EDITOR’S NOTE SKYPE FOR BUSINESS VS. CONSUMER SKYPE: THE SAME, BUT DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS DIGS INTO THE TELEPHONY PIE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS HEADS TO THE CLOUD

Is Skype Just Hype or the Business Tool You Need?If your enterprise needs a new unified communications tool, Microsoft Skype for Business could be the one. Here are some integration tips to help you get started. BY IRWIN LAZAR

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EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

VS. CONSUMER SKYPE:

THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

DIGS INTO THE

TELEPHONY PIE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?2

EDITOR’SNOTE

It’s No Longer Lync, but It’s not Skype Either. Who Else Is Confused?

Almost exactly four years ago, Microsoft announced it was paying over $8.5 billion—in cash—for Skype. It was “a curious move,” as the author of this guide, Irwin Lazar, puts it. Lync was gaining a following—so why would Micro-soft rebrand it Skype for Business now and risk confusion, both in the market and with users?

We may never know the reasoning behind Microsoft’s decision. Perhaps it’s a symbol of our era, an era in which the lines between home and office, work life and personal life are blurred—people use Skype at home and now they can use Skype for their business commu-nications, too. Blame it on the first employee who slipped a mobile phone in his pocket and strolled through the enterprise door.

But that only gets you so far. It’s more important for networking professionals to focus on the question of whether Skype for

Business is the unified communications tool their IT team and enterprise need. And if the benefits are worth the investment, exactly how should that adoption proceed?

This is a guide for the perplexed. It covers the basics, spelling out the essential differ-ences between consumer Skype and Skype for Business as well as the ways it can be gainfully deployed, either on-premises or in the cloud. Whether your enterprise already uses Lync or not, this guide is an essential for network-ing pros who need to understand what Skype for Business offers and how best to anticipate areas of confusion, likely operational costs and more. n

Brenda L. Horrigan, Ph.D.Associate Managing Editor

Networking Media Group

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

VS. CONSUMER SKYPE:

THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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TELEPHONY PIE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

HEADS TO THE CLOUD

IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?3

SAME BUT DIFFERENT

Skype for Business vs. Consumer Skype: The Same, but Different

Microsoft recently rebranded Lync, its enterprise unified communications plat-form, as Skype for Business (SfB). Is this just a name change, or is there more to the story? How is Lync transitioning to Skype for Busi-ness? And what does the switch mean for those businesses currently using or evaluating Lync? Let’s find out.

Microsoft officially unveiled Skype for Busi-ness at this year’s Enterprise Connect con-ference in Orlando, Fla. Replacing Lync with Microsoft Skype for Business in the company’s enterprise applications portfolio is a curious move: Lync rapidly captured both mindshare and market share as it moved beyond instant messaging, presence and Web conferencing and was capturing telephony and video conferenc-ing business from competitors like Avaya and Cisco.

Skype for Business isn’t just a rebranding of Lync. As Microsoft noted in its official blog,

SfB has new functionality and more seamless integration with the consumer Skype service, plus video chat with consumer Skype users and the ability to search the consumer Skype direc-tory from within SfB. In addition, SfB changes the client look and feel to offer more consis-tency with the consumer Skype app.

Like Lync, Microsoft Skype for Business will exist as both an on-premises platform that offers enterprise telephony capabilities and a cloud product as part of Office 365 with enter-prise telephony announced for future delivery. From a purely architectural standpoint, there’s little change for enterprises that will deploy and manage a Lync/SfB service.

THE SAME BUT DIFFERENT

Skype for Business is not consumer Skype, and it does not run on the same servers that support the consumer Skype service. Despite

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EDITOR’S NOTE

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THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

DIGS INTO THE

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SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

HEADS TO THE CLOUD

IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?4

SAME BUT DIFFERENT

the architectural similarities with Lync, our research shows that SfB is creating confusion in the marketplace.

In our conversations with enterprise IT lead-ers who are using or evaluating Lync, especially those in regulated industries, many people are telling us they will have difficulty deliver-ing Skype for Business to their employees. Users may think they are using the consumer Skype service and not a company-owned and managed on-premises platform that meets enterprise requirements for security and compliance.

IT leaders say they will need to educate their risk-management and security teams and end-user communities that Microsoft Skype for Business is not consumer Skype and that they

can continue to maintain separation between their consumer and business Skype accounts. (One early adopter said the first call to his help desk regarding SfB was from a user who wanted to know why he didn’t see his personal Skype contacts when he loaded SfB.)

Reinforcing this confusion, a recent Reddit Ask Me Anything discussion with Skype team leaders saw many of the questions focused on the consumer Skype product and not Skype for Business.

As of April 14, 2015, the SfB user interface (UI) replaced the Lync UI for many Office 365 customers. However, administrators can force users to keep their Lync interface for the time being. But it’s reasonable to believe that, in the near future, Microsoft will end support for the legacy Lync UI.

