ITSPA Microsoft Teams workshop in London

We had a great Microsoft Teams workshop in London yesterday. Organised by the UK ITSP Association and sponsored by Netaxis and our vendor partners  Audiocodes, Oracle and Ribbon the workshop was fully subscribed with over 70 attendees and indeed standing room only at the back of the room.

It is clear that there is a real interest from the ITSP community in whether there is a business opportunity for them in organisations using Microsoft Teams. A brief outline of this opportunity seems appropriate.

Microsoft, having set out with a strategy of world domination in voice, realised that providing voice services is not as simple as they thought and have restricted their voice services to 12 markets. This means that companies with a presence in more than these 12 markets are unable to source all their inbound numbers from Microsoft – likely a vast majority of larger enterprises which are Microsoft’s core market. Enter Teams Direct Connect stage right.

Teams Direct Connect allows telecom providers to offer their services to Microsoft Teams users by connecting through one of three approved suppliers Session Border Controllers, unsurprisingly our co sponsors at the ITSPA event. Coincidentally Netaxis are business partners of all three of these SBC vendors.

The event was a huge success with Pure-IP Ceo Gary Forrest presenting his business as a shining example of an ITSP making money out of Teams. Gary told us that the company had over 130 business customers using Teams Direct Connect ince launching the service last year.

The workshop was chaired by yours truly, Trefor Davies from Netaxis Solutions UK with contributions from around the industry. It wasn’t all pro Microsoft stuff mind you. There were voices in the audience who felt that Microsoft was a competitive threat. However the audience left for a well deserved beer (and curry) afterwards thinking it had been an useful and informative afternoon and Netaxis came away with a number of enquiries for Teams certified SBCs – nuff said.

Paul Buxton – Microsoft Solutions Architect Trefor Davies

Also check out our Microsoft Teams Solutions page.