Comms Dealer

US-based investment firm Berkshire Partners is to acquire a majority interest in global service provider Masergy Communications.

Masergy serves clients in over 75 countries, offering hybrid networking, managed security and cloud communications solutions to medium and large enterprise customers.

Chris MacFarland, Chairman and CEO of Masergy, said: "Berkshire brings the industry expertise required to help us fulfill our vision."

Berkshire Partners MD Tom Kuo added "Given the accelerating rate of change across the information technology landscape, there are significant opportunities for Masergy to continue its growth."

Synergi IT's Managing Director Peter Joynson shows how fully engaged customer education provides a framework in which cloud service providers can flourish.

Joynson's relationship with new technology predates the emergence of word processors way back when. He's been in the IT sector ever since, and aside from industry experience shaping his foolproof go-to-market strategies other personal influences are on vivid display. In large part, Joynson attributes his ambition to family factors. These include his father who instilled a familial drive and determination as well as a clear perspective on what is 'really important in life'; and the family office equipment business where Joynson worked immediately after leaving school at 16 years of age.

"This was the beginning of my career in technology," said Joynson. "In the early days it was electronic typewriters followed by word processors and the desktop PC revolution in the late '80s and early '90s. For 30 years my career has reflected developments in software and technology, but the biggest step-change is the rise of cloud technology and SaaS, and Synergi IT is well placed to help drive this transformation."

Since the sale of the family business in 2003 much of Joynson's game plan has been founded on sharp observations of evolving technology; and following a 10 year stint working for a large national services provider he intervened in the market with an immediate purpose. "I began to see the strategic direction companies like Microsoft were moving towards, and noted the growth projections for cloud technology services," explained Joynson. "Justin Short, my co-Director, shared the same vision so we created Synergi IT in 2013 as a Microsoft Cloud and SharePoint focused services partner."

Joynson's mission is to liberate organisations from the outmoded techno-world in which they live - that of legacy premise-based systems. He thrives on the front line, meeting buyers, educating them and generating growth. In Joynson's business plan, education has become an important strategy and there is no shortage of ambition. "We focus on helping to educate the market and become trusted partners to our clients," he added. "We call it Digital Transformation and have secured several great success stories and some excellent client wins as a result. These include regional water supplier Northumbrian Water, care home operator Hadrian Healthcare, and Walker Filtration which manufacturers compressed air filtration and drying equipment."

By far the most positive sign of Synergi IT's advance to date is winning the Nintex Partner of the Year Award 2016, handed over at Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference in Toronto this summer. "Integrating modern business platforms like Nintex, Microsoft Office 365 and Azure can improve and automate what were previously seen as labour intensive processes," noted Joynson. "In doing so, it is now possible to provide better access and greater mobility to business data, improving the user experience with agility. We will continue to invest in the right team and products to secure our hard won position as a leading Microsoft cloud provider in the north of England and Scotland."

Joynson pointed out that every index of Synergi IT's business growth improvement shows a steady upward graph. "We started with a team of four back in 2013," he explained. "Today we are 16 strong and have a talented, experienced and passionate team. Turnover is also tracking headcount growth, while our ability to grow is linked closely to investment in resources and team numbers. We broke through the £1 million turnover mark this year and are well positioned to continue to secure growth through the addition of new Microsoft cloud accounting software solutions to our portfolio in 2017. We also have a robust, expansive customer base that ranges from local SMEs to internationally recognised brands."

The essence of Joynson's market engagement strategy is a total commitment to putting live experiences back at the centre of educational activity. "We've been running educational breakfast workshops for the last 12 months and have another six planned across the north east of England for the year ahead," he stated. "The focus of these free events is to help business leaders better understand the full power of Microsoft cloud and how Synergi IT has the experience and expertise to help them transform their businesses."

Educating buyers about the improving state of ICT enables Synergi IT to identify and nurture the prospects who most readily accept new technology and understand that their progress will ultimately depend on it. "Our proposition is simple: We want to work with businesses that wish to improve," commented Joynson. "Many, if not all, commercial sectors have been under intense economic pressure during the last five years. A lot of organisations have reacted by driving through cost cutting measures, stopping unnecessary purchases and reducing headcount in a bid to remain competitive. However, we want to work with businesses that perceive technology as the way to improve how they sustain long-term efficiency and, ultimately, growth."

Another of Joynson's triumphs is to have overcome one of the industry's biggest challenges - finding the right staff. "The technology market is relentlessly fast paced, so keeping abreast of the changes and developments is a constant challenge," he added. "To do this we have become adept at recruiting high quality talent and built a strong, like-minded and forward thinking team that has an eye on the developing market. We select both experienced and talented IT professionals while searching out an enthusiastic new breed of bright young people who can quickly flourish in a nurturing environment that's also positive, creative and focused.

"Our priority is to ensure that Synergi IT is always a great company to work for and do business with. We will continue to display a positivity and agility in our working relationships with clients. But of course we are only human, so balancing that with the pace of change and a constant need to learn is always a challenge - but one that we relish."

What also excites Joynson is that his portfolio continues to evolve as Microsoft and Nintex release enhanced functions to their solutions. "Since 2013, we have seen massive steps in what can be achieved by Office 365," he added. "No longer is it Word and Excel in the cloud, rather a multi-component business platform that, when implemented well, truly influences how our customers interact with each other and their business data."

Nintex is a key component in Synergi IT's portfolio and a strategic tool to enhance workflows and introduce electronic mobile forms to clients. Often these tools are at the core of delivering cost savings and tangible improvements. "Nintex's new Hawkeye Workflow reporting and Document Generation solutions will play a big part in our ongoing development throughout 2017 and beyond," noted Joynson.

