Unified What?!

Unified messaging: The application that wouldn’t die. Like a B-movie zombie, unified messaging—the ability to manage email, fax and voice mail via a single interface—crops up in one form or other, only to be ignored by the vast majority of enterprises.

And this year is no different. Unified messaging services and technologies have once again surfaced in the headlines, but they seem to chiefly reflect unified messaging’s seemingly endless need for resuscitation. They include:

* Active Voice Corp. unveiled its Unity Enterprise for Domino package, which adds unified messaging to Lotus Notes and Domino. Active Voice also debuted an upgrade of its Unity Enterprise system, which puts unified messaging on Microsoft Exchange 2000 servers.

* Cox Interactive Media will use Commtouch technology to provide unified messaging services to subscribers in its localized media markets, starting with its AccessArizona.com, AccessAtalanta.com and AccessLasVegas.com users.

* Lakes Internet Inc., a rural Minnesota ISP with 20,000 business and residential subscribers will use Voice Mobility International Inc.’s Unified Communications software to provide unified messaging services to its users.

Also, “best intentions” deals abound in the unified messaging market. Some of the more recent ones include:

* Carrier-grade VOIP switch maker empowerTel has joined IPeria to leverage its Unified Services Exchange with the IPeria Service Node to deliver an enhanced services platform that includes unified messaging.

* Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. will license Soundpipe’s unified messaging and VOIP client technologies into a proposed line of “Soundpipe enabled” Internet access appliances.

* Unified Messaging Systems AS and Brooktrout Technology announced they intend to develop a worldwide unified messaging network, using UMS’s unified messaging platform and Brooktrout’s voice and fax technology.

Hope springs eternal. In 1999 U.S. businesses bought 9,029 unified messaging systems and, according to Blair Pleasant, director of communications analysis with the Pelorus Group, there were 556,000 seats running unified messaging clients. This year Pleasant forecasts an increase in shipments to 18,615 by year’s end, and she projects sales of 39,425 systems by 2001.

However, when she compares the pace and scope of voice mail adoption in the 1980s and email in the 1990s, unified messaging remains stuck in the slow lane. “Unified messaging isn’t having that kind of growth,” Pleasant said.

“Bottoming Out” On The Bottom Line
The problem is the lack of a clear value proposition for the enterprise. Paul Stockford, chief analyst with Saddletree Research, summed up unified messaging’s plight this way: “It’s one of those things that is nice to have, but not necessary; and difficult, if not impossible, to cost justify.”

Users already manage their emails, faxes and voice messages without unified messaging—it’s just that they manage multiple inboxes instead of a single inbox, says Art Rosenberg, a principal with industry analysts The Unified View. He continued, “So what if all your messages are in the same place? Unless you get tons of messages, who cares? If you say ‘messaging’ and only ‘messaging,’ you are only talking about a subset of communications. The real world is not compartmentalized like that.”

Focus!
Rosenberg contends that unified messaging’s proponents focus on all the wrong things. He noted that going back to the early days of voice mail, “The real value was telephone answering, and second prize was that [callers] got to leave a message for you.”

Rosenberg argued that unified messaging development efforts should focus on unified communications rather than messaging. He told BCR, “Messaging, all by itself, is not going to do anything without real-time communications. If you cannot escalate to a real-time response, it’s not much value.”

Rosenberg said what’s needed are applications that match the dynamic nature of business communications—reaching contacted parties and engaging them in live communications whenever possible, like the original goals of voice mail and auto attendant systems. “Knowing the other party’s situation, you can use some intelligence in how you communicate with them,” he said.

But to reach the level Rosenberg believes is necessary will take new technology. He maintains that to implement truly unified communications requires a robust directory architecture, which contains the details of each user’s communications status—where the user is, the means by which he or she can be reached, etc. He refers to this capability as a “presence management system,” which would continually update a directory on each user’s status. But Rosenberg admited that getting from here to there won’t be easy: “It’s got a long way to go technologically.”

But at least we know the first step: Developers need to build ways for disparate, live, communications media to work with one another. For example, enabling someone who is in a meeting but who only has access to a laptop to exchange messages or “converse” with someone who is on a telephone. Rosenberg calls this “cross-media access”— one party can talk and the other can type to create some sort of conversation. To that end, Rosenberg helped launch the Unified Communications Consortium, an industry forum geared at expanding the development and adoption of cross-media messaging and communications.

Great WAP Hope
In the near term, road warriors, not desk jockeys, may give unified messaging its next lease on life. Stockford, Pleasant and Rosenberg remain confident that the growing numbers of mobile professionals will stimulate demand for unified messaging. Some analysts point to Europe as an example of what could happen in the U.S.

With wireless penetration at much higher rates than in North America, European business users have already moved quickly to adopt short messaging service (SMS), the standard for sending short text messages between wireless devices. Action also continues to heat up in Europe for wireless access protocol (WAP). With that in mind, Ian Rowlands, a research analyst with Frost & Sullivan, predicts that by year-end 2002, unified messaging will be a standard service on all European mobile networks.

While nowhere near as optimistic about unified messaging in North America, Stockford sees hope arising out of WAP-based or similar services. “The mobility market makes a lot of sense because mobile users can stay in touch with messaging systems,” he says. “Combine that with the proliferation of WAP-enabled devices, and you may have the catalyst for growth.”