Interactive Intelligence last week announced that it is combining its all-in-one IP communications software platform with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007. The integration is designed to help organizations communicate more effectively by adding contact center and IP telephony functionality to OCS environments.

Senior Analyst for Enterprise Communications at Current Analysis Robert Arnold, commenting on the announcement said, “The pledged support and stated delivery timeline put Interactive Intelligence on the early part of what is expected to be a wave of similar announcements.”

Arnold continued, “Alcatel-Lucent, Avaya, Aastra (formerly Ericsson Enterprise), Mitel and Siemens Enterprise Communications are all slated to make their PBX integrations with OCS available in Q2, followed by Cisco in Q3. This in general will keep Interactive Intelligence’s unified communications portfolio development on pace with the top-tier developers in the enterprise voice systems market.”

In a prepared statement, Interactive Intelligence founder and CEO, Dr. Donald E. Brown said “We’ve gone beyond the basic integration of simply connecting audio calls between systems. Combined with OCS, our solution provides a broad set of contact center and IP telephony applications, a common company directory, and simplified administration for user provisioning.”

The OCS integration is planned for general availability in Q3 2008, and it will be offered through the Interactive Intelligence channel of approximately 300 value-added resellers worldwide. Interactive Intelligence provides unified business communications solutions for contact center automation, enterprise IP telephony, and enterprise messaging. The company was founded in 1994 and has more than 3,000 customers worldwide.

Our observation: It looks like just about every VoIP systems supplier has integrated or plans to integrate with OCS, and those systems that include contact center capabilities are also including OCS integration. However, we'll also point out that while OCS integration may be nearly universal, OCS itself is not universally deployed by every enterprise. So VoIP systems suppliers are well advised to make sure that their own systems work well with - or without OCS.

Steve Taylor is president of Distributed Networking Associates and publisher/editor-in-chief of Webtorials. Larry Hettick is a principal analyst at Current Analysis.