New Zealand's unified communications market grew by 6.6 percent in 2011, despite a cautious economic environment, according to analyst firm Frost & Sullivan.
In a September 17 statement, the firm stated that growth was based on demand for voice-based and video conferencing endpoints, and will continue to grow, from 2011 to 2017, at 9.1 percent CAGR, due particularly to cloud-based solutions.
“Cloud based [solutions] will be one of the key enabling factors that will drive widespread uptake in New Zealand," says Anand Balasubramanian, an analyst covering the UC market in ANZ. "The 2011 Canterbury earthquake served as a trigger point for many organisations to evaluate the resilience of their IT infrastructure. The shortening life cycles of software applications and frequency of updates also makes management an increasingly complex and resource intensive task for organisations running on-premise solutions. The flexibility and reduction of maintenance overheads will be key factors driving the uptake of UC-as-a-Service.”
The rationale for this prediction, according to the statement, is that cloud-based solutions will make UC available to a wider range of organisations, with voice being the prime driver in the medium run, and video heating up in good time. According to the firm's report on the state of the New Zealand market, the planned completion of the UFB project meshes with a maturation of a cloud based delivery model for UC as a service.
