The move to unified communications — to improve both personal and business productivity — is set to have tremendous impact over the next ten years because it will influence and potentially revolutionise cultural and social norms on a global basis.

By automating and integrating “all forms of human and device communications into a common user experience” — to use Wikipedia’s term — unified communications, or UC, will help to redefine the quarterly meeting, the press conference and even the family get together.

The total integration of voice, data and video networks with productivity tools and applications will fundamentally change the ways in which we interact with one another, both personally and professionally.

We will establish new virtual relationships, whether among casual acquaintances, trusted colleagues or even close confidantes. And we will form electronic bonds that may well replicate the strong ties we now share with the people we see every day.

Seamless communication benefits culture and society

UC has the potential to be a great equaliser by fostering bottom-up idea generation and collaboration — throughout the ranks of a corporation or the generations of an extended family. Immersion in UC will enable more flexible work schedules and allow us to minimise our environmental impact by staying put to reduce fuel consumption.

With UC, information can be shared more seamlessly, enabling faster decision making and leading to reduced costs and increased productivity. Whether at work or at home, UC will not only simplify our lives, but it will help improve our quality of life.

Efficiencies influence business

As unified communications gathers momentum, it is changing the face of business. Businesses looking for a way to compete in the global economy welcome the ability to employ network resources to their advantage.

To cut costs and increase efficiencies, they are assessing and implementing network-based unified communications solutions that enable users to collaborate and communicate in real time via a single interface.

This environment — marked by the growing adoption of UC tools and applications — represents a real opportunity for service providers not only concerned with simply surviving in today’s economy, but looking to take advantage of the downturn to generate more business and come through this difficult period stronger than ever.

Industry trends fuel demand

Several phenomena are shaping the evolution of business and contributing to the demand for unified communications tools and applications. Globalisation, virtualisation and an increasingly mobile society are motivating factors behind the applications that end users require and the network-based services that global carriers must deliver.

Add in the environmental movement, and you have the main drivers behind key business challenges that can be addressed with unified communications solutions.

Globalisation can be described as the process of increasing the connectivity and interdependence of the world’s markets and businesses. No sector is more influential in making globalisation possible than the telecommunications industry. Today, a reliable communications infrastructure is a fundamental component of economic well-being in every world region. As multi-national companies expand their reach, it is critical that their communications services providers expand with them to provide support and enable seamless service delivery to continue.

Globalisation throws up the challenge of managing and supporting geographically-dispersed employees and customers. New, IP-based communications applications, integrated and federated with presence information through UC, help companies extend more efficient lines of communication independent of time zone or geography.

With UC, a sales manager in Frankfurt and a developer in India can work effectively with employees at a company’s US headquarters. The ability for users to access presence information and adapt real-time to the appropriate communications mode drives efficiency and strengthens relationships.

UC applications are closely aligned with increased virtualisation. Virtualisation addresses how to extend and optimise the business processes and critical functionality of businesses with virtualised infrastructure — both equipment (computing power via server virtualisation) and workforce capacity. One consequence of this trend is that location is becoming less and less relevant.

Virtualisation of infrastructure and resources enables businesses to present a single face to their customers and suppliers.

Underlying this “single face” are collaboration tools deployed on an unprecedented scale. New network design configurations must accommodate remote and mobile workforces with the UC capabilities this environment demands such as collaboration tools, virtual meeting rooms, conferencing — both audio and video — and the provisioning of common corporate interfaces and applications.

These UC tools are potentially more effective business aids than yesterday’s physical tools such as standard devices and fixed business locations.

The case for UC is also supported by our increasingly mobile society, which is changing the way people live, work and play on a global scale. As companies expand their operations around the world, and wireless broadband becomes more prevalent, the requirement for easy access to applications that are seamlessly available from desktop to mobile devices becomes crucial.

And with the increasing popularity of smartphones, users have more functionality than ever while on the move.

The hallmarks of UC, such as presence and collaboration tools, will play a core role as fundamental business and personal resources available with every smartphone and mobility service package. The notion of presence and the ability to locate the desired party easily will make moving among varied communications modes an indispensable part of an employee’s work day and even the tourist experience.

Beyond the obvious benefits, such as the reduced need for physical travel, UC also lends itself to the imperative for businesses to be more environmentally friendly. Although new green activities may be affected by economic climate, UC frequently offers a compelling alternative route.

Holding the line on expenses and reducing an organisation’s carbon footprint are complementary goals that oftentimes can be furthered within the same UC project.

The current marketplace resolve — that suppliers demonstrate environmentally sustainable applications of technology — is not an obstacle, but an opportunity, for telecommunications providers.

UC solutions remain in play

The efficient and productive application of telecommunications services — to improve real-time business interactions and processes — can play a vital role in optimising all business sectors globally. The network has evolved into a strategic asset that can be used to increase efficiencies within every department and throughout entire organisations.

By prioritising UC investments on technologies that deliver immediate return on investment and can be extended into broader long-term UC solutions, companies can realise radical improvements that help them weather current economic pressures.

With an approach that deeply integrates communications within core business processes, companies can create new forms of differentiation and competitive advantage.

UC — that is, collaboration tools plus fixed or wireless voice — enable carriers to fulfil the role of strategic supplier by helping customers across all business sectors increase productivity and reduce spending in areas such as transportation, printing, shipping or real estate. UC provides a promising strategic approach to enabling new efficiencies throughout the business world.

While many of the individual communications and collaboration tools that comprise UC have been in place for years, the value and efficiency of integrating the component applications into today’s concept of UC is a fairly recent occurrence.

The proliferation of unified communications strategies aimed at reducing travel requirements is motivating carriers to assess their individual infrastructure capabilities and package viable network-based solutions.

One increasingly popular unified communications application is telepresence. The adoption of telepresence throughout a global organisation has been shown to substantially reduce travel costs.

For example, since launching the AT&T TelePresence Solution internally, AT&T has experienced a significant improvement in collaboration across business units, increased employee productivity and reduced travel costs. AT&T estimates that its use of telepresence will reduce CO2 emissions by approximately 31,000 tons over the next five years — an amount that is roughly equal to the emissions generated by 5,732 passenger vehicles annually.

AT&T delivers

In addition to AT&T TelePresence Solution, AT&T offers conferencing and collaboration solutions as well as UC consulting services.

AT&T Connect service transforms disparate voice and web conferencing applications into a company-wide communication tool that will benefit nearly every service provider employee. This converged conferencing tool transforms audio, web and video conferencing into a single, enterprise-wide collaboration solution that empowers innovation throughout the organisation, enabling employees.

AT&T Conference Now service enables wholesale customers to offer a feature-rich collaborative conferencing solution to their own customer base. The UC consulting practice of AT&T delivers planning services that extend expertise where customers need it, to evaluate various technologies for inclusion in their UC plans. AT&T UC consultants help to demystify UC and recommend how individual organisations can tap into the power of UC solutions to further business priorities.

Underpinning all UC functionality is a highly resilient network that has the capability to deliver the rich set of UC applications at the scale needed by enterprises.

Network providers, such as AT&T, are in a strong position to help businesses implement UC because of the presence, status and location-based information they can gather from the network.

As more and more organisations turn to UC, AT&T has the scale, knowledge and experience to support service providers’ adoption and delivery of UC services. GTB