Enterprises are always upgrading and adding to their burgeoning communications networks, studying difficult investment decisions. Is using one or a select few technology vendors any guarantee of successful integration? Or should a company use the latest solutions made for their industry, regardless of vendor? There’s a constant worry of being stymied by one-trick, non-compatible applications and solutions.

 

When IT, telecom, and security teams jointly assess a company’s communications environment, the evaluation includes technology, equipment, switching fabric (like SIP), communications functionality, infrastructure, industry-based versus vendor-specific solutions, and how all these fit with the security framework. The challenge is to leverage existing investments while deploying new solutions. Anything new must not only meet immediate needs, but prepare for future capabilities not yet identified. The only way to accomplish the task is to be sure all new technology and solutions are designed to interoperate with other vendors’ equipment and are based on open standards.

 

Interoperability and open standards extend the life of existing infrastructure, enabling both upgraded and new connectivity and applications.

 

Open standards in communications and VoIP systems have continued to evolve. For both ISDN standards sponsored by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and SIP standards sponsored by the International Engineering Task Force (IETF), openness is now covering industry solutions and interoperability among multiple vendors’ implementations.

 

To help enterprises create the best possible communications for their unique business needs, Avaya is committed to interoperability in our solutions, and we have been active in industry standards groups for years. An enterprise’s communication services could include carrier-hosted services, mobile services, and services delivered to or within the enterprise. Avaya and our partners routinely collaborate to perform interoperability testing of an enterprise’s entire communication solution.

 

By using open standards Avaya has been able to break down the capabilities within enterprise applications into modular, self-contained components that can communicate with each other and with business applications through a well-defined interface. This common set of communication protocols can connect all applications and services within the enterprise, regardless of their underlying hardware, operating system, or programming language. Avaya has enabled unlimited possibilities of integrating with other vendor applications.