The Microsoft Lync Blog

Accelerating our business with partners at WPC 2012!

Lync Team — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 12:00:00 GMT

It’s the beginning of July and that can mean only one thing – the Lync team is heading east to connect with our partners at the 2012 Worldwide Partner Conference, in Toronto, ON! WPC is the annual partner event to celebrate our joint successes over the last fiscal year and set the groundwork for business planning for the year ahead.

Our last fiscal year that ended in June saw continued growth and momentum for Lync in the market. Lync grew at double digit rates, reached over three million enterprise voice users who are using Lync as their only telephony solution, two million Lync mobile clients were downloaded in just six months, and many customers such as Sprint, Helly Hansen and Astra Zeneca are benefiting through cost savings and increased
productivity with Lync and the rest of the Office applications.

Our partners play a critical role in our journey to transform communications. Partners have been instrumental in helping customers decide, implement, manage and support Lync. They also continue to push the envelope in creating innovative offerings and solutions on our communications platform. We’ve seen a bunch of great innovation from partners, and I’d like to take a moment to highlight our Lync award winners and finalists.

Communications Market Acceleration Partner of the Year: Hewlett-Packard for their expertise in planning, deployment and management of Lync and launch of the HP AppSystem, a robust backend system for rapid adoption of Lync by customers.

Finalists: Wortell, Enabling Technologies Corporation

Communications Technology Partner of the Year: Avtex for their innovative suite of Lync based applications such as the Team Assembly System that provides real time availability of dispatch crew saving valuable time in gathering response teams during emergencies.

Finalists: Aruba Networks & Plantronics Inc

In addition to looking back at the last year; WPC also represents the perfect opportunity to share new initiatives, programs, and business planning with our partner community. The Microsoft Lync team has an action packed schedule
designed to help partners in accelerating their business with Lync. We will be sharing our go-to-market efforts for the next fiscal year, discussing opportunities on deployment, support and development platform and how Office 365 partners can leverage the value of Lync Online to lead customer deployments. I am especially looking forward to sharing the evolution of the new Premier Services for Lync Partners offering, based largely on direct feedback from our
partners. In addition, we have a host of activities, networking events and meetings planned to connect with our partners and build off our joint success in FY12 to have an even more successful FY13.

If you are a partner and heading to Toronto next week, here’s what you wouldn’t want to miss:

Lync Sessions:

Monday, July 09

3:00 PM – 4:00 PM
FOP02 Accelerate Your Business with Lync
Session Type: Breakout Session / Track: Future of Productivity

4:30 PM – 5:30 PM
FOP05i Lync: Compete Mythbusters
Session Type: Interactive Discussion
Track: Future of Productivity

Tuesday, July 10

2:00 PM – 3:00 PM
FOP11 Delivering Business Value to Your Customers with Lync Online and Office 365
Session Type: Breakout Session
Track: Future of Productivity

5:00 PM – 6:00 PM
FOP20 Lync Support Options for End-to-End Success
Session Type: Breakout Session
Track: Future of Productivity

You can add these sessions your calendar via the session scheduler at www.digitalwpc.com. We are also giving out passes to the most coveted event at WPC, “The Party”, so be there to
not miss out on any of the action. Plan also to stop by the Future of Productivity booth (#M3) and the Lync calling stations in the Solution Innovation Center to see hands-on demos. The Solutions Innovation Center will
feature:

LYNC CALLING STATIONS
Save those calling minute and experience the power of enterprise voice. Make phone calls to friends and family all via the power of Lync.

LYNC TECHNICAL EXPERT DEMOS
Even the savviest experts may not realize all of the features and functionality that Lync has to offer customers. Swing by the demo stations to meet with Lync technical experts and learn more.

LYNC DEVICE WALL
Touch and experience the latest audio, video and conferencing devices that would make any office phone green with jealousy.

PREMIER SUPPORT FOR LYNC (PSLP) ASK THE EXPERTS LOUNGE
Talk directly to PSLP experts about opportunities around Premier Support for Lync partners. Ask questions and learn more about how PSLP can benefit your business.

From keynotes, sessions, interactive discussions, demonstrations in the Solution Innovation Center, networking opportunities and not to miss parties, there will not be a dull moment at the conference. I look forward to seeing you in Toronto!

Ashima Singhal
Group Manager Lync, Microsoft

Questions about enterprise mobility? Time to brush up on Lync mobile clients

Lync Team — Thu, 24 May 2012 14:00:00 GMT

Enterprise mobility is top of mind for a lot of IT leaders at companies everywhere. Considering the trend, it’s no surprise that the Lync team continued to receive feedback on a great webcast covering Lync for mobile. In response to questions across social media, the Lync team decided to host a chat on Twitter giving current and prospective Lync customers a chance to engage directly with our team.

Not familiar with the Lync mobile client? Check out the video below for a quick introduction

(Please visit the site to view this video)

Skip Chilcott (@Skip_C), Marketing Manager for the Microsoft Unified Communications team and Brian Crum (@CrumBrian), Product Manager of Lync for Mobile client were kind enough to lend their time and insight to the cause answering questions, fielding suggestions and getting feedback on the Lync mobile app which is available on Windows Phone, iPhone, iPad, Android, Nokia, and other devices.

To kick things off we asked Skip a few questions that we commonly have come through our Twitter handle (@MSFTLync) and Facebook page.

Q1: What is needed to make Lync accessible from a mobile device?

Resource(s):

Lync Clients

Q2: How do companies get the app onto employee’s mobile phones?

Q3: How secure are the communications between the Lync mobile app and Lync servers or Lync Online?

Q4: Do users neeed to be logged into the Lync mobile app all the time to use it effectively?

Q5: What is the best resource for more information about Lync mobile services and the mobile apps?

Resources(s):

Q6: What are a few big takeaways our audience should leave with from today's chat?

Apart from the Q & A with Brian & Skip, a few users also shared their favorite features on Lync for mobile. Here are a couple highlights from some of our most engaged #LyncChat attendees that shed a little insight into how the Lync mobile clients are being used.