Cue another 2017 product strategy. "Although Microsoft has had offerings in the accounting ERP and CRM space for many years, these software technologies have to date been mainly server based on-premise software deployments," pointed out Joynson. "This is about to change. The emergence of Microsoft Dynamics 365 platforms excites us and we are well placed to build on this opportunity along with the wider Office 365 platform. We have been to Microsoft UK's HQ at Thames Valley Park to align our strategy and we're enthused by the next generation of Dynamics ERP solutions."

The potency of such cloud-based solutions is becoming inherently more influential in a market receptive to change. "We are now seeing huge adoption of cloud technology by all kinds of businesses," noted Joynson. "We spotted the change in technology early and are focused on it. We don't have the distraction or baggage of more traditional IT firms, but we know there is still much to do in terms of education on how modern technology really can make a positive difference. Soon we will all look back and wonder how we ever ran successful businesses with all those servers and software licenses to manage." •

On the development of seamless collaboration technologies and products few can challenge the experience and influence of Toby Gold, Chief Executive Officer at sipsynergy.

Advances made in creating a strong market for seamless collaboration are in large part down to the efforts of technology champions such as Gold who recognised the benefits of collaboration early in his working life and soon after set about meeting the demands of customers wanting ever more seamless interaction. "My initial introduction to what I'd call collaboration goes back to my time in engineering," he recalled. "I trained as an engineer in what were called simultaneous engineering techniques, where people would collaborate over the lifecycle of product development. That was in the 80s and was the first time people were starting to use technology to collaborate effectively. That approach would then become embedded in a lot of future visualisation technologies. Not long after that, still fairly early in my IT career, I began working officially in collaboration and have been involved in it, and passionate about it, for over 20 years."

The most visible sign of collaboration as we know it today emerged in the early 2000s when Cisco, for example, prioritised the development of UC. And recognising the potential impact of collaboration and UC across the entire range of businesses Gold moved to Cisco before running the collaboration practice at Logicalis that was responsible for the video conferencing business. "We were very much in that vanguard of organisations that were in the midst of working out how to create a seamless collaboration experience across voice, messaging, video and other collaboration technologies," stated Gold.

"While at Logicalis we tried to create our own hosted collaboration solution so that the whole customer lifecycle becomes more integrated and repeatable while costing less from a partner perspective. I tried to do this using the resources of one of the largest systems integrators in the UK, and even then it was a struggle. We managed to come up with an amalgamated approach to what I call the end-to-end service ethos but really didn't get any further than that."

According to Gold sipsynergy has passed through this impasse and his overwhelming urge was to resume his role as a lead player in driving the market for true collaboration and help to realise sipsynergy's potential. "I know how hard this is to do and appreciate what sipsynergy has done," explained Gold. "When I saw what the company had achieved I was so excited, but knew it needed structure and investment to take it further. That's why I joined.

"I've run start-up type organisations, I've worked for a manufacturer and I've worked in more mature systems integrator and service provider environments, so I know where we're coming from and where we're going. I understand the manufacturer's perspective and believe I've got the ability to realise sipsynergy's potential, which is to be a far more scaled up business addressing the needs of the SMB and mid-market customer. Much of what I've done in my career has led me here. The role is a summary of all the things I've achieved to date. Fingers crossed, my greatest achievements are ahead of me here at sipsynergy."

Gold joined the company two months ago along with another industry heavyweight, Tom Kelly, who is the firm's Chairman. The duo are charged with accelerating sipsynergy's growth and customer base following a £2.75 million investment from YFM Equity Partners. Gold moved from Dell Software where his most recent role was Director of Northern Europe. His first priority in the new job was to ensure that sipsynergy had a sound financial plan and ability to measure and track progress. "We're in a period of accelerated growth therefore much of our current focus is around identifying and recruiting the right people for the right roles," he added.

sipsynergy was established in 2009 by Barnaby Ritchley and John Fox as a developer of software solutions for Cisco UC service providers. The founders soon realised they had the basis of a strong UCaaS business and invested in a Cisco HCS platform. Their insight into the requirements of the service provider community and an innovative approach to process and technology automation gave them a powerful USP.

"We obtained the VC funding and recruited a number of new executives to fully exploit the market opportunity," added Gold. "We're focused on bringing the benefits of UCaaS to business customers through the partner community and we plan to grow aggressively over the next few years."

Gold's current role reflects the technology gulf between the mid-2000s and now. Initially a software company, sipsynergy recognised the best way to serve its customers was to create a platform and deliver it as-a-service. From the outset it was solving the problem of multi-tenancy and service automation and applying that to create a UCaaS platform. "There's been an enormous amount of growth in the hosted collaboration market for companies with less than 250 users," said Gold. "That market in Cisco's space hasn't

been well served and, historically, it's been difficult for organisations like ours to deliver a service that was sufficiently repeatable and would meet the requirements of smaller organisations. So we have a fast growing market that's not been well served, and our approach is to build a highly repeatable automated platform and scale into that market using a partner led approach. We've put a tremendous amount of effort into making the partner's life easier."

Automation plays a significant role in Gold's plans and he expects to peak at circa 65 employees. The firm currently works with 50 partners and has almost 10,000 subscribers on its platform. "We want to increase the number of partners we work with, but our focus is very much on quality rather than quantity," added Gold. "Our two main challenges are to quickly broadcast the message of what sipsynergy is able to offer to our customers and partners in terms of capitalising on the benefits of our platform. Secondly, our ability to innovate needs to be matched by our ability to execute or any potential competitors will catch up. The aim of where we want to get to over the course of the next three-five years is key to our whole company ethos. We want to be universally known as a partner-enabled collaboration provider for the mid-market and SMB customer space, whatever shape collaboration takes over the course of the next three-five years."

