By Charles Chance
I wanted to update you on our Microsoft Teams project because Phase 1 is nearly complete and we’ll be getting in touch with customers who have asked to test very soon!
Firstly, what is Phase 1, or indeed any other Phase? Phase 1 is the core integration between our carrier network and Microsoft such that every number on the Simwood network globally becomes Teams-capable. This is using Direct Routing but we’re making progress with Operator Connect which’ll follow through the same series of phases.
Phase 2 is taking that capability added to the carrier network and available to all Carrier Services customers and extending it to the Sipcentric platform such that customers can have Teams trunks into their white-labelled hosted PBX. Here, the PBX remains central but calls can be delivered to Teams using dedicated DDIs, or Teams users can make calls out over the same account and benefit from its inclusive minutes and free calls between users.
Lastly, Phase 3, is moving beyond trunks towards direct user-to-user mapping such that a tenant can be PBX or Teams centric but means that our Carrier Services customers can have user-mapped delivery of calls to and from their own platform. This leverages our existing VoxAP Core technology.
For Phase 1, we’ve meshed 8 global Microsoft PoPs with the Simwood network such that calls enter and egress optimally, and customers will configure a new ‘trunk’ type in the Simwood portal or API. That trunk will need enabling Microsoft-side which is a pretty horrid process from our perspective, but one we understand those more used to the Microsoft way of doing things are used to! Our hope is that deep integration with Operator Connect can circumvent this in due course.
Teams requires a 1:1 relationship between DDI/DIDs and users, even where there may be a single number for a call-centre routing to 1000 operatives – each operative will require their own number in order to have call capability. Numbers can therefore be linked Simwood-side to the relevant trunk (and vice-versa) and in terms of monetising the service we will charge for Teams Trunks on a per-number basis.
Pricing will be £500 set-up for a given account and £2 per enabled number per month with no minimum. We think this pricing is disruptive enough for our customers to compete head-on with others offering platform integration with Teams. Pricing for Phase 2 and 3 will build on this as appropriate.
If your name isn’t already down for beta testing and you’d like to, please get in touch. We’ll be deferring the set-up charge for 3 months for those early-adopters.