Skip & Brian shared their favorite Lync mobile feature as well.

For the entire Q&A dialogue check out the #LyncChat hashtag. If you have some questions you’d like answered by the Lync team, don’t hesitate to connect with us on Twitter @msftLync or on our Facebook page.

Microsoft Lync at Enterprise Connect 2012

Exchange Team — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 14:42:00 GMT

Enterprise Connect covers the major technology trends shaping communications and collaboration. As a leader in the United Communications industry, Microsoft Lync will be participating as a Diamond level sponsor this year. We have a lot of things going on this year you should check out, highlighted by a keynote address from Kirk Koenigsbauer, corporate vice president from the Microsoft Office Division, taking place on Wednesday, March 28 from 10 – 10:45 AM.

In addition we’re participating in a bunch of sessions at the conference and I encourage you to check them out. Here’s a list of the sessions the Lync team is participating in during the show:

Monday, March 26^th, 2012
Time		Type of Session	Session Title	Location	Speaker
11:00 – 12:00 noon		Plenary/Summit	Summit: Has the Post-PBX Era Begun?	Sun A	Warren Barkley, General Manager for Lync
1:00 – 1:45PM		Plenary/Summit	What’s Next for the Mobile Enterprise	Sun A	BJ Haberkorn
2:00 – 3:00PM		Breakout	Creating the Social Enterprise: Case Studies	Sun D	Kevin Rice, Enterprise Architect, AT Kearney
2:00 – 5:00PM		Breakout	UC with PBX RFP Session	Osceola B	Jamie Stark
1:30 – 2:15PM		Breakout	Integrating Microsoft, Google, and Other Cloud Platforms with UC	Sun C	Allan Carscaddon
Tuesday, March 27^th, 2012
8:00 – 8:45AM	Breakout		UC Federation: When Will We Get There?	Osceola A	Albert Kooiman
2:30 – 3:30PM	Breakout		UC Interoperability: How Real, How Much?	Osceola A	BJ Haberkorn
2:30 – 3:15PM	Sponsored Session		The Business Value of Lync	Osceola 1	Shelly Marston
Wednesday, March 28^th, 2012
8:00 – 8:45AM	Breakout		Voice-Enabling Web Browsers	Osceola 1	Albert Kooiman
8:00 – 8:45AM	Breakout		Case Studies: Putting Mobility to Work	Sun B	Oyvind Kaldestad, VP of IT, Lionbridge
10:00 – 10:45AM	Keynote		Kirk Koenigsbauer, Corp VP, OBP	Osceola C	Kirk Koenigsbauer, CVP, Microsoft Office Division
2:30 – 5:30PM	Breakout		RFP: UC without a PBX	Sun C	Shelly Marston

A full list of all programs at Enterprise Connect can be found here: http://enterpriseconnect.com/orlando/program/

That’s the business side of things – but we also have some fun stuff going on:

While at Enterprise Connect, we'll not only share our viewpoint on the latest trends in the industry, we’ll also help you find things to do around Orlando after show hours with a special promotion called "Behind the Screens". With the "Behind the Screens" VIP pass, you'll get access to rewards on entertainment and restaurants around Orlando while you're in town. Come by booth 816 to pick up your pass today, we only have a limited supply and it's first come, first served.

What does the BTS pass get you?

Buy one get one 50% off at the Wizardz
Theater Magic Show when you mention the "Behind the screens"
promotion. Buy your tickets in advance before it sells out by calling the
number on the website www.WizardzMagicTheater.com
Score $28 off tickets at the Arabian Nights Dinner
Attraction
Put 15% back in your pocket at the Falafel
Mediterranean Market Restaurant
Save 10% off your bill at the luxurious Venetian
Room
Earn 10% off and get a free appetizer with $30
purchase at Hao Hao Chinese Kitchen
Get all night happy hour, $5 drinks, and no cover
all night at Pafos UltraLounge Cigar/Dance Lounge

Stop by booth #816 to learn more about Lync and to pick up your “Behind the Screens” VIP pass.

If you have any questions or would like to connect, tweet us at @ucteam with the hashtag #ec12 and we'll be happy to help you. The Microsoft Lync team is looking forward to a great Enterprise Connect 2012 and we hope to see you in Orlando!

Microsoft Lync: Meeting Unique Deployment Requirements

Lync Team — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:43:07 GMT

One of the advantages Lync provides our partners is the ability to choose the deployment strategy that makes the most sense for their customer.

For example, as you may have seen, BT recently announced their hosted platform for Microsoft Lync voice pilots. Originally unveiled at Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC) 2011, the platform is now fully operational and available for customers that want to evaluate both Lync and BT’s service offerings. For customers ready to deploy Lync in production, BT offers on-premises Lync system integration, on-premises Lync managed services, and hosted, managed services.

The ability to choose the appropriate deployment approach is critically important to customers. Lync enables customers and partners like BT to choose between on premises deployment, Lync through Microsoft’s public cloud offer Lync Online and Office 365 and, with the recent release of the Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Multitenant Pack, multi-tenant partner hosting.

The major features in the Lync Server Multitenant Hosting Pack include:

Instant messaging (IM) and Presence
Voice and video over IP
Audio, video, and web conferencing
PSTN calling to and from the Lync softphone

The Lync Server Multitenant Hosting Pack enables service providers and other partners to satisfy functional, data sovereignty, and business requirements sometimes not satisfied by Microsoft’s public cloud offers, and to combine Lync capabilities with their own assets to create compelling new offers. The Lync Server Multitenant Hosting Pack is yet another milestone that demonstrates our commitment to deliver cost effective ways for our customers to experience the richness of Lync, while creating opportunities for our partner ecosystem.

For more information about Lync, please visit http://lync.microsoft.com/en-us/Pages/default.aspx.