The challenges of the present are more easily overcome by looking forward to a new golden age of communications which draws on the experience and achievements of industry movers such as Gold whose contribution is irrefutable, and often associated with pivotal decisions. "We decided to make a substantial commitment to Cisco's hosted collaboration solution platform and ensure that it was deliverable to our partners, as well as making the conscious decision to be white labelled," commented Gold. "Through our partnership with Cisco, working through resellers into SMBs, sipsynergy has created one of the first white labelled UCaaS 'Business in a Box' solutions. This has enabled partners to deliver their own branded enterprise class collaboration solutions to small to mid-sized businesses."

Collaboration technology and the marketplace is constantly evolving so another point of focus for sipsynergy is monitoring industry trends and making sure that its roadmap is ahead of the game. "The biggest industry trend impacting us is mobility," stated Gold. "People want the same experience from their corporate collaboration platform as their consumer apps and they want to be able to have access any time, on any device.

"To stay aligned with the market we take a considered approach to keeping our edge on innovation while adding more process and structure around what we do. Our culture is entrepreneurial. We're fortunate to have some of the most gifted developers I've ever seen. It's the combination of entrepreneurial flare and deep techie geekdom that makes sipsynergy what it is."

The expansion of sipsynergy has validated Gold's early assumptions about the growth potential of true collaboration. He looks back on those days as an engineer from the standpoint of a business leader who aims to bring a transformation in the way businesses operate and communicate, typified by an urge to make a difference, not only to sipsynergy, its customers and partners, but also the wider industry. "As a sector I'd like to see us practice what we preach more, have better access to the full range of talent out there and bring more women into the workplace," he said. "I'd also like to see people be productive while living a fulfilled family life. I don't see why technology needs to be so intrusive. It should support a work-life balance."•

US-based cloud comms giant Vonage has swung its gaze onto the UK reseller channel and linked up with DMSL to drive forward a decisive partner recruitment campaign via the distributor's 300-plus reseller base.

The man at the forefront of Vonage UK's resolute channel building campaign is Managing Director Simon Burckhardt who aims to add more numbers to the company's already impressive set of financial figures and highly populated customer base. In 2015 Vonage generated revenues of $895 million and boasts more than 70,000 business clients and nearly two million residential customers, all served by its 1,700 people working in global offices. Founded in 2001, Vonage was one of the original providers of residential VoIP services but in 2013 the company pivoted its strategy towards businesses, targeting a range of organisations from single person companies to enterprises with multiple locations.

"Vonage has near iconic brand awareness in the US and has embarked on a strategy to strengthen its presence in the UK," said Burckhardt. "This includes growing our reseller channel. The partnership with DMSL gives us an opportunity to immediately extend the distribution of our cloud solutions by working with its 300-plus resellers. Our focus is on small businesses, offering them the readily accessible features they need, fast provisioning and an intuitive plug-and-play set up.

"These features include mobile and desktop apps, call recording and conference calling. Today, with the evolution of technology, businesses also require a communications system that allows an increasingly mobile and distributed workforce to maintain a business presence and to be productive any time, anywhere. Employees are no longer tied to the office, and UC enables them to work from any device with clear reliable connectivity and access to the same information and functionality as if they were in the office."

Vonage's acquisition of Nexmo was its springboard into contextual communications, bringing new CPaaS (Communications Platform as a Service) capabilities that are now being leveraged to the full advantage of channel partners and end users, says Burckhardt. The Nexmo API Platform provides tools for voice, messaging and phone verification services, allowing developers to embed contextual and programmable communications into mobile apps, websites and business systems. This enables enterprises to more easily communicate relevant information to their customers in real-time, anywhere in the world via text messaging, chat, social media and voice.

"Vonage envisions the future of business communications as a fusion of UCaaS and CPaaS, enabling greater mobility, productivity and collaboration among employees while helping businesses to stay more closely connected to their customers," commented Burckhardt.

He joined Vonage in 2012, the latest move in a career that includes other leadership roles in international telecoms companies, namely Telefonica, BT and MTS, based in various locations from Qatar to Moscow and the Czech Republic. He also founded and ran a small business called Route 30 and worked as a board advisor to Cambridge-based start-up Voipex and Dutch-based Simbrella, a mobile commerce firm. Burckhardt also brings experience in the mobile marketing and CRM sectors. "I'm passionate about how technology can facilitate businesses, particularly through cloud-based services," he enthused. "By creating a complete solution that considers the business need for mobility, video and software integration with voice as a platform, we can deliver enhanced mobility and productivity for employees where location and device become irrelevant."

Burckhardt's immediate priority is to push Vonage's portfolio deep into the UK via the build-out of a reseller channel based on mutually beneficial partnerships. "Vonage chose DMSL as a partner for its ability to identify, recruit and engage with its nationwide network of resellers who understand the value of cloud communications," he explained. "Our partners in the channel will help us to not only meet the needs of small businesses but also manage customer relationships as our reach grows in the UK market.

"In turn, together with DMSL we are providing a one-stop-shop for our partners. Those selling cloud services in the past needed to work with multiple providers depending on whether they wanted to offer a quick-to-provision simple voice service with BYOD, a larger multi-location solution over a private MPLS network, or cloud services beyond voice, such as virtual desktop and virtual server offerings. Vonage is able to provide our partners, and their customers, with all of those services."•

Gamma's acquisition of a core mobile network infrastructure in 2014 was its first step on the road to launching an exclusive business mobile service to the channel. Following the roll out of the new service in June to existing mobile partners Gamma last month threw the doors open to what Rob Davis, Head of Converged Products, claims is a rare opportunity to take on the big boys.

The UK's business mobile market is fiercely competitive and Gamma has made a name for itself as an ambitious competitor with the determination to go up against industry monoliths as well as smaller rivals. Last month Gamma added considerable muscle to its mobile campaign with the launch of a business mobile service that better enables reseller partners to square up to bigger companies with a converged fixed and mobile capability exclusively configured for business customers.

