Increase in flexible working
drives businesses to focus on unified
communications, reveals research from
the SAS Group
Survey reveals 42 percent of UK firms
currently investigating unified communications
London,
26 March 2008 - A survey of IT decision
makers at 110 top UK businesses conducted
by the SAS Group, an international provider
of IP-based network and communication
infrastructure services, has found that
a critical number of companies are now
investigating the use of unified communications
(UC). Although the research revealed
that just 14 percent of UK firms are
currently using a UC solution, 42 percent
of respondents did state they are now
planning or considering a deployment.
This increased interest in UC is mirrored
by considerable growth in the number
of firms supporting flexible working
practices. The survey also found that
94 percent of UK firms now employ mobile
workers, compared with 69 percent in
May last year. The number of businesses
employing teleworkers is also increasing,
rising from 55 percent to 77 percent
during the same period.
With more and
more companies looking to accommodate
both mobile workers and remotely located
teleworkers, the growth in the number
of businesses looking to UC to facilitate
these working practices is no surprise.
The benefits derived from enabling flexible
working in terms of productivity and
staff satisfaction can be an attractive
proposition for any organisation, yet
actually ensuring a business network
is able to support UC deployments can
be difficult.
Any UC implementation requires
detailed analysis of the entire corporate
infrastructure, including the LAN, WAN,
servers, switches, routers, cabling,
PCs and other applications running over
the network. For those businesses with
a high proportion of mobile workers,
it may even be advisable to upgrade their
infrastructures to incorporate secure
VPNs, which are capable of supporting
quality of service (QoS).
“UK businesses
are now embracing flexible working practices
and have rightly recognised that unified
communications solutions are a key enabler
in this process. However, whilst the
advantages are well documented, many
businesses underestimate the impact that
these solutions have on the wider network,” said
Charles Davis, CEO of the SAS Group. “Unified
communications technologies are not plug
and play solutions. Any deployment needs
to be properly scoped and managed. Where
necessary, an expert third party should
be consulted to ensure a successful implementation.”
The
SAS Group helps companies through every
stage of their IP telephony and UC deployment,
ensuring that any new system is utilised
to its full potential. It has also produced
a series of educational whitepapers,
and runs training webcasts to address
the practical requirements of installing
converged networks. A webcast and white
paper both entitled “Identifying
if your existing equipment will work
with IPT” is available to download
at www.sas.co.uk.
About SAS
The SAS Group is a major UK and international provider of IP-based network and
communication infrastructure services. In partnership with leading technology
organisations including BT, T-Mobile, Cisco, Microsoft, HP and Symantec, the
company specialises in the delivery of enterprise and small business solutions
for IP telephony, WAN infrastructure, security, mobility and disaster recovery.
Founded in 1989, SAS is headquartered in Horsham, West Sussex.
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