Thank you,

Wajih Yahyaoui, Lync Program Manager

Introducing Lync mobile clients…

Lync Team — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 19:37:00 GMT

We first showed an early beta of our Lync 2010 mobile clients at Enterprise Connect earlier this year, sharing our vision for how these clients would extend the capabilities of Lync beyond the desktop. I’m thrilled to announce that Lync 2010 for Windows Phone is now available for download via Windows Marketplace and that Lync 2010 clients for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Nokia Symbian have been submitted for approval to their respective app stores.

The Lync 2010 mobile clients combine instant messaging, conferencing, and calling features in a single application that’s both familiar to Lync users and optimized for mobile productivity.

Windows Phone users will enjoy the beautiful Metro design of the Lync 2010 for Windows Phone app, while other platforms will recognize the familiar tabs they are accustomed to.

For the past several months, I’ve been using Lync 2010 for Windows Phone. I use Lync instant messaging multiple times each day and our single click conference join feature nearly as often--gone are the days of trying to remember and type 800 numbers and passcodes as I walk or drive! I travel a great deal and the ability to search our corporate directory and easily start a call or chat right from the search results on my phone is invaluable. I think the Lync mobile clients are a lot like Lync in general: now that I’ve got it, I can’t imagine how I’d get my job done without it.

If your company is already using Lync 2010, you’ll need to enable the functionality before users can take advantage: this NextHop blog has details for on premises customers, and this Office 365 community article provides information for Lync Online. Once the mobile clients have been enabled, users can download and begin using Lync 2010 for Windows Phone today, with other platforms coming soon. Visit here for the latest update regarding availability.

Today is an important step for Lync on the road to fulfilling its promise as a ubiquitous communications tool and I’m proud to be a part of the team delivering these clients to our customers.

BJ Haberkorn

Lync group product manager

Happy 1st Birthday Lync…

Kirk Gregersen — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 18:14:50 GMT

A year ago today, December 1^st to be exact, Lync 2010 was first made available to customers. To celebrate this milestone, I thought I’d share some updates about Lync’s first year in market. I just came back from several weeks on the road, meeting with customers and partners in Europe and Asia, and it’s been great to talk with current Lync customers and partners about their experiences, and to speak with prospective customers about how Lync 2010 can transform the way they communicate.

When we launched Lync 2010 last year, we made a bold claim: that Lync was “ushering in a new generation of communications.” At the time I wondered if that statement could have been too bold. We were excited about Lync, but you never truly know what you have with a product until customers really start to use it. After reflecting on some of the stories we’re hearing from customers, it is clear that Lync is indeed enabling people to communicate in new ways, increasing productivity wherever they are.

Feedback has been tremendous. From LA Fitness telling us they’re saving more than $650,000 per year using Lync, to the US Army using Lync to help keep soldiers connected. Swisscom, which deployed Lync across its entire 15,000 employees, recently finished decommissioning all of its 94 PBXs, resulting in $17 million in savings. The Commonwealth Bank of Australia tells us that Lync was the fastest product roll-out in the history of the company, resulting in 60% adoption rate among its 32,000 employees within just 24 hours of roll-out. Hendrick Motorsports is using Lync to collaborate and communicate on the race track during race day. Dell deployed Lync to support their Connected Workplace initiative, enabling their employees to work from any location that helps them to be the most productive, while helping to reduce Dell’s carbon footprint. I am really thrilled and amazed at the progress and success when I look at these and other customers in aggregate! You can find more Lync customer stories at www.microsoft.com/casestudies/ and at the Lync website.

Beyond individual customers, the aggregate numbers also speak to Lync’s rapid adoption. Microsoft had long been considered a leader in IM and presence with Office Communicator and Communications Server 2007. With the R2 release, the product took things to the next level with audio, video, and web conferencing, enabling customers like Intel and Credit Agricole to dramatically reduce both audio conferencing and travel expenses. Lync 2010 went further, with full PBX-replace level unified communications, much to the excitement of customers who had been waiting to deliver a seamless experience to their users. The resulting adoption has been rapid, with nearly 3 million enterprise users relying on Lync for telephony instead of a traditional PBX. In the last fiscal year alone, our enterprise voice deployments grew 250% – and these are just the ones we validate directly with customers.

No look back at Lync’s first year is complete without highlighting the innovation our partners are delivering. There are hundreds of certified partners across the world that are dedicated to selling and deploying Lync and many of them are creating differentiated offerings. BT recently announced a managed hosted service for Lync in the United States; Dimension Data and Unify Square are among the first Lync certified Premier Support partners on a global basis; and telco Swisscom is not only a Lync user itself, but is also redefining its service offering to customers based on the capabilities that Lync provides. In the device space, partners now offer over 130 Lync optimized devices (double the amount from launch) delivering customers the freedom to choose the device that works best for their needs. The amount of Lync interoperable network gear and gateways has seen similar growth. We predicted true innovation though the power of software and in the last year over 1,100 Unified Communications applications have been submitted by over 1,000 partners to the Microsoft Platform Ready program, enabling customers to get even more value out of their communications investments through communications enabled business processes (CEBP). I’m excited to see this space continue to grow as we believe the Lync partner ecosystem is one of the areas of greatest value to our customers.

If you haven’t considered Lync yet, I’d encourage you to visit www.microsoft.com/lync to learn more. And if you haven’t experienced the product yet, I’d encourage you to reach out to your Microsoft account representative or certified partner to ask about pilot opportunities and the “Turn on Lync Voice” promotion currently available when you add enterprise voice capabilities to the presence and IM features in Lync. We are certainly excited about customer reaction to Lync over the past year and look forward to delivering additional capabilities for Lync and Lync Online over the coming months.

Thanks!

Enriching the Lync video conferencing experience

Lync Team — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 16:30:00 GMT

Hello from the world of Lync gadgets! Lync’s one-year anniversary is less than a month away and we’re starting year two with a wave of new solutions being brought to market by our audio and video partners.

Today, I want to talk about video Gateways and why they are important.

Why video Gateways for Lync?
One of the key features of Microsoft Lync is the integrated P2P and video conferencing capability, which adds desktop video conferencing to the palette of communication options while also preserving the click-to-call ease of use of the overall solution. Customers who are interested in utilizing Lync desktop video capabilities may already be using room-based video conferencing, and they’d like to keep the experience consistent across all systems.

