SIP trunking, expanding conferencing and management tools are on tap
Avaya updated its IP Office product this week with features aimed at giving small office business users big office IP PBX cost saving and management features.
Avaya updated its IP Office product this week with features aimed at giving small-office business users big office IP PBX cost-saving and management features.
The IP Office is the vendor’s compact IP PBX for offices with five to 32 employees. New features on the IP Office 500 includes the to connect the device to a SIP-based VoIP phone service, expanded teleconferencing features and a new “Professional Edition” upgrade, which adds contact center and interactive voice response (IVR).
SIP-based trunk support lets an IP office connect directly to a carrier’s IP-based VoIP service. Avaya says this gives a small-business features that may be familiar to consumer VoIP service customers, such as Vonage. SIP trunking lets a business support phone numbers in different area codes from a single location, or keep an existing number and area code of the business moves to another state. Small businesses with multiple offices could also make low-cost Internet calls among branches, and other customers on a SIP-based VoIP service, Avaya says.
The IP Office 500’s conferencing feature now supports as many as 64 connections — up from three parties in past versions. Avaya says this feature could help small businesses save on dial-in conference bridge services by hosting large conference calls in-house.
Avaya has also built in new management tools into IP Office 500 that provide easier access to system-configuration settings, and also allow for remote management and troubleshooting of the device. The Web-based tool gives customers, or service providers supporting the device, access to configuration and setup screens, as well as a system monitoring page, which shows call volume and device-performance statistics, as well as access to system logs.
The simpler interface and expanded conference bridge support are appreciated by Bruce Rickenbach vice president of operations, MEI Management, which uses the IP Office 500 to support five employees in the company’s Dayton, Ohio, office.
“This version is much more user-friendly” than past releases of IP Office, which MEI has used for over three years, Rickenbach says. MEI often used outside conference bridge services to communicate with clients and other groups, partly because of the lack of support for large parties, but also because multipart calls were had to set up on older IP Office systems, he says.
MEI Management acts as a central management company for hundreds of small associations across the country and internationally. Rickenbach also says the IP Office allows MEI to set up direct inward dial extensions for all of its clients, which lets the staff see the identity of the client being called on IP phone displays, and answer the call with the appropriate greeting.
The professional upgrade for IP Office 500 expands the call capacity of the device to 270 users, and adds a small-office call-center feature, as well as an IVR feature for customer self-service applications. Features in the professional upgrade include tools to record calls and manage recorded-call storage, as well as tools for managing outbound calling campaigns.
Avaya’s IP Office competes with Nortel’s Business Communication Manager product, Alcatel’s OmniPCX Office, Inter-Tel’s 7000 series product and Cisco’s CallManager Express. The Avaya base IP Office 500 starts at $700, with a 32-port phone interface card costing an extra $900. The Professional Edition upgrade costs $1,000. All products are available.