MAKING THE SWITCH

Those businesses planning to deploy Skype for Business—especially companies that are limited or prohibited from using the consumer Skype service—will want to educate their security and governance teams upfront about

IT will need to educate their security teams and end users that SfB is not consumer Skype and that they can maintain separation between their consumer and business Skype accounts.

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

VS. CONSUMER SKYPE:

THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

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IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?5

SAME BUT DIFFERENT

SfB. Additionally, those companies will want to tread carefully into SfB and consumer Skype integration, ensuring that any connectors they establish meet information-protection requirements.

Some companies have looked the other way

as employees used consumer Skype for their business communications. The ability to inte-grate consumer Skype with Skype for Business should come as welcome news to their employ-ees who are looking to simplify and unify their communications experience. n

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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TELEPHONY PIE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?6

TELEPHONY PIE

Skype for Business Digs into the Telephony Pie

Despite all the hype surrounding Lync, now Skype for Business (SfB), Microsoft still owns a relatively small slice of the enterprise telephony pie.

According to Nemertes Research’s most recent benchmark data, just 2.2% of compa-nies considered Skype for Business their pri-mary IP telephony platform. But of the 31% of those companies that were consolidating voice and UC onto a single platform, just over 41% said that consolidation was happening on SfB, meaning that over the next several years, Microsoft should own an increasingly larger piece of the enterprise telephony market.

However, Nemertes unified communication (UC) total cost of ownership research shows that compared with other platforms, operating

SfB generally results in higher operational expenses.

WAYS TO SLICE IT

Those companies adopting Microsoft Skype for Business for telephony generally follow one of two adoption models: on-premises or hosted. In the on-premises model, an organiza-tion builds, deploys and manages its own Lync instance. In the hosted model, an organiza-tion relies on a third-party provider to deliver a packaged SfB service to them, typically as a managed or subscription-based service.

How an organization chooses which approach to take is largely driven by cost, control and governance concerns and whether or not it

How an organization chooses which approach to take in adopting SfB is largely driven by cost, control and governance concerns.

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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TELEPHONY PIE

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HEADS TO THE CLOUD

IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?7

TELEPHONY PIE

wants to own the platform.By far the biggest challenge when imple-

menting Skype for Business for telephony is creating an integration and migration strategy with the existing telephony environment.

The simplest approach is to run Skype for Business and existing platforms as indepen-dent entities, using SIP trunks to enable calls to traverse each system. But that approach likely won’t support extension dialing, and it’s a complicated effort to transition users from the old system to SfB. Engineers must identify Direct Inward Dialing (DID) for specific groups of users, and transfer their associated trunks to SfB.

An emerging approach uses session manage-ment to create an abstraction layer that sits above existing telephony platforms and Skype for Business. The session management layer is where the organization would manage dial plans, calls between systems, security and per-formance management. Moving users from one system to another becomes as simple as mak-ing a configuration change in the session man-ager to implement a new call routing policy.

Another key issue is the end-user exper-

ience. Because Skype for Business is a software app, many adopters look to leverage the SfB cli-ent’s embedded softphone capabilities as the

primary means of making calls. But we often hear that many users don’t want to embrace the softphone/headset model and prefer instead a standalone desktop appliance.

Those who provide a USB telephony or standalone IP telephone controlled by the Skype for Business client, rate their soft-phone success higher than those who provi-sion a wired or Bluetooth headset—though the vast majority (71.4%) go with the wired USB approach.

Newer headsets featuring noise cancellation and high-definition audio should improve suc-cess ratings, but not everyone wants to be teth-ered to their desktop while on a call. Moving

An emerging approach uses session manage ment to create an abstraction layer that sits above existing telephony plat-forms and Skype for Business.

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

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IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?8

TELEPHONY PIE

to headsets and softphones also requires addressing 911 calls to ensure that first responders can locate those using the 911 system.

Additional challenges include the ability to manage Microsoft Skype for Business call qual-ity, proactively fix problems before they occur and reactively troubleshoot call quality issues. Microsoft recently announced new call quality

management features in partnership with Event Zero, Nectar and Unify Square. Expect more network and voice quality management vendors to deliver SfB services or integrate support into existing network management platforms.

As you plan your implementation, be sure to address interoperability, end-user interfaces and management to ensure success and mini-mize operational expenditures. n

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

VS. CONSUMER SKYPE:

THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

DIGS INTO THE

TELEPHONY PIE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

HEADS TO THE CLOUD

IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?9

CLOUD SKYPE

Skype for Business Heads to the Cloud

As part of its recent rebranding of Lync to Skype for Business (SfB), Microsoft also announced plans to support enterprise tele-phony within its Office 365 service without the need for an on-premises enterprise server. So what are the options for using the cloud with SfB?