That is where video gateway solutions help us integrate board rooms, siloed video applications, and immersive video experience into Lync. Gateways provide connectivity between the two environments. It allows any H.323 endpoint to register to the Lync server and act just like a native Lync client via the video Gateway. The endpoint’s presence will display in the Lync contact list including offline, available or in a call, and calls can be made to the device in full HD using the familiar click-to-call user interface.

Many customers will choose to deploy native interoperable endpoints as they expand their networks, but still require interoperability with their existing endpoints. Deploying a gateway gives them this flexibility. It also gives them the flexibility of having multipoint calls that include any endpoints on Lync’s built-in A/V MCU. Without a gateway the only way to do this would require all the Lync clients and endpoints to connect to an MCU.

As part of our Video Interoperability Program, we are looking at qualifying video gateways that will enable these functionalities for Lync customers. One of those partners is RADVISION, which we’re happy to confirm has implemented some of the key scenarios for interoperability with Microsoft OCS 2007 R2 and Lync 2010, including providing customers firewall traversal as well as secure point to point video calls between Microsoft OCS and Lync clients and third-party endpoints. RADVISION is also working to add interoperability support for TCP protocols in order to complete qualification of their device. We anticipate that they will complete that work by the end of the year. You can reach out to RADVISION for more information info@radvision.com.

I encourage you to learn more about Lync Conferencing and how we are working with our partners to make it easier, better, and allow customers to leverage and integrate their current infrastructure.

More on the benefits of Lync audio, video and web conferencing: http://lync.microsoft.com/en-us/Product/Workloads/pages/conferencing-software.aspx

Maura Hameroff

Lync Earns Recognition

Lync Team — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 17:00:00 GMT

Analysts play a key role in the tech industry. They look at how products are actually being used in the real world and advise their IT clients. Perhaps one of the most respected firms in the enterprise IT market is Gartner, with a dedicated team of analysts who closely watch the UC market.

Every year, Gartner publishes a series of annual reports sizing up the major players in the UC market, and the competition is tough. I’m proud to say I believe Lync has done exceptionally well in these reports and I want to take a moment to share the results:

In early July, Gartner published the MarketScope for Enterprise Instant Messaging and Presence in which Microsoft was rated Strong Positive based on evaluation of Lync. This report looks at IM/Presence vendors and evaluates their solution based on a number of factors including: federation, management and security, advanced features like video/voice, and market share.

In mid-August, Gartner published the Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications , which is considered one of the few definitive assessments of the UC market, and Microsoft placed in the Leaders quadrant.

In mid-September, Gartner published the Corporate Telephony Magic Quadrant where we landed in the Visionaries quadrant. Gartner notes in this report, “companies are increasingly focusing their strategies and acquisition decisions around unified communications and collaboration (UCC) technology; it is supplanting the historic domain of corporate telephony.”[i] Lync telephony has only been in market since last December, and we’re confident our UC platform will continue to gain against legacy vendors who have been in the PBX market for decades.

These reports, while a great recognition, represent a moment in time and Lync has continued to improve since these published. You probably saw the Lync for Mac RTM announcement a few weeks ago, and we have an exciting fall ahead of us with more Lync updates you’ve been waiting for. Stay tuned to see what’s next.

Cheers,

BJ Haberkorn

[1] The MarketScope is copyrighted 2011 by Gartner, Inc. and is reused with permission. The MarketScope is an evaluation of a marketplace at and for a specific time period. It depicts Gartner's analysis of how certain vendors measure against criteria for that marketplace, as defined by Gartner. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in the MarketScope, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest rating. Gartner disclaims all warranties, express or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. This MarketScope graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research note and should be evaluated in the context of the entire report. The Gartner report is available upon request from Microsoft.

[1] This MarketScope graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research note and should be evaluated in the context of the entire report. The Gartner report is available upon request from Microsoft."

[1] “Gartner Magic Quadrant for Corporate Telephony” Gartner Research, September 15, 2011.

[1] "This Magic Quadrant graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research note and should be evaluated in the context of the entire report. The Gartner report is available upon request from Microsoft."

The Magic Quadrants are copyrighted 2011 by Gartner, Inc. and is reused with permission. The Magic Quadrant is a graphical representation of a marketplace at and for a specific time period. It depicts Gartner's analysis of how certain vendors measure against criteria for that marketplace, as defined by Gartner. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in the Magic Quadrant, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors placed in the "Leaders" quadrant. The Magic Quadrant is intended solely as a research tool, and is not meant to be a specific guide to action. Gartner disclaims all warranties, express or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Lync gets people talking

Kirk Gregersen — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 17:18:00 GMT

It’s hard to believe that it’s been almost a year since the launch of Lync Server 2010 in New York. I was back in New York (and Boston) this week visiting with customers, press and analysts, sharing updates and touching base on progress since launch. Many customers have used our instant messaging and conferencing technology for years, but with the release of Lync, it’s been notable the number of customers who are using Lync to bridge the gap between enterprise telephony and other real-time communications. Over the last couple years, we’ve tracked and validated deployments of Lync and OCS, including telephony, with a subset of our customers. We’ve seen enterprise voice deployments grow 250% in the last fiscal year alone, adding up to nearly three million total “lines” deployed to date (i.e., call control with Lync or OCS), and hundreds of enterprises with multi-thousand user Microsoft telephony deployments.

Recent enterprise voice roll-outs include 15,000 seats at Swisscom in Europe, 33,000 seats at Western Kentucky University in the U.S. and 10,000 seats at Sharp in Japan. Global energy group Royal Dutch Shell has 150,000 IM and presence users and nearly 20,000 telephony users. Information Week highlighted another customer – LA Fitness – that chose Lync for its 20,000 employees after assessing Avaya and Cisco, and is now saving $650,000 per year in hard savings and reaping significant other productivity benefits. At Microsoft, we’ve literally bet our own business on Lync, with more than 90,000 employees worldwide using Lync as their only telephony solution, in addition to IM, audio, video and web conferencing. It is making a difference at Microsoft and for customers all over the globe, so if you’re considering Lync and want to hear about other customer experiences, check out the more than 450 case studies on Microsoft.com, or talk to another customer who has deployed it – your Microsoft account executive would be happy to make the connection.

