Editor's note: This is the second in a two-part series on Lync for SMBs.
In my last blog I talked about some of the ways cloud-based services can bring Lync to SMBs that might not otherwise be able to deal with the complexities often associated with Microsoft's UC solution. I ended it by pointing out that while Microsoft hasn't yet introduced Enterprise Voice capabilities to Lync Online, some providers of UC services have built their own hosted Lync services targeted specifically at SMBs. These, however, can cost quite a bit for the full Enterprise Voice experience, perhaps more than a small business is ready to spend. Which creates an opportunity for...
Lync Appliances
The other way Lync with Enterprise Voice is being sold to SMBs is via server-based appliances. Lync appliances take the many software components that make Lync too complicated and expensive for SMBs to deal with, and cram them onto a single server. I touched on this topic in a blog I drafted last year, but pretty much only listed the names of the various appliance vendors. A number of these are the same this year, so to move things forward a bit I spoke with some of them to learn more about their company and their services. Here's what I found out:
StartReady. If there's a grandpappy of Lync appliances, it's Netherlands-based StartReady. The company was founded about six years ago by a former Microsoft channels guy focused on SMBs and the mid-market. The company's search and SharePoint appliances have since fallen by the wayside, but its OCS R1 appliance launched in 2008, became an OSC R2 appliance in 2010, was subsequently updated to run Lync 2010, and now runs Lync 2013 on a Dell PowerEdge R610 server. For a while it had a VoIP gateway from Ferrari Electronic integrated into the box, but founder Lucas Wensing says that's been dropped since the company found that customers either already had a gateway, had a preference for a gateway other than Ferrari's, or preferred native Lync trunking.
StartReady sells two Basic Appliance for Lync models, one for businesses with at least 100 and up to 700 users, and another that scales up to 2,500 or more users. A redundant appliance can be deployed for high availability.
All Lync appliances have secret sauce that differentiates them. In StartReady's case this is management software that simplifies Lync deployment and configuration, number plan management software, remote server management and monitoring, and a subscription-based pricing model.
StartReady is unusual among Lync appliance vendors in that the company is focused solely on Lync. In addition to the Basic Appliance I've just outlined, there's also a hosted Lync service for businesses needing fewer than 100 Lync seats, an Enterprise Appliance for larger installations (the largest StartReady customer has 20,000 Lync seats), and an upcoming "virtual appliance" that loads the Lync and StartReady software onto a virtual machine on a customer's existing server.
BT, Dell, and KPN resell the StartReady appliance, each targeting specific parts of Europe, including Austria, Benelux, Germany, the Netherlands, Scandinavia, Switzerland, and the UK. There's also a StartReady sales office in Austin, TX, which manages a set of US resellers that have made about 25 sales to date. Because its Lync appliances have been around so long, StartReady has the largest customer base of the vendors I spoke with--about 200 customers with 70,000 Lync seats, a figure that includes not just SMB customers but the large enterprise ones as well.
Active Communications. You might remember Active Communications as Active Voice, the unified messaging company that both Cisco and NEC somehow both acquired back in the Stone Age. I can't quite fathom how, but after being acquired twice there was enough of the company left over for executives in the Netherlands to buy out the business, slightly change its name, keep the legacy messaging and fax server business in place, and add a Microsoft Lync business which is now the company's main thrust.
Active Communications has a turnkey Lync solution geared more for the enterprise and mid-market, with its ACS Express targeted at SMBs with 25-100 users. Marco de Jager, head of business development, says Active Communications differentiates ACX Express with a management suite that simplifies installation and maintenance; an Active Directory connector that imports users from multiple directories; and a centralized call forwarding feature so techs setting up the system or admins can set users' call forwarding settings for them. The appliance can be configured as an SBA (survivable branch appliance) in enterprise environments. And ACX Express runs as a virtual machine on an Audiocodes Mediant 800 gateway's OSN module, so SMBs get Lync and gateway in a single box.
Because ACS Express only went GA earlier this summer, it has no customer base as yet. Westcon distributes it in Europe with an MSRP of €7,400 ($9,500) for 25 users not including Lync and Windows Server licenses. INET Consulting resells it in the Americas, and Audiocodes opportunistically represents it in sales situations outside the US.
Sangoma. Here's another company that underwent a corporate transformation in recent years. It started off as an OEM supplier of voice processing boards that are still sold to a range of PBX and data switch vendors, branched into gateways and SBCs, and then introduced a Lync appliance.
