your analog systems.  Like a full-scale replacement, including getting new phones, or even eschewing new phones and moving to desktop/mobile clients instead.  You may have done this with other systems as well, maybe bringing in e-fax type solutions as an example.  What other analog communication systems are still in use?  You could choose to swap them out too. 

I’m guessing in your business, you have over the years swapped out some of your most important communication systems, but that you still have a few more to go.   

This is where a POTS replacement solution would work best.  You can utilize modern POTS replacement gateway solutions to keep the current analog endpoints still in use, but get them to communicate with modern networks, thereby enabling you to rid yourself of POTS lines.  

Secondly, I believe knowledge worker type businesses are also asking this question.  And I believe this since I see this in the Clearspan customer base.  We typically sell to large enterprises and large school systems.  These customers might already have a video or collaboration type client in use (Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Webex).   And while they use that internally to collaborate, they want to use a “better” call control system / PBX to handle the outgoing/incoming phone calls.  And so, we can integrate our system with those clients to make that happen.  In that case, these customers also just want a basic phone system because they are connecting it to something else. 

Let’s answer that question first.  Yes, it is.  All UC systems, while offering all kinds of ways to communicate (voice, video, chat, collaboration, etc.) offer PBX functionality.  If you just want voice / PBX, you’ll still get the other stuff since most systems include that.  However, if you only just want voice / PBX stuff, I would urge you to go with a vendor (like Clearspan!) who has their roots in voice.  Not roots in video.  Not roots in collaboration.  And I say that only because these systems will have much more mileage on them, and functionality, related to PBX. 

And let’s get to another issue “behind” the question.  Why are these kinds of questions coming up in the first place?  I believe there are at least two reasons which we’ll cover in next week’s blog post. 

Figuring out how to keep the analog endpoints (i.e. not have to replace them) but still use the newer networks is a hot topic now.  So, if the business cannot utilize POTS lines like it used to, what to do?  They need to communicate on the newer wireless / VoIP networks.  Which means there needs to be a mechanism for the protocols used by the analog endpoints to convert to protocols understood by the newer networks.

That is basically a POTS replacement solution.

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POTS replacement solution work by putting in a gateway that converts an analog signal to the VoIP/internet signals.  This way, the older analog end points (they could be phones, alarm systems, fax machines, point of sale devices, etc.) can stay and a business would not have to re-architect its entire communication system.

And this is not necessarily expensive.   Vendors, such as Clearspan, provide a monthly recurring model for each analog port, that does not have any upfront costs.  And Clearspan also provides optional wireless if you want to use the wireless network to connect out to the world.  Clearspan has already deployed POTS replacement solutions for thousands of analog endpoints.  We know how to do this.

But there are many endpoints in businesses that use POTS lines (i.e. are analog) such as phones, alarms, faxes, etc.  So, for a business to fully move to the newer networks, all the analog endpoints would need to be updated to be compatible with the newer networks.   This is not feasible from a cost perspective and re-architecture of your business perspective.   This is just not as simple as replacing the analog endpoint either.  In many cases, there are “systems” behind the endpoint, and it would also mean changing out the system.  This spells Cost and Aggravation.

In next week’s blog, I will go over how to avoid re-architecture aggravation.

1. Flexibility for Growth: Adapt swiftly to changing business demands. Scalable UCaaS solutions like Clearspan allow companies to expand operations and scale resources seamlessly. 

1. Cost Efficiency: Scale resources up or down as needed without additional infrastructure costs. With Clearspan’s flexible pricing models, businesses optimize spending and maximize ROI. 

1. Operational Agility: Handle seasonal fluctuations and unexpected growth without disruptions. Clearspan’s scalable UCaaS ensures uninterrupted communication and collaboration across teams. 

1. Global Expansion: Support international operations with ease. Scalable UCaaS features enable companies to extend their reach without compromising on communication quality or reliability. 

1. Future-Proofing: Prepare for future growth and technological advancements. Clearspan Cloud Communications offers scalable UCaaS solutions that evolve alongside your business needs. 

Ready to scale your business with confidence? Discover how Clearspan Cloud Communications empowers companies with flexible and scalable UCaaS solutions tailored to your growth ambitions. 

If you are a Service Provider, UCaaS  is still a core component of your business services.  You should be wondering if you have the right UCaaS provider.  Will it be there for me?  Will it continue to innovate and keep up?  How do you evaluate if you are have the right UCaaS provider.   

Well, first, you have to see if the provider is a “viable entity”.  We have seen Microsoft get into the game with buying Metaswitch and Affirmed Networks. But now we have seen Microsoft get out of the game.  If you have been using Metaswitch, what should you do?  Probably not just stay with them and hope it will get better.   Because it won’t.  You need a new provider. 

Second, you have the see if the provider really has a viable roadmap.  Are they really just putting the minimum into the product, such as just providing security patches and updates to keep up with government regulations?   If so, this is a big red flag.  So ask questions about the roadmap.  Real questions about improving admin, 3rd party integrations, add-on services, optimizations and AI. 

