In Microsoft’s tryst with VoIP, Pushpa Sathish describes a preview of Microsoft’s new Communications Server.Â
Capabilities in the private beta of Office Communications Server 2007 include placing and receiving voice calls; advanced call routing; streamlined integration with the new unified messaging capabilities in Exchange Server 2007; multiparty conferencing; call holding, forwarding and transferring; and compliance capabilities.
Sounds a helluva lot like a PBX, doesn’t it? In 2003 I had several conversations with local people in or associated with the PBX industry here in Ottawa. With the direction of LCS at the time, and the trend toward all software PBX’s in evidence, it was clearly just a matter of time before Microsoft showed its hand. Interestingly, nobody would acknowledge this.
How long until the Nortels and Mitels of the world are reduced to handset manufacturers?
Alec Saunders is the Vice President of Developer Relations for BlackBerry maker Research in Motion. This is his personal blog, with his personal viewpoints. Prior to this Alec was the CEO and co-founder of Calliflower — the easiest way to hold a meeting, online, on a conference call, or on the go. A double-decade veteran of product management and marketing, he spent nine years at Microsoft where he helped launch Windows 95, the first two versions of Internet Explorer, the Universal Plug and Play initiative, the push into home markets, opt-in email marketing and what might well go down in history as the very first direct email list ever.
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I am pretty sure that the UI is there (much in the same way you can place a call in Outlook) but the actual functions and system req. fall back to the IP PBX, I know they have been integrating the Nortel BCM into LCS for some time, I would imagine it became pretty apparent to them that call control was needed if you were using Windows messenger with a SIP PBX.
Nortels own Softphone and the peripherals that go along with it (astronomically priced) have these capabilities now, (as do other proprietary softphones) so it isnt' too far a stretch to add the protocol to Windows messenger.
Fax and Voice resources aren't Notels forte', so I would be very surprised if they are adding that functionality as a pure software play.