When Sangoma Lync Express launched last year it sported Lync 2010, an integrated gateway, and scaled to 100 users. That product has since been discontinued and replaced by a version 2.0 system that has three configuration options (integrated gateway, integrated SBC, both gateway and SBC integrated); support for SIP trunks (courtesy of the SBC); support for analog phones (courtesy of the gateway); PSTN failover; PBX integration; and scalability up to 1,000 users (courtesy of a 2U server rather than the otherwise 1U appliance). Pricing starts at $8,995, $10,495, or $11,495 for a 100-seat system with integrated gateway, an integrated SBC, or both gateway and SBC, respectively.
Marketing director Jeff Dworkin says Sangoma has shipped hundreds of Lync Express systems, but most of these are in the labs of partners as opposed to deployed in the field. There are fewer than 20 deployed to date, each of which has 100-200 Lync seats on it. The company is leveraging its existing gateway and SBC channel partners to represent Lync Express. Cincinnati-based InTrust IT and Texas-based Comlink are master distributors in the US, while the company has recruited a number of resellers in Europe, Asia, and Latin America.
The list of Lync appliances can go on and on. There's also boxedUC from Italy-based FrabbicaDigitale, Lync Appliance from SynSIP in Belgium, UCS 3000 from Iluminari Tech in Canada. One of the things that concerns me is the small size of the vendors developing them. I'd feel more comfortable if some industry heavyweights were behind the Lync appliance movement so it didn't seem like such a cottage industry. Cisco and IBM, of course, won't get involved, but HP and Dell are both significant Microsoft partners. So what's their take on all this?
While HP has no Lync appliance, "we do have a tested and validated Reference Architecture for Microsoft Lync," distinguished technologist Manfred Arndt told me in an email. "It provides a tested and proven Lync 2013 customizable blueprint based on HP Converged Infrastructure, that includes specific lists of all the required hardware components along with best practices for UC from both HP and Microsoft for channel partners, that is designed for small and midsize enterprises with 250 to 2,500 users."
So that's what's behind the 2,500-seat scalability figure, which I thought was high for a server appliance targeted at SMBs. There's a reference architecture that Microsoft partners can use to put all the Lync software on a single server for that number of users.
For Dell, it's a different story. In November the company will launch Cloud Managed Appliance for Lync, a version of StartReady's all-in-one Lync server that will be sold in two different ways. First, there's the standard all-in-one sort of Lync appliance that we've been discussing. This will have one model for businesses needing 200 or fewer seats, another model for 200-600 seats, and a high-availability option with two appliances configured for failover. Dell will also have options for mid-market businesses requiring higher scalability.
The second deployment option will be as a "management appliance." In this scenario, the Dell appliance will be set up at a company that has a standard Lync deployment with the various Lync server roles and software components running on different servers. The appliance--or rather, the deployment engine and management tools--allows Dell to remotely monitor and manage the Lync environment. Dee Chury, UC&C Portfolio Director at Dell IT Consulting, says that ahead of the November launch date one company--a healthcare business with over 1,300 users--has deployed Dell Lync's appliance in management mode. Dell plans to wrap additional services in with Cloud Managed Appliance, such as on-site implementation services, integration with existing PBXs, and integration with partners' SIP trunking services.
Even with HP and Dell involved, each in their own way, I do worry about the future of Lync appliances. They seem to have a rather high price point...at least higher than what SMBs are used to paying for telephony systems. I understand that they do a lot more than standard SMB telephony systems, but that's what potential customers are going to compare them against.
Another area of concern: Few of the Lync appliance vendors are solely focused on the SMB opportunity. Rather, they have an all-in-one Lync appliance for SMBs, but many developers are leveraging this to go up-market. This undoubtedly makes good business sense in terms of selling systems to the widest possible base of customers. But it also makes me wonder if there just isn't enough demand for Lync appliances specifically in the SMB space.
There might be interest in Lync appliances for SMBs if Microsoft continues to drag its heels on adding Enterprise Voice to Lync Online. But once Enterprise Voice is baked into Lync Online, that will be the preferred way SMBs consume Lync-based telephony. I suppose that's why so many of the Lync appliance vendors are making sure they can sell to more than SMBs. Appliances for customers needing a thousand, or thousands of, Lync seats means that these typically tiny developers aren't tied to just the SMB market.
But these appliances do mask the complexity of deploying Lync for SMBs with limited IT resources. And they're great for adding Microsoft-based communications to Office 365, whose Lync Online component continues to lack Enterprise Voice. In fact, this is a use case cited by most of the appliance developers: A hybrid scenario where the SMB has a Lync appliance onsite integrated with Microsoft's cloud-based Office 365 service. If more large companies like Dell and Westcon make a showing in the Lync appliance scene--and if large companies like Dell and Westcon make their Lync appliance businesses global rather than regional--perhaps these devices will become less of a market niche than they are today.
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