"We hear from our partners that their business customers want a better overall mobile service and one that is supported by someone who understands their needs," stated Davis. "Gamma Mobile, together with our channel partners, can make both of these a reality with bolt-ons like MultiNet providing coverage from multiple UK networks from the same SIM, as well as business class support from their channel partner who can provide near real-time control over network provisioning, barring and usage alerts using the Gamma portal that has direct links into the core of our mobile and fixed network."

Gamma has been delivering mobile services for business customers through its channel partners for more than eight years, offering a high level of control, ownership and flexibility. "However, we wanted to take it to the next level by investing in our own core mobile network so we could give channel partners more of an edge when competing with the large mobile networks," added Davis. "So we've invested millions over the last two years building our own mobile core network and integrating it with our fixed line network. Since it is focused exclusively on business customers we're building the features that business customers want most, such as the aforementioned MultiNet bolt-on for providing increased coverage across multiple UK networks, and a business grade voicemail platform with options for different greetings inside and outside office hours and much longer message storage."

Alongside fixed line and data services Gamma Mobile is a key area of the firm's product portfolio, aligning closely with a growing number of business customers who are demanding more services from a single supplier. Furthermore, resellers want the operational benefits of having fewer suppliers that are able to offer a high level of automation and support. "The response from both existing and new partners has been positive and we have increased our team of mobile specialists who are working closely with partners as part of the transition to the new service," added Davis.

Positive partner feedback has prompted Davis to forecast strong growth in the number of resellers taking up the mobile service. "Many resellers and dealers tell us they are increasingly frustrated by the large mobile networks continually changing their commission plans and channel strategy, costing them money and reputational damage," stated Davis. "As with our other services we aim to be fair to our partners on mobile and expect this approach to help increase both the number of existing Gamma partners that sell Gamma mobile as well as helping new partners sell some or all of our services."

For more than ten years Gamma's portal has been central to putting resellers in control of the services they sell to customers, and its evolution has been a focal point of ongoing development for many years. According to Davis, the portal is also a boon to resellers of Gamma's new mobile services.

"Many telecoms companies rely on call centres and manual processes to make simple changes such as adding network bars or doing a SIM swap," said Davis. "But this adds delays of often up to 48 hours based on standard network SLAs of a 24 hour response time added to a 24 hour network change time. We are committed to developing and giving resellers the tools to do as many network changes as possible in as close to real-time as possible while their customer is on the phone, which is the only way of providing a true business class service."

Davis reiterated that the Gamma Mobile service gives channel partners margin opportunities by combining both the operational savings of working with Gamma's portal for all fixed and mobile services as well as the ability to win more business from the big mobile providers with a differentiated mobile proposition. "We're pleased with the level of engagement, feedback and sheer enthusiasm of ideas from our partners in terms of which business services they would like to offer customers but have struggled to get other mobile providers to take on-board," added Davis. "The Gamma Mobile roadmap is partner-led, so watch this space."•

WebRTC: What better time for resellers to assert their sales knowhow and profit from a transformational technology that is growing in popularity among users across the world?

The advent of WebRTC is already fundamentally transforming how many businesses communicate with their customers and reserving judgement on whether to dive into this deep pool of market potential is not an option for comms and IT resellers, according to Dean Manzoori (pictured), Vice President of Global Cloud Communications at Masergy. "We are starting to see WebRTC real-world applications in gaming, social networks, content streaming, job interviews, online retailing and even real-time language translation," he stated. "One of the most obvious WebRTC uses is to facilitate customer engagement on websites. It enables visitors to click a button to initiate a call or video chat with a call centre agent. We use WebRTC ourselves on our own customer support page."

In an enterprise environment, WebRTC can extend collaboration beyond the corporate borders and, for example, enable individual sales people to more easily conduct video conferences that let customers see not only the sales person's face, but also slides, on-screen demos, videos and other supporting material. WebRTC is also making a notable difference in the NHS. Andrena Logue, a health expert at public sector technology analyst firm Kable, commented: "Collaborative tools are starting to be used more extensively by clinicians, not only to consult with peers but also to offer online patient consultations. GP practices and hospitals are already offering this capability. When usage becomes more widespread there will be considerable scope to offer services in areas such as social care via public sector agencies."

To opportunistic comms resellers the rise of WebRTC is their chance to capitalise on a tech-trend that can only gather pace. "Resellers are in a unique position to help customers truly understand WebRTC," added Manzoori. "Businesses that embrace WebRTC will undoubtedly see commercial and competitive benefits, not least better customer engagement, boosted sales, improved communication and reduced call costs. If 2015 was the year WebRTC was hurled into the limelight, then 2016 will be the year it becomes the go-to solution for real-time communications. Comms, IT resellers and VARs should be taking full advantage."

In most cases, personal video conference services that make use of WebRTC operate on a monthly pay-for-use subscription fee, offering plenty of quick scalability and the freedom from having to own expensive and difficult to manage hardware. Facebook, with its 1.9 billion worldwide users, recently added a WebRTC powered feature that allows Chromebook users to initiate video calls without the need to install plugins or go through workarounds. "Gone for good will be the hassle of downloading software, managing frequent software updates, searching for contacts to join a video call, and the disappointment of finding your contact isn't even a Skype user and prefers FaceTime," said Manzoori. "Anyone can use WebRTC."

Ease of use has helped WebRTC services to gain strong appeal, but until recently there has been a slow take-up of the technology as the industry has struggled to understand how to apply it to real customer situations, hampered by Apple and Microsoft's slow progress toward adoption which is now starting to pick up, believes Darren Hilton, Director of Partner Services at Timico, who also predicts that 2017 will be the breakthrough year for embedded real-time communications and collaboration.

