Streamline your communications and make business more productive

Business Communication technology is constantly advancing, and organizations in the Middle East are benefiting from this innovation. To truly harness the power of the extended enterprise, companies need to deploy an Intelligent Communications strategy combining traditional communications and collaboration tools with business applications.

For the first time, organizations of all sizes are able to become more profitable and productive by enabling people, networks and business applications to work together--when they need to--anywhere they happen to be in the distributed enterprise or the world at large.

The key is a whole new category of business communications applications and services that are connecting workers, customers and processes to the right people, at the right time, in the right medium. Avaya is at the forefront of providing this technology.

Avaya is a global provider of business communications applications, systems and services. The company has widened its lead in worldwide enterprise Internet protocol (IP) telephony revenues, according to Synergy Research Groups 2Q 2007 Enterprise Voice Market Shares Report. 

With this report, Avaya reinforces its leadership in this market, as more businesses around the globe evolve their voice networks to IP telephony. The report shows Avaya as the number 1 vendor in IP telephony revenues (as defined by Synergy), with 25.4 per cent of the global market for the second quarter of 2007.

In addition, the report shows that Avaya retained its leadership position in the worldwide overall enterprise telephony market in revenue, with nearly 19 per cent of the market in 2Q, more than 2 percentage points over its nearest competitor.
"Avaya customers are now experiencing the competitive edge that can only be gained through a highly reliable, flexible and open IP Telephony platform," said Nidal Abou Ltaif, managing director for Avaya MENA. "Avaya's communications solutions are giving businesses the powerful tools they need to add significant value today, while providing an IP foundation that ensures business success tomorrow."

“Avaya is the company driving intelligent communications for businesses in the Middle East, and we are finding customers to be incredibly receptive to the mobility and productivity story that we have here. What is also convincing for enterprises are our fantastic customer references from a number of industries and markets in the region,” explains Abou-Ltaif.

As more businesses in the Middle East are adopting IT Telephony, even more are keen on adopting unified communications. Avaya's Unified Communications strategy has consistently emphasized streamlined integration of its solutions with existing networks and applications, to better leverage and organisations current technology investments. Avaya anticipates unified communications to be the most significant advances in the Middle East’s networking sector throughout 2007.

“Employees of organisations in the Middle East have too many devices and communication applications to manage.  Users are bombarded with phone calls, email, voice mail, fax, and instant messaging.

“Through Unified Communications, Avaya aims to integrate these applications under one easy-to-use interface that enables users to respond faster to clients, and give them a competitive edge. Unified Communications is a major initiative in our industry that will shape regional market and change the way businesses deliver strategic communications and collaboration tools to workers wherever they are, and on any device,” added Abou-Ltaif.

Unified communication applications and implementations are set to rise in the region, fuelled by the twin drivers of more IP network implementations and the need for increasingly mobile solutions. And Avaya says it is set to cash in on the growing customer interest.

Avaya recently reinforced its commitment to the Middle East by and answered regional customer demand for Arabized IP Telephony solutions by launching of new Avaya one-X™ deskphone Arabic edition and mobile solutions.

The new Avaya IP telephony solutions offers the Middle East’s more than 300 million Arabic speakers unparalleled mobility and simplicity, as well as faster access to a vast array of advanced applications, making them more productive by doing business in their native language.

Abou-Ltaif explains: “We have delivered on our spoken commitment to localize our business to meet the needs of regional customers, and it is our most significant launch ever in the Middle East to deliver the region’s first Arabized IP telephony solution. Offering IP telephony solutions in Arabic helps to preserve the culture and traditions of communications in the Middle East while creating a more mobile and productive environment,”

Avaya believes that Arabized IP telephony offerings will have particular applicability to industries such as government, healthcare, and education, and will enable Arabic-speakers to more fully utilize the functionality of IP systems because of an increased comfort level with the user interface on the Avaya one-X deskphone and mobile editions.

With approximately 1.86 billion speakers worldwide, Arabic is rising in the ranks of the world’s major languages – experts rank it anywhere from fourth to sixth place. Analysts based in the region have stated that approximately 65% of Arab Internet users are not comfortable with the English language and only 35% actually speak it fluently, and our experience in the Middle East region has also demonstrated that a percentage of native Arab speakers have refrained from using IP-based technology because they are not confident in English. Avaya’s one-X solution in Arabic addresses that very real market gap.

"For the average user or the CEO, it's not the technology that's key but the processes that it enables. The normal user at the desk is not a Dubai power user. The Arabic version of the IP phone is designed to initiate and make simple processes easy for the user. We think that's a part of unified communications. In the region, phone experience and mobility are proving to be highly critical,” added Abou-Ltaif.

Complementing its one-X™ range of communication solutions, Avaya also recently launched the web-based one-X™ Portal - an integrated browser-based interface to Avaya telephony, messaging, conferencing and mobility services. One-X™ brings the full power of Unified Communications to the PC in a single, intuitive and powerful tool.

Abou-Ltaif continued: “With the launch of one-X™ Portal, we are enriching our one-X™ portfolio and complementing our one-X™ desktop and mobile editions. The need for Unified Communications in the Middle East has become a pressing business concern due to a number of market dynamics.

The increase in working remotely, the growth of business travel, and the regional demand for constant email and Internet access are driving adoption of Unified Communications solutions. The introduction of the Avaya one-X™ Portal reflects our understanding of regions business requirements and the importance of delivering mobility- and productivity-enhancing solutions.”

Avaya’s regional leadership in contact centre solutions was also recently demonstrated at the Middle East Contact Centre Awards, where six of the eleven awards for contact centre excellence were bagged by companies that have implemented Avaya solutions.

“That six out of the eleven organisations recognised as winners at the Middle East Contact Centre Awards are all deploying Avaya solutions is a significant testimony to our regional leadership in contact centre technology and implementations. The region is playing an increasingly strategic role in terms of the size and profitability of its contact center operations,” added Abou-Ltaif.

Avaya currently supports and creates significant value for more than 100 contact centers in the MENA region, in part by ensuring that they achieve a fast return on their investment. As a growing number of industry sectors realise the critical importance of customer service and satisfaction, tremendous potential growth is generated for contact center services in the region.

For the last several years, Avaya has been educating the market about the benefits of IP telephony, contact centers and now unified communications. The Middle East is a very service-centric market and so customers have been receptive to solutions that enable them to provide an enhanced level of service.

Organizations from both the UAE’s public and private sectors have adopted Avaya solutions, including leading banks, hotels, telecoms operators, service providers, and government departments.

Avaya has deployed communications solutions for some of the regions most visible organizations including Emirates Bank International, Dubai Police, Etisalat, Dubai Department of Health, Dubai Civil Defence, Shuaa Capital, Saudi Airlines, BUPA Middle East, Emirates Bank International, King Faisal Hospital, Gulf News, and National Bank of Dubai, and Abu Dhabi Water and Electricity Authority.

Expanding its reach with the Middle East, Avaya is soon set to open its office in Jeddah to oversee its operations in Saudi Arabia and provide its Saudi-based clients with local expertise. This growth is in addition to an office in Qatar and the MENA headquarters in Dubai, UAE.

Avaya is providing the type of solutions that are unique to the market in that they can be sold, deployed and supported quickly and easily, which makes better business sense and faster return on investment for its customers and channel partners.