Why are customers increasingly choosing Lync for telephony as well? First, as the workplace and collaboration have evolved, many customers are looking for more than a phone replacement. Lync is the first truly unified communications solution on the market – with a single client experience for the user, a single server and management experience for the administrator, and a single set of unified APIs for the developer. This platform element of Lync in particular has also helped finally realize the aspiration around Communications Enabled Business Process, which was introduced as a concept nearly ten years ago. With Lync, partners and customers can finally build rich, real-time communications into business applications and workflow (examples are here and here). And for customers who have made a bet on Microsoft technologies such as SharePoint, Exchange, and Office, Lync works great with those products right out of the box.

Customer and market momentum may be one of the reasons behind recent legacy infrastructure vendor claims about Lync. Let me address a few of the questions that have come up recently in the blogosphere.

First, because Microsoft is the only vendor in this space that builds its own mobile phone OS, one area I get asked about is mobility. Mobility is a huge investment area for the company and Lync, and we are committed to building the best experience for customers. In fact, many customers choose Lync because of its advantages for mobile workers in particular (e.g., built-in remote access in our PC and Mac clients that enables customers to effectively serve mobile workers without requiring mobile phones or VPN connections, as consulting firm AT Kearney describes in this case study). Beyond a best-in-class softphone user experience, we’ve traditionally supported clients for the PC, Mac, Windows Phone 6.5, Symbian, and Blackberry, and later this year we’ll release the next generation of mobile phone clients for Lync 2010 for Windows Phone, iOS, and Android – clients built and supported by Microsoft. Moreover, Lync has a rich set of unified APIs that enable developers and partners to build custom mobile clients and experiences, leading to an ecosystem of custom options for customers as well.

Another area I get asked about is system level pricing for Lync, since we rely on a more ecosystem-oriented approach to our offer. We’ve bet on leading global partners for hardware since we fundamentally believe this leads to greater innovation, more choice for customers, and more competitive pricing. System level pricing for Lync depends on a variety of factors, and we encourage customers to make side by side comparisons based on their unique situation and requirements. The telephony RFP evaluation at the 2010 VoiceCon (highlighted in this blog post) showed that the Lync based solution, including all hardware and software, compared favorably with legacy suppliers. In fact, today purchasers of a Microsoft-based system will see much lower endpoint prices than those used in the 2010 sample RFP response, and many will see lower per user licensing costs as well.

Another advantage of this approach is that customers can choose the best client and infrastructure hardware for their needs, taking advantage of the innovations of multiple device, server, gateway, and application suppliers. From a purchasing perspective, the ability to procure software and hardware from different suppliers also often results in greater pricing transparency than single-vendor offers.

Finally, because we take a more software-oriented approach to UC, we often get asked questions about related hardware requirements. Of course, hardware infrastructure depends on the capabilities deployed, as well as the required scale. For example, Avaya often suggests dedicated servers for its SIP Enablement and Application Enablement Servers, while Cisco requires a separate server to add IM and presence to a Communications Manager environment. We provide multiple deployment options and guidance on the most effective configurations, which includes the use of dedicated servers in some cases. However, we also allow the use of both physical and virtual servers and allow multiple software elements (or roles) to be co-located on servers.

Does this automatically mean that Lync has a more efficient architecture than those competitors? Not necessarily, though the Lync Standard Edition server, which provides IM, presence, conferencing, telephony, and application interfaces for 5,000 users using a single server, and can be made redundant with a second server, provides a starting point for comparison. A customer can add secure remote UC access for those 5,000 users by deploying a Lync Edge Server, eliminating a need for the VPN infrastructure required by some traditional voice solutions. And the results in terms of PBX voice scalability and reliability have been rock solid, with Miercom writing that:

“Microsoft Lync 2010 is the first Unified Communications product to pass the SIP Torture and Attrition Test with Miercom by achieving a record 4 million SIP calls complete without error…Microsoft Lync Server 2010 was able to sustain heavy call volume without dropping any calls or reporting any errors in a 4 million call completion test. The delivery rate with sustained operation without error is the highest capacity test applied to any Unified Communications / IP PBX product we have tested to date.”

Nine months ago we launched Lync Server 2010, joining with customers and partners to change the way businesses communicate. There are new examples coming all of the time from customers who are embracing a more unified approach to communications and collaboration. One great story that’s being told today is from employees of Volkswagen Group of America, who are blogging about their experiences with Lync at testdrivinglync.com. Thanks for your continued interest in Lync, and visit our website for more information on how Lync is harnessing the transformational power of software and changing communications.

Lync for Mac 2011 Released to Manufacturing

Kirk Gregersen — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 16:00:00 GMT

When we first announced Lync Server 2010 last November, we talked about our commitment to supporting multiple platforms and how over the course of 2011 you would see Lync become available for other platforms. Today, I’m excited to share with you today that Lync for Mac 2011 has been Released to Manufacturing, commonly referred to as RTM.

Starting in October, our Mac customers will be able to experience the integrated communications experience that Lync has become well known for. From the updated contact cards to the ability to set up Lync conferences from Outlook 2011 for Mac to enterprise voice features, Lync for Mac 2011 offers Mac users integrated functionality for presence, instant messaging, conferencing and voice and is designed to work with both Lync Server 2010 and Lync Online.

VIDEO: Lync for Mac quick tour

Lync for Mac 2011 is available to customers as a part of the Office for Mac 2011 Volume Licensing SKU, Office for Mac Standard 2011, or through many of Microsoft’s Licensing programs. Customers can also purchase the application as a standalone volume licensing SKU.

For more information on Lync for Mac 2011, please visit http://www.microsoft.com/mac/enterprise/lync.

What devices have been certified for Mac?