Third, how has the company been doing?  Are they still making money?  Are they still investing in marketing?  Some companies may look like they are growing because they are hiring.  But are they hiring because they are growing, or are they hiring since employees are fleeing?   

Fourth, does the company own their own IP?  If the UCaaS provider is reselling something under the hood, then they are at the mercy of the technology provider under the hood.   

Fifth, can the UCaaS provider meet your specific needs as a Service Provider.   Can the UCaaS platform run in your cloud?  Or does it need to run in their cloud?  Or does it need to run in a public cloud, such as AWS?  While this may be OK in some cases, you as a Service Provider may want your control over uptime, or security so that it meets your standards. You are probably providing UCaaS to large enterprise with as many as 50,000 seats.  They may want customization to make it look like their product – their naming, their colors, etc.  And/or they may have specific back-office integrations.  Can the UCaaS product do that? 

And finally, while this paper did explore that the concept of Unified Communications means all types of communication, such as voice, video, chat, fax, file sharing, presence, and team collaboration, voice is still the most important and prevalent way communication with end-customers happens.  So the UCaaS provider needs to really understand voice – how to route it, how to manipulate it, what real-time really means and importance of that, voice quality, and how to connect.    Is Voice still important for your UCaaS provider?

Clearspan is committed to delivering exceptional value and service to Service Providers, setting us apart as a trusted partner in the telecommunications industry. Here are some reasons to choose Clearspan if you are a Service Provider looking to update your UCaaS offer: 

• Expertise and Experience: With over two decades of experience in the telecommunications industry, Clearspan brings a wealth of expertise and knowledge to every project.  And we’ve sold to Service Providers who in turn have sold to enterprises that have 10,000, 20,000, 30,000, 40,000 and even over 50,000 seats.  We know how to do this. 

• Reliability and Performance: Our modern purpose-built platform is modular and extensible by design to bridge existing Service Provider resources to our new innovative platform.  

• Customization and Flexibility: We understand that every organization is unique, which is why we offer customizable solutions tailored to your specific needs and requirements. 

• Integrations and Customizations without Limits: Clearspan enables service creation, product and application integrations, and customizations that deliver unique vertical and/or customer at scale. This gives Service Providers the tools they need to offer unique services at competitive pricing. 

• Dedicated Support: Our team of dedicated support professionals is available 24/7 to assist our service provider customers with any questions, issues, or concerns you may encounter, ensuring a positive experience for your customers from start to finish. 

• Our own IP:  Clearspan offers our own IP for our desktop and mobile clients, our administration portal and our call control. We control our own destiny. 

• Healthy company:  While we are a private company and don’t share our financials, we have been in business over 40 years, and we have healthy EDITDA margins of over 40%. 

Clearspan understands you as a Service Provider has a business to run.  And we will be there for you – a stable known-entity who has been providing services to Service Providers in the background for over 40 years.  We are here to Service Providers redefine the future of unified communications for your enterprise customers. 

The industry saw various efforts at diversification away from just phone calls and providing a pipe for data.  They knew they needed to sell other services.  And since the CSPs provided their core services to both businesses and individuals, from the business front, selling more enhanced voice services to businesses made sense as a way to diversify.  After all, the business enterprise was coming to a CSP to get data transport and trunking for the business phone service anyway, so why not get into hosting of the business phone service, and thus also sell hosted business phone services.   

So we saw the rise of UCaaS as an offer from the CSP.   It was (and continues to be) a win-win for both enterprise and for the SP.  It provides a means of additional monthly recurring revenue for the CSP in a very adjacent area (voice services).   And the enterprise is getting high quality, highly scalable and highly stable business phone service.

And this is even driving integrations with other mobile and desktop clients that are not from the UCaaS vendor – i.e. integration with Microsoft Teams.  This is especially prevalent in organizations that have a central home office and many other small locations that tie into the central HQ office.  For instance, retail chains, hospitality, financial services, and even government agencies might all have Microsoft Teams in the HQ home office, but a UCaaS system in the smaller locations because the smaller locations need to provide a higher quality voice service because they are dealing with the outside consumer who is calling in to made an order, schedule an appointment, or talk to a support person.  

In other words, these locations need a voice centric UCaaS system as opposed to a collaboration-centric or video-centric UCaaS system.  The voice services need to be advanced and they need to work. 

At the core of UCaaS is “Unified Communications”.  As the definition of communications keeps expanding over time because of technical advancements, UCaaS needs to fold that in.  For instance 10 years ago UCaaS needed to integrate with fax and email.  A few years ago, video became a normal type of business communication. And so all UCaaS services now have evolved to handle video. 

What is the next frontier for UCaaS?  It is Artificial Intelligence, which can mean many things depending on what marketing organization you talk to.   But it certainly means the ability look at data, and make some decisions so you don’t have to.  And many of the UCaaS AI integrations will take place in the aforementioned clients.  For instance, perhaps the most popular AI integration now revolves around a conference call.  Yesterday, you needed to take hand-written notes and send out a meeting summary. Today, you can tell the AI-enabled client to summarize the meeting in a 1 page, 2 page, or whatever size document you want.