INSIGHT
“The value of integrating PSTN voice into Teams hasn’t really been addressed. This is a great
opportunity for voice resellers and IT specialists
Charles Rickett, Managing Director, V12 Telecom
Teams finds its voice
Unprecedented competition, a difficult trading environment, and a global shortage of skilled workers mean that
effective collaboration has become vital for businesses today. Prior to speaking at Channel Live in September, Lucy
Green, MD of Larato, explains how Microsoft’s Direct Routing capability provides a great opportunity for the Channel.
While instant messaging,
le sharing and video
calling are more
commonly associated
with MS Teams, an important
but less recognised integration is
voice communication. However,
with the phasing out of Skype
For Business and ISDN switch
o, now is the time to be
considering the role of voice in
this new world.
Larato sourced opinions
from a telecoms solutions
provider, a distributor and an
ICT specialist who are leading
the way with Teams.
V12
V12, a telecoms solutions
provider, is one of the rst
companies in the UK to launch
a fully compliant Direct Routing
solution. e service comes
with per-user pricing and fully
inclusive UK minutes.
Charles Rickett, Managing
Director at V12 Telecom sees
Microsoft Teams a major
disrupter in the telecoms
market that will blur the lines
between traditional IT and
telecoms resellers. He also sees
it as a great opportunity to
revisit the voice conversation
with customers.
Rickett says, “High-quality
voice is an important part of a
business solution. MS Teams
has a voice app for internal
Teams users. However, it is
not meant for broader business
communications where you
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could be calling mobiles, making
international calls or if you have
a call centre setup. is is where
an integrated PSTN solution
comes in. It must make sense
to utilise a service that allows
you to communicate with the
widest possible audience, not just
within your own organisation.”
Rickett says, “e value
of integrating PSTN voice
into Teams hasn’t really been
addressed. is is a great
opportunity for voice resellers
and IT specialists to deliver
a highly benecial service to
their customers and prospects
that will increase revenues and
customer satisfaction. It’s a real
win-win for everyone.”
Electronic Frontier
Electronic Frontier is a specialist
value-added distributor of
converged IP solutions and a
master distributor of Yealink.
General Manager, Conor
McCann believes that a large
proportion of workers still want
to use PSTN with a telephone
when they move to IP-based
communications.
He says, “ere is not a rush
to replace the desk phones with
other devices, when it comes to
Teams we believe that there will
be a signicant proportion of
the market that will still want a
desk phone.
“e transition to a solution
like Teams is more of a cultural
change than a technological
one. A desk phone provides a
valuable point of consistency
between the old and the new,
protecting people’s productivity
as new working practices
become established.”
McCann continued “High
quality voice across PSTN is
expected in the industry. Now
that Direct Routing solutions
like V12’s are available to the
Channel, it is the perfect time
to start talking to prospects and
customers who are already using
Teams about integrating PSTN
voice into their deployments.”
MACOM Consulting
MACOM Consulting, a global
ICT specialist in the Oil & Gas
sector, has seen real benets in
migrating clients to Microsoft
Teams. Mark Ashford, Managing
Director at MACOM Consulting
Ltd, commented “We’ve recently
migrated a client with operations
in East Africa to Teams and it’s
working well. e users, for the
most part, appreciate the ease of
use that the system oers.”
Ashford adds, “Microsoft
Teams is a great collaboration tool.
It provides the ability to bring
everything together onto a single
platform. ere is competition
for Microsoft from the likes of
Google, but they don’t oer the
fully integrated platform, instead
relying on separate applications.”
“Many people in the Oil &
Gas sector are used to using
Skype from remote locations,
for both welfare and business.
As this moved to Skype for
Business, the usage increased
and the migration to Teams is
the logical progression.”
With the increased adoption
of Teams, Ashford believes there
will be increasing demand for
an integrated voice solution. He
concludes, “It is only in the last
6 to 8 months that there appears
to be a stable platform that will
allow voice to be added onto MS
Teams through Direct Routing.
Having a vendor like V12 which
we can rely on and work with in
developing this as a platform is
critical to me.”
(L-R) Charles Rickett, Managing Director at V12 Telecom and Lucy Green,
MD of Larato
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