Gartner Recognizes Cisco as a Leader in Unified Communications…Again

For the seventh year in a row Cisco was positioned as a leader in the August 2014 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications. In the accompanying Critical Capabilities for Unified Communications document, published July 2014, Cisco also received the highest ratings in Full UC with Strong Telephony and Ability to Offer Hybrid Solutions use cases. We believe our continued recognition in these key industry assessments demonstrates that the focus on simplicity and user experience across the Cisco Collaboration portfolio is delivering our customers the productivity gains they are looking for through a collaboration experience that only Cisco can deliver.

According to Gartner, “The primary goal of unified communications (UC) is to improve user productivity and to enhance business processes. Gartner defines UC products (equipment, software and services) as those that facilitate the use of multiple enterprise communications methods to obtain that goal…UC products integrate communications channels (media), networks and systems, as well as IT business applications and, in some cases, consumer applications and devices.” Cisco shares this vision for UC and continues to deliver key innovations and integrations to ensure our customers are clearly benefiting from the full suite of Cisco’s leading telephony, video , web conferencing , messaging , IM/P and contact center offerings.

In the 2014 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications, Gartner once again positioned Cisco as a leader for ability to execute and completeness of vision. The report identifies strengths and cautions for individual vendors and we feel the strengths for Cisco UC offering are:

End-to-End portfolio: We are particularly proud of the full suite of solutions that Cisco offers and the level of integration happening across those solutions to enable enterprise, B2B and B2C unified communications that are comprehensive and interoperable.

Management: One of the strongest pieces of the Cisco UC solution is our unified management offering. Prime Collaboration provides a single pane of glass for configuration, provisioning, monitoring and analytics that now spans voice, video, endpoints, messaging, presence and mobility.

Buyer Reach: Great effort goes into educating and training a global network of Cisco partners, consultants and employees on how to deploy and configure Cisco UC solutions to ensure our buyers get the best UC experience available. Thanks to all of them for helping us earn this recognition.

Deployment Flexibility: An end-to-end portfolio and a history of delivering SaaS offerings have afforded Cisco and our partners many opportunities to deliver UC services from the cloud as well as spanning cloud and premises with new innovative hybrid models.

In the 2014 Gartner Critical Capabilities for Unified Communications, Gartner evaluates the effectiveness of vendors in addressing users’ needs in four primary use cases. Cisco received the highest product score in two out of four use cases ( Full UC With Strong Telephony Requirement and Ability to Offer Hybrid Solutions – scores below) and scored second highest in the other two use cases (Full UC with Strong Collaboration Requirement and Ability to Work with Other Vendors – see report for full scores and details). We feel this once again highlights our strength in Telephony, our commitment to Collaboration, our demonstrated Interoperability and our innovation in Cloud and Hybrid offerings.

With an end-to-end portfolio of solutions encompassing everything from infrastructure to endpoints, spanning voice, video, IM/P, conferencing, contact centers and more, I’m continually amazed by the innovation and visionary thinking that happens in this organization. With these reports and recent recognition from multiple analysts for our leadership in Video Infrastructure, it’s evident that analysts and customers feel the same way.