PRESS RELEASE — SAN FRANCISCO, CA, August 27, 2015 – IR, the leading global provider of proactive performance management software for critical IT infrastructure and communications ecosystems, today announced a new comprehensive suite of experience management capabilities in its award-winning Prognosis for Unified Communications solution, designed to help organizations successfully implement cloud-delivered communications with Microsoft Office 365. With the advent of true cloud-delivered unified communications within the context of Office 365, performance management becomes a critical deployment requirement.  Complete visibility of network, applications and infrastructure through and post transition is a key component of successful performance management.

Organizations deploying Office 365 and Skype for Business face several complexity and multi-vendor integration challenges in order to achieve full control and visibility as they shift to cloud-delivered unified communications. IR Prognosis will provide organizations with a clear path to Office 365 success through ongoing performance management and optimization of their applications, network and communication infrastructure. Importantly, Prognosis dashboards offer real-time visibility of user experience so that support departments can proactively resolve issues while calls are still active.

Since Microsoft announced its advanced cloud-delivered communications intentions through Office 365 in 2013, organizations have been moving one step closer to fully cloud-based unified communication delivery. The benefits of unified communications via Office 365 are enticing, enabling advanced concepts such as Cloud PBX, PSTN Dial-In Conferencing and ultimately PSTN Voice. These advanced offerings, available via Microsoft’s new enterprise E5 bundle as well as á la carte on top of current Office 365 enterprise bundles, promise significant advantages around operational simplicity and cost savings. 

Prognosis helps customers by delivering a comprehensive ‘current state of communications’ benchmark, full network assessment to make sure that a company is ready for an Office 365 deployment plus proactive scenario testing and continuous collection of data from the current and future state environment. Additionally, Prognosis’s suite of capabilities, which support Microsoft SDN API 2.2, provides best-of-class insight into Office 365 adoption and utilization through unparalleled visibility into the cloud-based network.

“Communications technology leaders and the deployment options they offer can no longer be limited to on-premises implementation; they must be able to handle today’s environment and support these future imperatives of cloud-based and hybrid environments,” said Darc Rasmussen, CEO, IR. “The immense growth and sizable installed base of the Office 365 productivity suite, and expected rapid growth of cloud-delivered communications within our global customer base proves this and makes this solution offering an important milestone for us.”

According to Gartner, “Regardless of whether a VoIP/UC environment is self-managed or maintained via a third party, VoIP/UC-specific monitoring tools are a fundamental prerequisite to the success of any VoIP/UC project.”*

Additional Information

Experts from IR will discuss “Implementing and Managing Lync/Skype for Business” at a panel during the Enterprise Connect Tour, starting in San Francisco on August 27th. Visit the IR booth to discuss how Prognosis is facilitating organizations’ transition to unified communications in the cloud.

About IR

IR is the corporate brand name of Integrated Research Limited (ASX:IRI), the leading global provider of proactive performance management software for critical IT infrastructure, payments and communications ecosystems. More than 1000 organizations in over 60 countries—including some of the world’s largest banks, airlines and telecommunication companies rely on IR Prognosis to provide business critical insights and ensure continuity-critical systems deliver high availability and performance for millions of their customers across the globe. For further information on IR, visit www.ir.com.

*Gartner “Hype Cycle for IT Infrastructure Availability and Performance Management, 2015”, by Ian Head, 23 July, 2015.