R2 officially launches today. You can view all the PR stuff over at Microsoft & Jeff has linked to the launch site. There are some great videos about what people are doing with OCS here as well. If you do check out the videos, I highly highly recommend watching the Dassault systems video. It’s a great example of people building their own UC-enabled apps with the OCS platform. If you don’t want to wade through the site (which is quite nice) then here’s the link to the 45MB video.
Anyway – as for the R2 launch, I have a one-line summary: OCS is a viable option to replace your current communications platform.
Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next week, but soon you will need to evaluate R2 as a replacement for your existing PBX, Audio/Video/Web Conferencing, IM, and call center systems. R2 is a single, cost-effective platform to handle all your real-time communications including voice, video, conferencing.
Microsoft hasn’t, prior to R2, made a big effort to replace PBXs with OCS. It’s been a more "compliment the PBX" type of message… but OCS R2 stands on its own and I am looking at 2009 as the year of the PBX replacement.
You don’t have to take my word for it – download a trial version of R2. Engage with a partner (PointBridge comes to mind… J) to do a "voice pilot" and see for yourself. At some point you will realize that R2 is the real deal – that it does eliminate the need for a separate PBX.
I’ve worked with phone systems (TDM and IP) for most of the last decade and I can tell you that R2 is a big deal. Try it!
