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Avaya Changes How It Brings Its Tech to Market

Following a realigning of its core networking offerings, Avaya is revamping how it brings those technologies to market. The first fruit of that effort is a new alliance with Google. Avaya is focusing its sales and marketing efforts on a customer engagement set of technologies based on its contact management software and a team engagement […]

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Michael Vizard

Dec 11, 2014

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Following a realigning of its core networking offerings, Avaya is revamping how it brings those technologies to market. The first fruit of that effort is a new alliance with Google.

Avaya is focusing its sales and marketing efforts on a customer engagement set of technologies based on its contact management software and a team engagement set of technologies based on its unified communications technologies, said Valentine Matula, senior director of emerging products and technology. As a result, a subset of the company’s partners will similarly adjust to this more solutions-centric approach to marketing and sales, Matula said.

“We think that in time that a number of our partners will make a similar shift with us,” Matula said. “Of course, we also recognize that a lot of our partners may simply want to resell network hardware, so it’ll be up to each partner to decide.”

In fact, Matula stresses that Avaya will continue to invest in core network virtualization technologies such as Avaya Fabric Connect, which makes it simpler to unify network services across geographically distributed Avaya routers.

In general, Avaya is moving to replace arcane networking technologies with a set of Web-based application programming interfaces (APIs) that will make it easier for partners to develop applications on their own, Matula said.

In the meantime, Avaya is making use of those APIs to collaborate with a broader range of industry partners. To that end the company this week also announced that is making it possible for agents working in contact centers to remotely access applications using Google Chromebooks.

While every network vendor these days is promising to make it simpler to build applications that run directly on top of routers and switches, Matula said, Avaya has already exposed all the interfaces and software development kits required to accomplish that.

It may not be realistic for Avaya to replace incumbent networking vendors overnight, but with each new application that gets deployed on top of Avaya network infrastructure, the barrier to accomplishing that goal gets just that much lower, Matula said.

Michael Vizard has been covering IT issues in the enterprise for 25 years as an editor and columnist for publications such as InfoWorld, eWEEK, Baseline, CRN, ComputerWorld and Digital Review.

Michael Vizard

Michael Vizard is a seasoned IT journalist, with nearly 30 years of experience writing and editing about enterprise IT issues. He is a writer for publications including Programmableweb, IT Business Edge, CIOinsight, Channel Insider and UBM Tech. He formerly was editorial director for Ziff-Davis Enterprise, where he launched the company’s custom content division, and has also served as editor in chief for CRN and InfoWorld. He also has held editorial positions at PC Week, Computerworld and Digital Review.

Avaya Changes How It Brings Its Tech to Market

Michael Vizard

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