"WebRTC plays a significant role in the Digital Transformation movement that is currently taking place," he said. "It enables a business to offer tailored real-time contextual communications throughout the customer experience workflow. We already have WebRTC live and working on our own website and are launching our WebRTC-based Synergy Smart Office technology in Q4 this year. Next year it's all about working with our partners to enable them to start delivering this technology and showcasing some of the examples of how we've already done this.

"The short-term impact of WebRTC is hard to quantify but it is accepted as a disruptive technology and being adopted by all the players who define future markets. Clearly it has the potential to seriously impact existing telecom business models and for those looking at longer term value now is the time to act. The biggest winners will be the early movers. For us, our technology partnership with Greenland has been key to overcoming the challenge of providing a scalable platform to bring enterprise class WebRTC services to market."

The influence of WebRTC is already strongly felt by some of Timico's partners who face the challenge of implementing it. "It's our job to give partners the technical assistance and training they require to meet their customers' demands," added Hilton. "Software vendors are ahead of the game so IT resellers and traditional comms resellers need to start thinking about how they can add software and web development skills to their capabilities."

Hilton re-emphasised that partners require particular assistance with the software development aspect of integration in order to give their customers a tailored solution. "Software development skills are currently not prevalent in the partner community, but we have seen a new breed of partner emerging with the integration skills that are traditionally lacking," he said.

Just as these new entrants could speed past traditional resellers, WebRTC bypasses the traditional models of monetising voice and video communications and therefore threatens the business models of many established players. "Although WebRTC won't remove the minutes model immediately it will start to erode that model over time," said Hilton. "There are new resellers who are approaching telecoms from a completely different perspective and consider voice to be simply an application to be used on the web. Innovate or die has never been more relevant in the telecoms industry than today."

As noted, WebRTC has the power to eliminate traditional boundaries, including distinctions between device manufacturers, operating systems and types of browser to deliver always-on communications between any parties. "WebRTC will rapidly change our understanding of communications," stated Martin Taylor, CMO at Content Guru. "With no downloads or plugins and its ability to incorporate video, text and voice communications straight from the browser on any connected device, WebRTC has the potential to transform the way we communicate on a global scale. By breaking down these barriers, organisations are just a click away from their customers."

Organisations are increasingly looking for cost-effective UC solutions that are both easy for users to operate and simple for corporate IT departments to incorporate within their existing systems infrastructure, noted Taylor. "WebRTC is already the stand-out option for businesses on account of its ease of use, accessibility and affordability," he added. "Users will increasingly look towards providers who embrace WebRTC as a seamlessly integrated communications experience. As adoption continues to grow and more mature WebRTC-based solutions emerge, these capabilities will continue to drive widespread advances across communication and collaboration, as traditional pre-requisites such as physical equipment become redundant."

However, noted Taylor, WebRTC in isolation can be difficult to monetise. Resellers therefore need to consider ways that WebRTC can be integrated with existing, mature communication portfolios and other technology roadmap items. "As portfolios become more diverse, so do customers' expectations," he added. "Resellers therefore need to look for cloud providers that not only have a roadmap in place to continue delivering on customer expectations, but also those that offer a true multi-channel solution."

WebRTC is already ingrained to the point that people are unknowingly adopting the technology, observed Rob Keenan, Head of Portfolio Readiness and Growth UK and EMEAR at Unify. "For example, WebRTC is embedded into UC products such as Unify's Circuit," he said. "WebRTC is also starting to replace communications in existing products from known vendors and it's used by new entrants to the market."

According to Keenan, WebRTC supports the future of the market because the technology works side by side with the cloud model and is easy to deploy and use on any device. "For comms and IT resellers WebRTC will be at the heart of any products they are selling, so they must be able to explain its impact and benefits," he added. "WebRTC is as fundamental as IP or SIP and will be the standard to deliver the communications and collaboration businesses need. The opportunity for the channel is immense. Resellers have the relationships to make these products successful."

Customers are crying out for more integrated, less complex, less expensive yet more seamless experiences, and WebRTC is one technology that can help to make that a possibility, agrees Spencer Bradshaw, Manager of Advanced Applications and Solution Architects for EMEA at ShoreTel "As new applications and devices come on to the market we're likely to see interest in WebRTC continue to grow," he said. "The emergence of CPaaS (Communications Platform as a Service) will start to see WebRTC-based applications communicate with each other without the need to log into all of them and carry out the discreet tasks. Expect to see wider adoption in areas like video and collaboration as the mobilised workforce jumps on the trend."

WebRTC has many use cases but one that stands out for Bradshaw is the potential to remove the proprietary nature of integrations and make it possible to give similar user experiences to client-based application users via a browser, securely and without having to be resident on an in-house system or be licensed to use one. "This makes it possible for me as a ShoreTel user to send a collaboration request to a prospect who uses another voice platform and for them to join that session without having to download anything," he added. "Easy, intuitive, borderless communications is the future."

Also anticipating WebRTC dominance, Paul Taylor, Sales Director at Voiceflex, is in early discussions with his customers about the technology, sharing ideas to see which applications can be delivered via WebRTC. "WebRTC opens the door for high quality audio and video communications and will transform how we communicate," he concurred. "We will see a significant shift from telephony to the web, and stepping stones are being put in place to provide high level web-based content. Resellers will need to increase their understanding of WebRTC and realise that they will not make money from calls, but from selling services and data connectivity. WebRTC moves the industry away from a me-to market into a consultancy based sales environment."•

The ultimate gauge of any USP is whether it communicates and delivers real practical benefits like no other, and neurodiversity in the workplace passes this test, guaranteeing a unique business model and unbeatable competitive advantage, according to Auticon's CEO Ray Coyle.

