In “Collaboration Predictions for 2010,” Cisco’s Barry O’Sullivan has provided a cautiously optimistic view of prospects for collaboration markets in the coming year based on signs of new investment energy that emerged over the course of 2009. Barry is well qualified to offer his prognosis on UC and other communications opportunities and his predictions are well worth a read: as Senior Vice President of Cisco’s Voice Technology Group, Barry O’Sullivan now leads a global team that is responsible for developing the company’s IP telephony systems, IP phones, customer contact solutions, and unified communications applications including presence, messaging, conferencing, business-to-business unified communications, and customer collaboration. Prior to joining Cisco, Barry worked for 18 years as GM of Nortel Network’s contact centre business, and before that, as VP of Enterprise Voice for Nortel’s European operations. IT in Canada is pleased to present Barry’s views on convergence in collaboration suites, growth in video and intercompany collaboration, the coming proliferation of new communications devices, and market acceleration in new regional economies that are looking to “leap frog” through use of new productivity tools – among other topics.
Collaboration Predictions for 2010 - By Barry O’Sullivan
While history can often be a guide for anticipating the future, this past year was, in many ways, an anomaly. We entered the year mired in what many are calling the Great Recession – with projects, spending and hiring stalled or frozen across consumer, small business and enterprise segments around the world. As we close the year, and can see signs of economic improvements, debate continues about the fragility of the economic recovery.
While it was a challenging year, many of the business leaders that I met with reflect upon 2009 as a year when they took decisive action to ensure their businesses would both weather the storm and emerge from the downturn stronger than their competitors. Like Cisco, many of these leaders believe that downturns bring opportunities to accelerate for upturns, and began investing in technologies that would help drive operational efficiency and innovation, and build closer ties with their customers and partners.
