Microsoft’s Lync Gets Hefty Industry Support

Microsoft Corp.‘s unified communications (UC) platform, Lync, is getting a lot of attention this week. A number of companies, from service providers to equipment makers, have announced their support for Lync as the UC Expo in London draws industry focus. 

Here’s a roundup of the partnerships and interoperability announcements:

Level 3 Communications: The carrier’s SIP trunking technology and infrastructure will underpin a Lync network environment that lets hosted VoIP providers offer UC applications. Capabilities include SMS, local voice throughout much of the United States and E911 in North America.

snom: The company has developed desktop IP phones that are compatible with Lync. There are a multitude of unified communications scenarios where telephony users require standalone fixed desktop or wall-mounted phones as an alternative to a softphone on a PC," said Michael Knieling, COO of snom. "The snom 300 entry-level IP phone, snom 370  and the snom 821 advanced IP phone have undergone Microsoft interoperability testing to achieve qualification status and help bring additional layers of functionality and productivity to a Microsoft Lync UC environment.

SIPCOM: The software developer has released its hosted communications and collaboration platform, Global Service Network (GSN) 2.0, which lets partners, including resellers and systems integrators, enhance the services they offer. SIPCOM worked with Microsoft over the past year to develop GSN 2.0 with features including telephony, conferencing and collaboration. SIPCOM also added mobility so Lync features extend to popular mobile platforms. Finally, Microsoft also SIPCOM as one of several vendors to help create the Lync Hosted Pack Reference Architecture; SIPCOM built and now operates four PoPS in the UK, France and North America.

Brocade: The switch-maker created an architectural framework to serve as the foundation of Lync deployments. The platform works with hosted and non-hosted enterprise environments and is available through accredited partners.

Acme Packet: The session border controller (SBC) manufacturer’s Net-Net Session Director devices now are qualified to allow hosted service providers to connect the Lync Server 2010 Multitenant Pack to third-party IP phone networks.

AltiGen Communications: The company, which provides integrated Microsoft UC solutions, released MaxMobile for Lync Server 2010. MaxMobile is an enterprise voice platform that supports the iPhone and iPad, Google Android, RIM BlackBerry and Windows Phone 7. It comes with the following features, all for Lync: VoIP/VoWLAN to the mobile device; GSM/CDMA support; instant messaging and presence; call detail report, Active Directory and contact integration; visual voicemail support with Microsoft Exchange Server 2010.

Juniper Networks: As a Lync architecture partner, Juniper is providing its MX, EX and SRX series of products for WAN and data center routing, and switching and security, all for the hosted pack.