Microsoft’s cloud strategy for Lync always presented a bit of a challenge for enterprise IT architects. Until now, Microsoft had a split offering: Lync Online as part of Office 365 for voice, video chat and Web conferencing, and Lync Server on-premises for enterprise tele-phony functions and PSTN access. That setup means companies leveraging Microsoft’s popu-lar Office 365 service for email, calendar, docu-ment sharing and Yammer social computing must still run an on-premises server if they wish to use Microsoft Lync as their enterprise phone system.

The situation gets murkier for companies

that aren’t ready to commit all their tele-phony services to Lync. End users who aren’t using Lync for IP telephony can continue to have their accounts serviced by Office 365 for instant messaging, Web conferencing and for voice or video chat, while those who are using Lync for telephony receive not only phone services, but also instant messaging, Web conferencing and voice/video chat from the on-premises server. This means a potential split in account provisioning with some users living off the local Lync server while others are attached to the cloud.

OFF-PREMISES OPTION

Enterprise customers who wish to avoid run-ning any services entirely on-premises have turned to Microsoft partners like AT&T, British Telecom, HP, Orange Business Services, Veri-zon and others that deliver a combined Lync

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EDITOR’S NOTE

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THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

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IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?10

CLOUD SKYPE

and Office 365 service as a complete unified hosted offering. This saves them the cost and complexity of running their own on-premises instance of Lync.

In February 2013, Tony Bates, then president of Skype, proclaimed at the inaugural Lync con-ference that Microsoft would add PSTN access to Lync Online in 18 months. That deadline came and went, as did Bates, who left Micro-soft in 2014.

Fast forward two years, and Lync Online—now Skype for Business Online—still lacks enterprise IP-PBX functionality and PSTN access. Microsoft leadership, at both this year’s Enterprise Connect in March and more recently at the Microsoft Ignite conference in May, are once again committing to delivering such func-tionality to Skype for Business Online, this time in a staged, two-phase rollout.

Phase one of cloud telephony is the addi-tion of “enterprise telephony” functionality to Skype for Business Online. This means that SfB Online will be fully capable of providing IP-PBX features that are currently only available via a dedicated instance of SfB Server—either on-premises or privately hosted. However,

enterprise customers will still need to provide their own PSTN access and will likely need to deploy a session border controller from Micro-soft partners like AudioCodes, Oracle or Sonus to trunk calls from SfB Online back to their premises and out to the PSTN. This arrange-

ment, for obvious reasons having to do with complexity and voice quality management, isn’t likely to see widespread adoption, but it should make it easier for service providers to bundle managed PSTN connectivity with Office 365 and resell it as a fully hosted pack-age. Microsoft plans to launch a technical pre-view of enterprise telephony in SfB Online this summer with general availability to follow.

During the second phase of the rollout, Skype for Business Online will provide PSTN

Skype for Business Online will provide IP-PBX features that are currently only available via a dedicated instance of Skype for Business Server—either on- premises or privately hosted.

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

VS. CONSUMER SKYPE:

THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

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TELEPHONY PIE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

HEADS TO THE CLOUD

IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?11

CLOUD SKYPE

access without the need for customers to have any on-premises PSTN connectivity. Microsoft has aligned itself with an array of global ser-vice providers that will provide PSTN access through their own connectivity into Microsoft Azure services. This service will be available in the U.S. in late 2015 with global availability to follow.

Assuming Microsoft finally delivers enter- prise telephony and PSTN access, custom-ers will then have a fully hosted option for all Skype for Business Online and Office 365 applications. But expect service provider part-ners to continue to bundle management, on-premises federation, security, compliance and cloud-to-cloud federation offerings around

Office 365 to keep customers from going directly to Microsoft.

IT BOILS DOWN TO THIS

If your organization chooses a pure cloud-based Skype for Business deployment, pay careful attention to Microsoft’s efforts to shift the current on-premises telephony and PSTN access capabilities to the cloud, keeping in mind that global offerings are likely a year or two away. In the meantime, work with your vendors to understand how they can help you realize your goal of hosting enterprise tele-phony capabilities even before Microsoft has a fully baked product of its own. n

HOME

EDITOR’S NOTE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

VS. CONSUMER SKYPE:

THE SAME, BUT

DIFFERENT

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

DIGS INTO THE

TELEPHONY PIE

SKYPE FOR BUSINESS

HEADS TO THE CLOUD

IS SKYPE JUST HYPE OR THE BUSINESS TOOL YOU NEED?12

ABOUT THE

AUTHOR

IRWIN LAZAR is the vice president and service director at Nemertes Research, where he develops and manages research projects, develops cost models, conducts strate-gic seminars and advises clients. Lazar is responsible for benchmarking the adoption and use of emerging tech-nologies in the enterprise in areas including VoIP, unified communications, video conferencing, social computing, collaboration and advanced network services.

Is Skype Just Hype or the UC Tool You Need? is a SearchUnifiedCommunications e-publication.

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Kara Gattine | Executive Managing Editor

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