Lync Team — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 18:42:06 GMT

My role on the Lync team focuses on “gadgets for Lync”, I manage the relationship with our audio and video device partners, and one of the things I like about working on this team is our focus on improving the customer experience. One question we get asked on occasion is what devices have been qualified/certified to work for Mac. The short answer is that we don’t yet qualify devices for Communicator for Mac 2011 or the upcoming Lync for Mac 2011 clients, but most of our device manufacturers have good solutions that will work with the Mac clients. USB devices such as headsets and speakerphones are excellent alternatives to basic computer microphones and speakers.

For example, Plantronics recommends all of their USB solutions that are certified by Microsoft (Calisto, Blackwire, Savi, and Voyager families), Jabra also recommends all their Optimized for Lync portfolio for a basic experience with Communicator for Mac 2011 and Lync for Mac 2011.

These products offer high quality wide-band audio (transmit and receive) that is optimized for use with Lync. However, in-line or on-headset call control will have limited functionality on the Mac client. Users will need to answer and end calls from the Mac client directly rather than using the headset buttons, and the Lync client may not reflect the actual mute state of the headset microphone if the in-line mute button is used.

To use USB audio devices with the Communicator/Lync for Mac clients, the USB device must first be selected as the primary device on the Mac operating system. This can be done under Apple Icon -> System Preferences -> Hardware -> Sound and selecting the desired USB device as the primary input and output device. This must be done before Communicator/Lync for Mac is launched. If a user wishes to add a device after the client is already launched, then the user must restart the client after the device is selected in the Mac operating system.

You can always use a companion IP phone, any of the qualified models would work as a desk phone.

I hope this information was useful. I’d like to close by asking you to share your favorite devices in the comments. What do you like about your current favorite device and what would be your biggest request for the next generation of devices (brevity is encouraged). We’ll take a look at your feedback to help us keep improving your experience with Lync and will give away devices for the best suggestions!

--Maura Hameroff

US Army Can Keep Soldiers on Front Lines Connected with Lync

Lync Team — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 20:54:00 GMT

Today I wanted to bring your attention to an article the U.S. Army wrote about its Lync pilot. I was excited to learn how the Army believes Lync can benefit its personnel, and I think you’ll find it interesting as well. At the Command and Control Directorate for the U.S. Army’s Communications-Electronics Research, Development and Engineering Center (CERDEC CD2), a development effort is underway to understand how the Army can use Lync to extend its communication infrastructure to keep soldiers connected to each other, whether they are at the command post or on patrol.
Instant communication is critical to soldiers on the front lines. In fact, soldiers rate instant messaging applications as the most important application they use. Adverse conditions, a wide variety of communications equipment, mobile personnel, and bandwidth constraints make communications difficult. Instant messaging helps the army overcome these challenges. Here’ s how:

CERDEC integrated presence information into several military systems. Through presence icons, soldiers can see multiple modalities to contact someone, whether by voice or instant messaging. “I was impressed with the work CERDEC C2D has done integrating Lync with our existing Army mission command systems, and I see great potential in a system that can operate at the tactical edge, in the lowest bandwidth environment,” said retired Lt. Col Jeffrey From, science and technology specialist at the Mission Command Battle Lab at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. Where bandwidth is available, soldiers can also use Lync to send files or share images through desktop sharing. It’s great to see that Lync has the flexibility to meet the needs of such a unique customer.

Soldiers can view presence and initiate chat sessions through a number of military applications integrated with Lync

Lync can be used to bridge communication devices. CERDEC configured Lync so that users can easily communicate with people using Single Channel Ground and Airborne Radio System radios, cell phones, or VoIP phones. “If a general is on a phone or a (computer) and needs to communicate, you could actually bridge that with a mobile radio unit and have that connection be seamless,” said Phil West, a principal technologist with Microsoft. This is really amazing to me: Soldiers don’t have to know where someone is or what types of devices are involved on the other end. The message still gets through. It really is instant communications because you just click on someone’s name and start communicating.

Users can easily view presence and initiate a chat, voice call, or video conference through the Lync client

The CERDEC C2D team sees the potential to use Lync federation to enable communication with NATO forces or other branches of the military. “[Lync] enables faster collaboration with coalition partners because we don’t have to worry about the information assurance implications of releasing commercial off-the-shelf software to foreign groups,” says Ron Szymanski, CERDEC C2D Chief Architect for Science and Technology.

Users can use Lync video conferencing and desktop sharing for tactical discussions

On a more practical note, the Army can take advantage of the interoperation between Lync and other Microsoft products--Microsoft Office, Microsoft Exchange, and Microsoft SharePoint Server--that are integral to its daily operations around the world. “Lync can ultimately improve organizational efficiencies across a broad spectrum of environments,” said Brett Burland, chief of the Science and Technology branch at the Mission Command Battle Lab. “It could be used in our more stable installation environment, and through the improvements CERDEC C2D has developed, it can function just as well in a deployed, tactical force.”

I think it’s also great to know that Lync had been approved by the Defense Information Systems Agency and the US Army feels it can use Lync to solve so many of its communications challenges. I like that the Army is using the most basic functions of Lync—instant messaging and presence—to keep soldiers in the field connected, but it also sees the potential of flexible Lync APIs to customize solutions that truly support its operations.

Read the US Army article

Kind regards,
Rainer Podjoutomo
Product Manager, Microsoft Lync

This is getting personal: Volkswagen Group of America & Microsoft Lync

Angus Norton — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 18:07:00 GMT

We’ve all seen how innovative technology can drive productivity, operational efficiencies, and cost savings – it’s a frequent story told amongst marketing departments throughout the tech industry. However, rarely are we able to get a first-hand view directly from the end user, the one who’s life/work is truly changed by the adoption of
new technology inside an organization. That’s why, when the folks at Volkswagen Group of America decided to give Microsoft Lync a test drive, we wanted to ensure you had a front row seat!

