Products & Services Unified Communications
Although many companies have improved their delivery of data services,
voice services still lag far behind. Most companies are still using
traditional key systems which are often inflexible and expensive to
maintain. The productivity of workers at small offices and remote
sites might also suffer if they don't have full access to the
features and dialling plan of the phone system at the main business
office. Large companies have addressed these issues by extending
full-service telephony over the IP data network. Until recently,
however, this has not been a cost-effective option for small and
midsize companies.
Phone systems are being tested by these organisational changes.
As businesses grow and extend their operations to multiple locations,
branch offices can become "islands" that lack access to the
communication services available at corporate headquarters. Many phone
systems in service today lack basic functionality, such as the ability
to forward voicemail messages between offices, or to use programmable
phones that allow calls from important customers to receive priority
handling. To overcome the limitations associated with traditional phone
systems – and to meet evolving business expectations – many organisations
are turning to IP communications solutions. These combine voice and data
infrastructures on a single, converged IP network, making these solutions
more manageable, efficient and cost-effective than maintaining separate
networks. In addition, unified communications solutions provide support
for phone communication with the same high level of quality and
reliability as traditional, circuit-switched telephone networks.
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CallManager) Top
Cisco Unified Communications Manager software is the call-processing
component of the Cisco Unified Communications system. It is a scalable,
distributable and highly-available enterprise IP telephony call-processing
solution.
Cisco Unified Communications Manager extends enterprise telephony features
and capabilities to packet telephony network devices such as IP phones,
media-processing devices, voice-over IP (VoIP) gateways and multimedia applications.
services such as unified messaging, multimedia conferencing, collaborative
contact centres and interactive multimedia response systems are made possible
through Cisco Unified Communications Manager open telephony APIs.
The software, installed on the Cisco Media Convergence Server 7800 Series of
server platforms and selected third-party servers, includes the following features:
- Highly scalable, supporting up to 30,000 lines per server cluster
- Supports a full breadth of communications features and applications,
including SIP-based applications
- Highly available for business continuity, supporting multiple levels of
server redundancy and survivability
- Support for a broad range of phones to suit varying user requirements
Choice of operating system environments: Windows server-based implementation
or Linux-based appliance model implementation.
Cisco Unified Communications Manager Business Edition Top
Cisco Unified Communications Manager Business Edition is an easy-to-manage
solution that combines voice, video, mobility, and messaging on a single
server to simplify system administration and reduce hardware and operating
expenses. This solution provides cost-effective deployment options for
medium-sized organisations with smaller IT staffs that require all the
advanced capabilities of Cisco Unified Communications Manager (formerly
Cisco Unified CallManager), Cisco Unity® Connection, Cisco Unified Mobility
(formerly Cisco Unified MobilityManager), and integrated management on a
single server to expedite migration to unified communications.
The solution includes many new capabilities designed specifically for
medium-sized organizations, including do not disturb, intercom with whisper
page, audio message waiting indicators, and Cisco Unified IP Phone 7931G.
Also, medium-sized organisations can access traditional enterprise features
such as speech recognition, integrated messaging, call routing rules, and
single-number reach.
Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express Top
Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express delivers telephony features to
meet the requirements of the small office or branch location. The Cisco
Integrated Services Router offers high reliability and advanced applications,
including IP telephony, VPN, firewall, encryption, dial access, Ethernet
switching with Power over Ethernet, and content networking – within a single
all-in-one platform that is easy to deploy and maintain – resulting in a
lower total cost of ownership (TCO).
As the business expands, Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express can be
easily migrated to a Cisco Unified Communications Manager large-scale IP
telephony solution. All hardware and software used by this solution is fully
compatible with Cisco Unified Communications Manager and Cisco Unified SRST,
giving customers investment protection.
Cisco Unified Communications 500 Series for Small Business Top
Cisco Unified Communications 500 Series for Small Business, a critical part
of the Cisco Smart Business Communications System, is a unified communications
solution that provides voice, data, voicemail, Automated Attendant, video,
security, and wireless capabilities while integrating with existing desktop
applications such as calendar, e-mail, and customer relationship management
(CRM) programs. This easy-to-manage platform uses business-class, proven unified
communications technologies to full advantage and supports flexible deployment
models based on your needs—a wide array of IP phones, public switched telephone
network (PSTN) interfaces, and Internet connectivity.