Auticon has shown us that the days are long gone when autism was categorised as an all encompassing 'disability'. For the company's UK CEO, the power of neurodiversity in the workplace is beyond argument, so much so that autism-specific strengths are what define Auticon's culture, philosophy, growth strategy and go-to-market. The German-based B2B IT service provider exclusively employs autistic people as consultants and launched its UK operation in March this year to advance a remarkable business model that leverages the exceptional cognitive abilities of those in the autistic spectrum to bring significant value to clients.

"By 2020 we plan to have a team of over 100 autistic consultants carrying out great projects across the UK," stated Coyle. "Our core strengths are in software testing and QA, data analytics, compliance, migration and transformation projects; and we are keen to work with channel partners who want to offer their clients a consultancy service in any of these areas. Auticon handles all of the job coaching and project management aspects when working through partners."

Auticon was established as a social enterprise in 2011 by Dirk Muller-Remus who has an autistic son and was alarmed by his job prospects. The company grew rapidly in Germany and now employs 90 autistic consultants across nine offices - seven in Germany, with the French and UK bases set up this year. Its customer base is predominantly blue chip organisations including 50 per cent of the companies on the German DAX index.

Coyle pointed out that it is important to recognise that there is as much variety in autistic people as in non-autistic. "Many autistic people would not fit into peoples' general preconceptions in any shape or form," he said. "There are some skills that have been shown to be more prevalent in autistic adults, including sustained concentration, attention to detail and cognitive pattern recognition. Therefore, our consultants are frequently able to tackle problems from a different perspective. Their approach has been described as being 'wired differently' and can deliver huge benefits in problem solving and within project teams generally.

"Our tag line, 'systematically creative', points to the combination of systematic thinking and creative intelligence that is first evident during the initial brainstorming and conceptual project stages. Our consultants enhance the client's project teams with their pattern recognition and innovative capacity.

"During implementation they excel with a systematic approach, their attention to detail and persistent concentration - all strengths that are invaluable in the field of IT quality assurance. Our alternative perspective can generate far more creative solutions and make the whole team more productive and efficient. People often do not think of creativity when they consider autism, but that is one of the key commercial benefits of neurodiversity in the workplace."

Coyle advocates an immediate reassessment of autism as the key to unlock a new creative dimension in IT consultancy. "The UK is fairly advanced in its knowledge of autism, and in my view the IT and comms industries are ahead of the curve in recognising the talents of autistic adults," he added. "Research shows that 79 per cent of UK autistic adults would like to work if they had the right support. However, only 15 per cent are in full time work. There is a lot more that can be done to bridge this gap, and we do not meet with much resistance from potential clients and find they are generally keen to engage with us. The key thing for clients to understand is that our role is to support our consultants so that they can deliver to their full potential."

There are of course challenges as well as advantages for people on the autism spectrum. Many autistic people find social interactions difficult so Auticon provides skilled and experienced job coaches to assist with that aspect. "We have also found that small and simple changes can be made to help our consultants perform to their full potential such as reducing background noise and distractions," he added.

Not surprisingly, Auticon's recruitment challenges are different to most in the industry. "There is a large pool of talent out there that is being wasted," said Coyle. "Often people do not have the confidence to approach us as they are concerned that the application and interview assessment process will be daunting. We stress that we interview all applicants and do not prejudge on the basis of qualifications, experience, CV or even interview performance. We run a range of thorough skills assessments to really find out what the applicant's skills are so that we can offer employment based on talent rather than history."

Coyle's industry experience is rooted in IT distribution at Frontline (now Tech Data) in the early 1990s. He worked for a number of large and small IT businesses until switching to a career in law, spending eight years at the tech focused city firm Osborne Clarke before being hired to run Grow Software, a DRM platform for 3D printing, two years ago. His experience is therefore a mix of technology and high-end advisory work that is today being put to good use in helping Auticon build on its evolution.

"As Auticon has grown we have learned how to operate better, making constant changes to the business model and our own processes," added Coyle. "For example, our original business model involved just consultants and job coaches who both acted as a support person and point of contact for our consultant, and also liaised with the client. We have now split these roles so we have a job coach and a project manager on each implementation. This has brought a number of benefits in terms of reporting and communication lines, and the process now works much more efficiently."

Coyle has been mindful of Auticon for some time. While running the Impact Investment Team at Osborne Clarke one of his clients was an early investor in the firm. "When Auticon launched in the UK I was keen to be part of its journey," stated Coyle. "Our immediate priority is recruitment to expand our team in the UK. The longer-term objective is to demonstrate to the industry that there is a huge untapped skill set that is being overlooked and to raise our profile as an open, honest and supportive organisation. While we are a commercial business, our social purpose runs through everything that we do. We expect that, over coming years, more businesses will see the benefits of neurodiverse teams, particularly in technology projects."•

Any examination of the big trends that currently dominate the communications landscape expose the unstoppable march of WebRTC, according to Paul Clarke, Regional Sales Manager UK&I, 3CX.

An upward movement in WebRTC adoption last year continues to gather momentum with industry analysts projecting a CAGR of 50.9 per cent and a market worth $4.45 billion by 2020. Clarke believes that it won't be long before WebRTC acquires a life of its own as the Internet Engineering Task Force continues to prepare a series of WebRTC standards even as the technology is gaining ground in all sectors far and wide. From a development perspective, the WebRTC API and the Google codebase for mobile apps has also spurred adoption rates.

"Ongoing development, usability and security have all led to a global proliferation of business apps in every vertical," said Clarke. "Users can run video conferencing sessions without plug-ins on all supported browsers, and this communication is secured with encryption. WebRTC does not rely on outside applications to maintain complete data security at all times, using SRTP encryption in its code."

One fast growing trend pointed out by Clarke is the use of WebRTC-powered links that can be sent to customers or partners, or placed on a landing page for rapid contact with potential customers. "The ability to get face-to-face with customers easily boosts sales," commented Clarke. "Retailers, for example, can bring a website viewer directly into their showroom in seconds."