Follow the story all up, or see how the VWGofA employees (The Drivers), respond to changes in the way they get their work done and communicate with their colleagues. We’re tracking and consolidating all of their conversations at the Lync Test Drive. My favorite story? It’s got to be when Greg G., Chief Strategy Officer, used Lync and in-flight Wifi to stay connected, engage in a whiteboarding session, and keep his team and business moving forward all while on his flight from San Francisco to Detroit. If that isn’t a “productivity from anywhere” scenario I don’t know what is! Here’s your chance to follow the story on your own, visit the Lync Test Drive to see what all the commotion is about.

Angus Norton, General Manager, Information Worker Marketing (United States)

Hello from the Lync Team at WPC here in sunny L.A.!

Lync Team — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 16:00:00 GMT

It’s the second day at our Worldwide Partner Conference and it’s great to see the energy and excitement from partners on Lync. We kicked off the event with a pre-day session with 300+ Exchange and Lync partners. This is one of my favorite days at the conference. We get to spend an entire day with our closest partners sharing feedback, best practices and plans for the next fiscal year. It’s a chance for the team to meet partners from across the world and for partners to spend some time with us and networking with each other.

As you heard during Steve Ballmer’s keynote yesterday, this is a special year for Lync and the excitement is evident. I especially loved Steve referring to Lync as “the Kinect of the enterprise”, as it speaks to the wow-factor Lync has for customers. Since Lync launched last November, many of our partners are now fully qualified and have many customer wins. For example, telephony deployments on Lync grew 250% in FY11, with partners having hundreds of deployments that they can now grow through application development and managed services.

This year’s theme of our pre-day session was “Going Big with Lync”. There were two elements to this theme. First is reiterating the best practices and programs for partners – a full curriculum of readiness and training, voice partner community, architectural reviews for large or complex deployments and field support from their voice partner account managers, to name a few. The second focused on new investments Microsoft is making to help partners be even more successful with their customers. These have been in large part in response to feedback directly from partners - our partners are our biggest advocates and in some ways, our best sounding boards!

I am happy to share some details here:

Solution Incentive Program for Lync: Microsoft Lync Solution Incentive Program offers a way for partners to earn incentives on Lync license transactions. Previously, our implementation partners did not participate in the licensing transaction, which is carried out by Large Account Resellers. We recognize that many of our partners play an important role in selling solutions like Lync to customers and we will be rewarding partners that help in the sales process. This will make partners more vested in the entire process and help customers get more value and attention.
Evolution of Lync Voice Support: We are evolving support for Lync voice through a new offering, Microsoft Premier Support for Lync Partners, which will enable partners to offer end-to-end solutions backed by Microsoft IP, tools and Premier Escalation Engineers. Partners benefit from direct backing from Microsoft, access to resources, IP and a co-sales model and customers will see value from an end-to-end support offer from a certified support partner. Already, global partners such as British Telecom, Dell, Dimension Data, Orange Business Services and T-Systems have signed up to work with us as introductory partners.
Microsoft Communications Competency: Finally, in October 2011, the existing Unified Communications competency, which is the current competency relevant to our Exchange and Lync partners, will split into two separate, new competencies: the Messaging competency, focused on Microsoft Exchange, and the Communications competency, focused on Microsoft Lync. We blogged about this update in May, and we’re using WPC as an opportunity to connect directly on it with partners. This is an important evolution of the Microsoft Partner Network competency that allows partners to further differentiate Exchange and Lync expertise in the market. We know how much our partners invest in developing practices on Exchange and Lync, and these two new competencies will give them the chance to demonstrate these investments.

These are exciting times for customers and partners. Lync is helping customers transform their communications infrastructure and also help open new doors for partners. The opportunity is huge – and we are committed to helping our partners be successful and our customers have the best experience in their journey to change their productivity landscape.

If you are interested in learning more about the partner opportunity with Lync, partner solutions built for Lync, or to find a partner to help you upgrade or deploy, visit our Lync Partner Solution Center. And be sure to keep up with all the latest coming from WPC this week on the WPC website and on twitter using the #WPC11, #ExchangePartner and/or #LyncPartner hashtags.

Ashima Singhal

We’re looking forward to seeing all our partners at WPC!

Kirk Gregersen — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 17:50:00 GMT

Microsoft will host the annual Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC) next week (July 10-14), and we are eager to connect with our Exchange and Lync partners in Los Angeles, California.

WPC is the marquee event of the year to engage with our worldwide partners to reflect on the year’s performance, celebrate successes and discuss future opportunities. This year in particular is an important year in our journey to bring the best productivity solutions to our customers whether they are on premises, in the cloud, or a combination of both. With important releases of Exchange, SharePoint, Lync and most recently Office 365, our customers have the tools they need to transform productivity in their organizations.

Partners are an important element in that journey – not only do they help customers realize the value by deploying and supporting the infrastructure, but also they develop rich applications and solutions that helps unlock the potential of their software. For example, see these videos about Lync partners Gluck and Kanja helping construction firm Herrenknecht save costs and build CEBP applications for their business needs and Dimension Data help Commonwealth Bank of Australia have one of the fastest adoption of any technology product in their company’s history. And it isn’t just Lync partners—Exchange partners are also doing great work in helping customers adopt and deploy Exchange 2010.

There are many examples of partners helping customers save money and build innovative solutions. In particular I’d like to call out our UC Award winners and finalists this year. We had over 100 submissions from system integrator, ISV, hosting and device partners and it was fantastic to see the innovation and creativity. A big thanks to everyone who submitted an entry!

And here are the winners…

Unified Communications Market Acceleration Partner of the Year Winner: infoWAN Datenkommunikation GmbH for their expertise in planning, deployment and management of Microsoft Exchange 2010 and Exchange Online

Finalists: CDW & Dimension Data

Unified Communications Innovation Partner of the Year Winner: Polycom for their innovative and Lync interoperable solutions that span voice, video and telepresence.

Finalists: ProtonMedia and Jasco

Congratulations!