Cisco MeetingPlace Express Top
The Cisco Unified MeetingPlace Express is a complete rich-media conferencing
solution that integrates voice, video and Web conferencing capabilities to make
remote meetings as natural and effective as face-to-face meetings. Cisco Unified
MeetingPlace Express delivers enhanced video functions to better meet the needs
of organisations looking for a single enterprise-class solution and user
environment for simple and effective voice, video and Web conferencing. The
release adds industry-leading video set-up and control capabilities to deliver
greater video scalability, flexibility, security and ease of use.
Cisco Unified Video-conferencing Manager Top
The Cisco Unified Video-conferencing Manager facilitates face-to-face discussions
among video conference participants, using a wide variety of video-enabled devices.
It connects three or more H.323, SIP or SCCP video conference endpoints in a
single, multi-participant meeting.
It is an easy-to-use single application that enables organisations to set up and
control Cisco Unified Video-conferencing conferences. The solution also provides
functions to configure manage and monitor video-conferencing network elements for
an optimal visual communications experience.
Capabilities include:
- Simple set-up and attendance – schedule future and initiate impromptu
video conferences from Web browsers and Microsoft Outlook calendars. The
application reserves multipoint control unit (MCU) capacity, bandwidth and
video endpoints that are automatically connected when the meeting starts
- Advanced conference control – invite new participants, mute and unmute
participants and change the video layout
- Comprehensive administration – monitor, control and maintain all video
endpoints and network elements, including Cisco Unified Video-conferencing
mcus and gateways
- Simplify large deployments – the application enables accessing of multiple
mcus and gateways by a single number and manages MCU selection and cascading
to optimise resources and enable highly-scalable conferences.
Cisco Unity Top
Cisco Unity is a foundational element that brings unified communications
solutions to enterprise-scale organisations. Unity Unified Messaging combines
e-mail, voice, and fax message sending to your inbox as well as intelligent voice
messaging (full-featured voicemail providing advanced functions) to improve
communications, boost productivity,and enhance customer service capabilities
across your organisation.
Cisco Unity Voice Messaging features robust automated-attendant functions
that include intelligent routing and easily customisable call-screening and
message-notification options.
The Cisco Unity server architecture is truly unified with your data network,
minimising installation, administration, and maintenance costs. Built on a
platform that can scale to meet your organisation’s needs as it grows, Cisco
Unity Unified Messaging also uses streaming media and an intuitive Web
browser-based system administration interface that makes life easier for
the people who install and support your system, ultimately lowering your
organisation's total cost of ownership.
Cisco Unity Unified Messaging provides advanced, convergence-based
communication services and integrates them with the desktop applications you
use every day. With Cisco Unity Unified Messaging, you can listen to your
e-mail over the telephone, check voice messages from the Internet, and send,
receive, or forward faxes to wherever you are.
Cisco Unity Connection Top
Cisco Unity Connection is a voice-messaging application that provides an
intuitive telephone interface, voice-enabled dialling, voice-enabled control
of messages and desktop PC access to voice messages through an e-mail client.
It is a core component of midmarket and small enterprise voice systems.
New features include:
- Voice-enabled directory handlers that now enable users to search for
subscribers using the voice user interface
- Voice-enabled management of greetings
- Voice addressing of messages using personal and private distribution lists
- Increase of scalability to 3,000 mailboxes, 1,500 internet mail access
protocol (IMAP) subscribers (for desktop message access) and 48 voice ports
- Inclusion of caller id and subscriber name with text-based message
notifications
- Support for GroupWise e-mail clients for desktop messaging
- Localised voice prompts and end users’ web interfaces for UK English,
Australian English, French, German, Japanese, Italian, Latin American Spanish,
Chinese, Dutch, Arabic and Swedish.
Cisco Unity Express Top
Cisco Unity Express is an essential component of either a Cisco Unified
Communications Manager or Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express.
In a Cisco Unified Communications Manager environment, Cisco Unity Express
provides local storage and processing of integrated messaging, voicemail,
fax, automated attendant and optional IVR for branch offices with limited
WAN connectivity, alleviating concerns about WAN bandwidth and quality of
service (QoS). Cisco Unified Communications Manager customers with Cisco
Unity messaging solutions at their larger locations can also use Cisco Unity
Express at their branch or small-office locations and network the solutions
so that employees can easily send messages between locations. In a Cisco
Unified Call Manager Express environment, customers deploy a single
compact-form-factor Cisco Integrated Services Router platform, with Cisco
Unity Express installed, to meet their office telephony and messaging needs,
as well as other business communications needs.
