Cisco and Research In Motion, maker of the ubiquitous BlackBerry PDA, are integrating Cisco IP phones with the popular handheld device to provide single number capability as well as other features. According to this story by IDG News Service’s Stephen Lawson, RIM developed a version of its Mobile Voice System Server for Cisco’s Unified Communications Manager IP telephony platform.
The product is designed to allow enterprises to make workers reachable with one number, one caller ID and one voicemail box for both their mobile and desk phones. When calls come in, they may ring simultaneously on as many as four devices, including BlackBerrys and Cisco IP desk phones, or ring one device after another in a sequence, Lawson reports.
Alternatively, employees can make calls out from the BlackBerry using either the smartphone’s own number or an enterprise line. The applications also now gives BlackBerry users call extension and tranfer capabilities, and administrators can establish the same call policies for mobile and desk phones, and assign numbers to the device instead of to the user. When the employee leaves, the number stays.
The integration with BlackBerry is part of Cisco’s Unified Communications and collaboration strategy of making any content — in this case, voice and data — reachable anywhere, from any device. That is, until Cisco comes out with its own smartphone…
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