Contact centres also represent a strong potential market for WebRTC-based services. "It is important for contact centres to decrease the 'time to issue' resolution, making them more productive," commented Clarke. "Amazon pioneered this approach to customer service with its Mayday button that got a Kindle user in touch with an agent with just a click. The concept has since been applied on thousands of websites that boast a WebRTC-powered link to Help.

"Contact centre agents are also using WebRTC to receive incoming calls, with callers being routed to an agent's web browser via a company's IVR. Another growth area is WebRTC's file sharing capability which is being broadly exploited in data analytics and business collaboration."

Clarke also pointed out that a growing number of new start-ups are using WebRTC technology for disruptive applications. London-based Cloud9, for example, offers a trading system based on a WebRTC platform that expands the communications range of the industry standard product, and which cuts the costs of trading while maintaining a high level of security.

Meanwhile, Dutch company 24Sessions provides live contact with experts for consumers via WebRTC-powered online meetings. In Japan, carrier NTT is offering a speech recognition API compatible with multiple browsers, available for no charge on SkyWay, the company's WebRTC space for developers. These are just a small sample of businesses that are harnessing the power of WebRTC.

Not surprisingly, WebRTC offers a raft of opportunities for comms resellers. "Given the wealth of business applications for the technology, resellers can point to the best solution for a particular vertical or context," explained Clarke. "They can also show how these WebRTC apps provide solutions for business issues, working effectively as a consultant. Increasing productivity is, for example, a key issue for large and small businesses. Users can access WebRTC-enabled services over any network, public or private, Wi-Fi, mobile broadband or wired LAN, accelerating communications and collaboration.

"They can use the same services working remotely from the laptop or smartphone. This is possible thanks to integration with Unified Communications. The ability to hold WebRTC-powered online meetings gives a potent boost to collaboration, a key ingredient in improving productivity."

Improving technical assistance is another issue for many businesses. With WebRTC conferencing, technicians can share screens with the person they are helping. Similarly, companies can easily combine a face-to-face meeting with photos and information in a web conference to speed up and close sales. "Customers never have to look elsewhere for the information required to make a decision," said Clarke.

Resellers can also capitalise on the increased revenue streams from related hardware sales, providing webcams and headphones to use in web conferencing. "Resellers should look to offer a fully integrated open standards solution that provides a one-stop shop for all of an end user's communications needs," stated Clarke. "This will combine WebRTC-enabled web conferencing, click-to-call and an IP phone system."

3CX is an early adopter of WebRTC and the company quickly set about integrating this technology into the video conferencing feature of its own UC solution. "The evolution of WebRTC is fascinating," enthused Clarke. "Next will be the integration of comms into many different kinds of applications, just as we have seen with CRM. There will be complex solutions that combine, for example, big data analytics, communication and accounting software. Analysts are already talking about 'comms as a feature'." •

The latest set of financial figures from Tunbridge Wells-based Adept Telecom prove again that its CEO Ian Fishwick has succeeded in his strategy, posting a 31 per cent sales increase and 34 per cent hike in EBITDA.

Fishwick has been a Managing Director or CEO of telecoms businesses for over a quarter of a century and March 2016 marked the 25th consecutive year of increased EBITDA generated by companies under his leadership. Fishwick's growth plan is founded on a simple common sense strategy that in practice can only achieve its purpose and hasten Adept towards the realisation of its goals. Not surprisingly, sticking to a policy of 'back to basics' remains a potent force in Fishwick's thinking. "Cash is King," he stated. "You only go bust if you run out of money."

Recognising the primacy of cash may not be an ultimate guarantor of long-term prosperity but according to Fishwick the thought should always be at the forefront of a business owner's mind whether expanding or contracting. "In 2008 when the financial markets crashed the City believed that small companies were the most likely to go bust, and that those most at risk had borrowed money," he said. "That was a gross over-simplification. I told the team to pay back our debt as fast as possible and within three years we were in a different position. The major thing to remember is that Cash is King."

These basic business principles imposed by Fishwick have propelled Adept a long distance away from its commercial beginnings in Fishwick's spare bedroom back in 2003. Today, Adept is a public company and Fishwick is also Commercial Director of Innopsis, the trade association for network service suppliers to the public sector. He is also a man who has grown accustomed to achieving his purpose and offers important pointers to those starting out with similar aspirations.

Top tips
"My advice to young entrepreneurs is to resist giving away too much equity stake in your business," said Fishwick. "Be wary of building your own bespoke platforms as integration issues will make it difficult to buy your business. And always be mindful that ten very good people will always be better than 100 not so good staff. Some people get a kick out of being the boss of a large number of employees. I've been there and got that T-shirt, and it's not the answer."

Fishwick managed 1,250 staff and circa 400,000 customers when running Telewest London and South East in the late 1990s. This job followed a stint at Marconi Secure Systems between 1990-95, after Fishwick 'fell' into the comms industry by accident. "I had qualified as an accountant and saw a job advert for Plessey (which later became Marconi) in Liverpool," he explained. "Plessey wanted someone to transition the business from paper accounts to computerised finance systems. I then became the Managing Director.

"In 1995 I went into cable. These were truly exciting years building the networks and launching services like Sky Movies, Sky Sport and Digital TV as well as doing telecoms and Internet at the same time. I ran Telewest North West and then Telewest London and South East. When we moved from four regional heads to one UK boss I didn't get the big job and had to leave."

At this juncture in Fishwick's career a US company called World Access asked him to manage its seven UK acquisitions. "I inherited £250 million sales with over 1,000 people but the company was losing £20 million a year," said Fishwick. "After 16 months we had merged the seven businesses and were profitable, making £1.6 million. But the US parent went into Chapter 11 bankruptcy and I was forced to break the organisation up and sell it. We improved the profitability by £21.6 million in just over a year, but it still went wrong. That's when I'd had enough of large companies and set up Adept in 2003."