Cisco Unified Mobility Top
Cisco Unified MobilityManager makes it easy for enterprise workers to keep
in touch with the business at hand, whether at their desks or mobile. It
introduces Cisco Mobile Connect enterprise mobility services to extend the
benefits of IP communications to workers inside and outside the enterprise
campus. An application server that integrates with Cisco Unified
Communications Manager, Cisco Unified MobilityManager intelligently manages,
filters, routes and places calls between a worker’s IP phone and remote
mobile phone.
With Cisco Unified MobilityManager, a worker can receive and place business
calls from the devices most convenient for the task without interrupting the
calls, whether in the office, in transit, or at a remote location. Cisco
Unified MobilityManager also helps enterprise IT and telecom managers better
serve the communication needs of their mobile workers, while enabling them to
take advantage of the enterprise IP communications network resources available
with Cisco Unified Communications Manager. Cisco Unified MobilityManager is
installed on the Cisco 7800 Series Media Convergence Servers (MCS).
Cisco Unified Presence Top
Cisco Unified Presence is a crucial component for delivering the full value
of a Cisco Unified Communications environment. It collects information about a
user's availability status, such as whether the user is using a communications
device such as a phone at a particular time. It also collects information
regarding a user's communications capabilities, such as whether Web collaboration
or video- conferencing is active. Using information captured by Cisco Unified
Presence, applications such as Cisco Unified Personal Communicator and Cisco
Unified Communications Manager (formerly Cisco Unified Communications Manager)
can improve productivity by helping users connect with colleagues more efficiently
by determining the most effective means for collaborative communication. Cisco
Unified Presence takes advantage of Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) technology to
support new voice services in the enterprise environment. SIP enhances the voice
network by providing a core set of behaviours for session establishment and control
that can be applied in a wide array of features and services. In addition to core
SIP support, Cisco Unified Presence uses SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence
Leveraging Extensions (SIMPLE) technology to support both instant messaging and
presence.
Cisco Unified Presence consists of a SIP presence engine and a SIP proxy function.
The presence engine collects user presence information (such as busy, idle, away,
or available status) as well as user capabilities (such as the capability to support
voice, video, instant messaging and Web collaboration) and compiles the data in a
repository for each user. The applications and features that each user employs
access this repository. Unique user rules and privacy can be applied by each user
to help ensure that only authorised applications and users have access to presence
information. The SIP proxy function facilitates efficient and accurate routing of
both presence and general SIP messaging through the enterprise.
Cisco Unified Presence is tightly integrated with various desktop clients and
applications. It helps Cisco Unified Personal Communicator, the Cisco enterprise
desktop client, to perform numerous functions such as click to dial and phone
control and voice, video and Web collaboration. In addition, Cisco Unified
Presence provides a core instant messaging service for Cisco Unified IP Phones
connected to Cisco Unified Communications Manager. Cisco Unified Presence also
supports interoperability with enterprise desktop applications such as IBM
Sametime and Microsoft Office Communicator, allowing these desktop applications
to operate in conjunction with Cisco Unified IP Phones supported on Cisco
Unified Communications Manager.
Cisco Unified Contact Centre Express Top
Cisco Unified Contact Centre solutions provide an open, strategic platform
that allows you to move your organisation beyond today's call centre to the
next phase of customer care – a customer interaction network.
Use Cisco Unified Contact Centre solutions to:
- Create a better customer experience
- Make customer-service agents more efficient and productive
- Improve contact centre reporting and analytics
- Build an IP-based contact centre to enable a new generation of customer
interaction applications and increased flexibility of deployment
- Extend your workforce with expert agents and remote agents.
Cisco Unified Contact Centre products consist of voice self-service
and assisted-service solutions, and voice self-service application
development capabilities.
Cisco Unified Customer Voice Portal helps deliver intelligent, personalised
self-service over the phone, allowing customers efficiently and enjoyably
to retrieve the information they need from the contact centre.
Cisco Unified Contact Centre Enterprise and Cisco Unified Contact Centre
Express assisted-service solutions provide skills-based contact routing,
voice self-service, computer telephony integration (CTI) and multichannel
contact management.