Growth Our small business and UC related solutions are holding up well in a market which is flat and expected to remain so for some while. TalkSwitch the small business IP-PBX is doing particularly well and we expect this to continue to be a reliable profit earner for our Channel Partners. Wave our UC IP-PBX solution is also showing firm sales and we expect that this will continue. Sales are partly driven by the price reduction made at the start of the year but it is the core usp’s of Wave which are attracting the end users whilst Channel Partners are finding that the capability to offer a price competitive but unique solution gives them an edge.
Channel Partner opportunities Our Polycom on-site mobility solutions are the real winners for our Channel Partners. Growth in demand for on-site voice mobility has been strong and is expected to continue out to 2015. In the medium term, as a result of the Microsoft – Polycom partnership and the release of Lync, the forecast suggests that demand for our Polycom SpectraLink and KIRK voice mobility solutions will continue to outstrip the market and possibly reach double figures.
Medium term growth in the on-site mobility market will be fuelled by the shift to UC but in the short term we are seeing productivity concerns driving sales. With recruitment on hold in many companies our Polycom SpectraLink and KIRK voice mobility solutions are seen as one way to increase the productivity especially in the service and care sectors.
Key trends & market growth The increasing participation and commitment of Microsoft to telecoms and its strategic partnership with Polycom has to be one of the most influential trends the market at the moment. Microsoft’s participation is likely to cause a paradigm shift in the licencing and pricing model as the data resellers business model become more influential in the channel and Microsoft imports its way or doing business into the industry.
Another key influencing trend over the next few years will be the shift to hosted or cloud based solutions. Figures suggest that the hosted solutions market will grow in double figures out to 2015. This will not necessarily be a threat to CPE solutions but it will mean the channel will need to learn to sell against cloud based solutions especially those Channel Partners whose business focuses on the SMB market.
Big hitters shape the market The moves of the big influencers such as Polycom and Microsoft will have a major effect on the structure of the market and the shares of established players. Long respected for its range of on-site mobility solutions for industrial type environments the planned move by Polycom to expand its handset portfolio into the high volume carpeted office environment with the introduction of new handsets will seriously disrupt market shares in this segment especially with its tie up with the other global trend maker Microsoft.
The "apps" business One of the major trends almost sneaking in unnoticed is the adoption of the “apps” business model so successfully developed by Apple. Vendors such as Vertical and Polycom are already shifting their product strategy to that of selling a platform on which communications apps can be run. Vertical Communications are creating an “App Store” for its Wave solution and Polycom will be releasing a portfolio of basic generic apps for the KIRK handset solutions.
More business for Channel Partners The rest of 2011 and 2012 will be an interesting time for ICON and its Channel Partners. The Microsoft -Polycom partnership is expected to expand opportunities for our Polycom on-site mobility solutions faster than the market is growing and the move by Polycom KIRK to a handset platform which runs “apps” is expected to generate new opportunities in vertical markets.
Recruiting partners In the short term ICON’s focus is on recruiting data resellers and helping its traditional channel partners to take on-board the more solutions focused and software based solutions.
Until recently the traditional telecoms solutions were not compatible with the data reseller channel. Now with the introduction of the UC solution Wave and the move by Polycom to build more software based apps into its solutions data resellers are becoming the channel of choice for these solutions.