Adept Telecom has since grown to employ 90 staff based across three sites with sales of £33 million and EBITDA of £7 million. Acquisitions have been a running theme and an important growth factor in terms of scale and capabilities, with the purchase of Fleet-based Centrix in 2012 being particularly significant, adding £10 million revenues and placing Adept in the UC space. "We started out selling simple products to small businesses but larger organisations now account for over 65 per cent of sales revenue," said Fishwick.

"We have transitioned rapidly and mainly sell complex integrated solutions to bigger clients. We are now strong in Avaya products with a specialism in both Aura and IP Office. We may consider other manufacturers such as Cisco and Mitel. We are also keeping an eye on data companies as telecoms and IT is increasingly converging. UC is our biggest opportunity, where we provide everything from the connectivity to the desk phones, smartphones and tablets, all integrated with contact management systems."

Adept's current go-to-market strategy builds on 11 years spent acquiring connectivity businesses and integrating their customer bases. "We did that 19 times," said Fishwick. "When we started out the orthodox thinking was that you couldn't make money from small firms as the support costs were too high. Our view was that if we automated our processes early this would enable us to make lots of money, and we did.

"The priority remains the same, to continue our unbroken track record of increasing EBITDA every year and to ensure that it turns into cash. We will use strong cash flows to increase our dividends and also identify selective acquisitions. As we move into more complex solution selling there is inevitably an investment needed in more expensive, highly trained specialists in every area from pre-sale through to installation and support. We are increasingly strong in the public sector but it has taken us six years of hard work and re-training people. Selling to this sector is very different to approaching a commercial customer."

Technologies such as UC have become the default mode of industry discussion, but Fishwick has a helicopter view of the bigger picture and does not hold back from pricking the comms industry's tendency to talk up the market with ballooning hype. "Not every customer wants fancy technology for road warriors," he stated. "Some are just hairdressers who use broadband for a PDQ machine once every half hour.

"That said, there is no shortage of revenue in our sector, up to several billions of pounds. However, there is too much cost supporting that revenue. We have massive duplication across the industry because there are so many small companies, often with technically focused business leaders who believe they can do everything. But it's blatantly not possible for a small company to be all things to all men and be profitable. We are not here to discuss technology, we are here to make money."•

Luminet CEO Sasha Williamson's new tactics mark a fresh approach to channel partnerships founded on a combination of vision, capability and determination.

Williamson's prevailing narrative indicates that he is clearly moving his business towards the channel to expand Luminet's routes to market via partners and wholesale. His outlook shows that he has not only seen what is possible growth-wise via partnerships but also the potential advantages to be gained from heterogeneous networks. "We want to be the leaders in intelligent managed services, pioneering a new approach to telecoms," he said. "We see a huge opportunity in heterogeneous networks and developing a neural host strategy."

In support of his statement Williamson also showed a determination to build on a new partnership with CCS that will see Luminet develop one of the first self-organising networks in a Tier One global city. "We see this as an industry game-changer in how mobile operators can scale with the ongoing increase in mobile data demand in urban areas," stated Williamson.

At this point the discussion moves from tactical logic and intent to capabilities and propositions. "Our big opportunity is to scale with larger partners and provide systems support for automation and sustainability," explained Williamson. "Our most popular channel products include co-location and business Internet services. We have recently launched the Fibre Air product, a wireless business Internet service that can be installed in as little as five working days. Partners reselling traditional fibre leased lines typically have to wait around 90 days for installation. With Fibre Air they can offer customers up to 2GB symmetrical broadband Internet connectivity almost straight away, which means they can immediately start billing."

He emerges as a figure in tune with techno-power and its potential to transform businesses while at the same time advancing Luminet's strategic cause. "We're driving our market penetration, developing new routes to market for wholesale and increasing our geographical presence," he emphasised.

Insights into Williamson's strategic thoughts recall past experiences that are very much in play today. "My career started in bulk purchasing for major European telecoms users and since then I have worked with a number of successful telcos including Broadband4U, Primus, Worldcom and ETT (now GTT)," he said. "Luminet is my most recent venture and my cross-functional experience in telecoms has helped me in this current role."

Luminet started life as Urban WiMax in 2007, an intelligent managed services provider offering organisations connectivity, communications, computing and security services. It was founded by Williamson and a management team that had strong experience within the telecoms and IT industries, holding key executive and technical roles in companies such as Telewest, ETT, CitiGroup, Orange and BT.

"From the outset we had an impressive 61 per cent CAGR," noted Williamson. "We have since weathered an economic crash and in May 2015 announced our rebrand to Luminet in line with an investment of £2.15 million through Santander's Breakthrough programme. Our turnover has grown every year since our inception and the funding enabled us to continue to innovate and develop our connectivity solution."

The financing from Santander enabled Luminet to accelerate its growth and develop a new product portfolio, including a LLU network and enhanced Fixed Wireless Access infrastructure. "We also offer intelligent PaaS value added services," said Williamson. "And provide services such as Insight, optimisation and control of any applications on any connectivity services. We pride ourselves on our 100 per cent SLA service for cloud and mission critical services, as well as the visibility and control we offer on any application on any connectivity with our intelligent PaaS."

Williamson says he has found an exciting course, one where a customer-centric culture permeates every aspect of the business. "Luminet currently has 550-plus customers and 70 partnerships," he added. "We have 50-80 per cent capacity in our data centres and 100 per cent core network uptime. We employ 28 members of staff in our central London office and are growing at a fantastic rate of 27 per cent per year. We align and empower our staff to the customer journey relationship and our transactional interaction, which is rated across four key measures at each stage. This has resulted in an improvement in our NPS score of nine to 42 over the last three years."•