In preparation for WPC, we’ve been working diligently to create great in-depth content, demos, and solution showcases. If you’re a partner heading out to WPC, here is a quick checklist on some of the Exchange and Lync sessions to look out for -

Tuesday, July 12 12.00- 1:00 PM: Future of Productivity Keynote (Kirk Koenigsbauer)

Tuesday, July 12 1:30- 2:30 PM: BP04: Dollars, Euros, or Yen: How Exchange brings you growth opportunities from on-premises to the cloud, (Julia White)

Tuesday, July 12 1:30- 2:30 PM: BP03: Going Big with Lync: Delivering a New, Connected Experience (Kirk Gregersen)

There are additional activities lined up, like our Unified Communications Symposium on Sunday, as well as interactive sessions during the general conference led by business leaders and subject matter experts. There is also an exciting and diverse set up of partner demonstrations at the Solution Theater from Aspect, Binary Tree, BT, Concord, Enabling Technologies, HP, Illuminari Tech, infoWAN, NET, Polycom, Quest Software, and Sipcom, among others.

During the week, we will have important updates to share. We will discuss the evolution of the Unified Communications competency, talk about how the new Solution Incentive Program for Lync creates more opportunities for partners, announce a new support services offering and discuss FY12 programs and offerings that will help partners deliver more value to customers. And you should visit the Lync device partners booths as they will have exciting announcements and new products to showcase.

And no event is complete without its share of fun and parties! Let me draw your attention to one of them. On Monday, July 11^th, on your way back from the Vision Keynotes to LACC, stop by the Kogi Truck where we will be serving up hot Korean/Mexican tacos. Say hello to the Exchange and Lync teams, grab some delicious tacos, meet with other partners and enter a chance to win a pass to the most coveted party at WPC!

Keep checking the UC Team Blog for more WPC updates throughout the event.

Get Face To Face With Lync

Lync Team — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 16:01:00 GMT

This blog is post #7 in the Ten Days of Office series to celebrate the one-year anniversary since the release of Office 2010 and provide you with tips and tricks to get the most from your Office experience. Tune in each week day for new tips and tricks!

June 9, 2011,

Yancey Smith, Director of Product Management, Lync

On the advent of the one-year anniversary of Office 2010, the Lync team is seeing a tremendous amount of momentum. Even though we just launched Lync last November, we’re thrilled about the results we’ve already seen. We’ve grown the number of Lync licenses by approximately 30% since last year, reflecting the increased interest and excitement that our customers have.

Since Lync launched last year as the final piece of the Office 2010 wave, we’ve seen customers use Lync to quickly achieve amazing results. Customers are freeing their employees from landline phone systems by using Lync enterprise voice, allowing workers to be more easily accessible when working remotely. Lync builds communication right into collaboration and productivity tools by weaving in the ability to initiate a conversation from the software people are already using, like SharePoint, Exchange or Office applications. This not only makes it easier to connect with others, but it also speeds up the process of working since you no longer need to play phone tag or rally e-mails back and forth to get questions answered. Effectively, Lync lights up Office and turns the entire suite into a collaborative, social application. And with the HD voice and video experience, many customers are already saving hundreds of thousands of dollars on travel while their global teams are working more effectively together through Lync.

Customers are seeing super-fast user adoption when Lync is rolled out, and we’re working to make sure Lync is providing workers with the features they need to work more effectively. Whether you’re using Lync now or thinking about implementing it in the future our Lync Adoption and Training Kit can help you make the most of your Lync experience.

We also recently released a new set of applications for Lync that are currently available for free download, to make business communications even easier. The new apps include:

IM an Expert - IM an Expert is a social networking tool that helps the people in your organization who have questions find the people in your organization who have answers. IM an Expert parses the question to determine the topic area, finds topic area experts in its user-populated expert database, and forwards the question. A willing expert responds to the initial question and follow-up questions using Lync.
Conversations Analyzer - Conversations Analyzer is an application that reviews your Lync instant messaging (IM) conversation history and gives you scores for your use of trust-building language in day-to-day communications with business associates and friends. Conversations Analyzer applies trust rules to determine the occurrence of words and phrases that have a positive or negative effect on trust.
Conversation Translator - Conversation Translator provides a real-time language translation service for Lync instant messaging (IM) conversations in up to 35 different languages. With Conversation Translator, both the sender and receiver can converse in their native language and Conversation Translator handles the translation.
Information Dashboard - Information Dashboard helps you start a conversation with a remote contact by providing current information about the contact's location. For example, if you are calling a coworker or a client in Shanghai, China, you can open Information Dashboard and enter the location of Shanghai before making the call. Information Dashboard will return the day, date, time, whether you’re calling during regular working hours, the weather forecast, and a news feed of articles related to the location. Lync also saves these settings are for your contact, so it’s easy to access the same information the next time you talk.
Tabbed Conversations - Tabbed Conversations provides a tabbed conversation window to allow multiple instant messaging (IM) conversations in a single window.
Group Chat Stress Tool - You can use the Group Chat Stress Tool to help verify your Microsoft Lync Server 2010 and Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Group Chat hardware deployment. Group Chat Stress is made up of two applications: Group Chat Stress Tool and Group Chat Loaders, the stress engine. Use Group Chat Stress Tool to create the configuration files for the loaders and to distribute the binaries to the remote machines that will be running the loaders. Use Group Chat Loaders to apply the specified load parameters on the Group Chat Server.

Really, Lync makes it easy to connect with anyone – whether they’re across the hall or across the globe. If you haven’t taken a closer look at Lync, visit http://lync.microsoft.com to learn more about the product and download a free 180-day trial version of Lync Server 2010 for testing in your own environment. To learn more about the Lync applications, please see the Channel 9 video below, and keep checking back as there will be more posted in the coming weeks:

IM an Expert: http://channel9.msdn.com/posts/Lync-IM-an-Expert-Part-1-of-2

(Removing mentions of Power Pack and using the formal name: Lync Adoption and Training Kit)

Why Does Lync Beat the Competition?

Lync Team — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 19:00:00 GMT

We have won a lot of projects with customers who were considering some of our competitors’ products. I took a closer look at what makes Lync a better solution for these customers, and what I found was that customers believe Lync stands above its competition because of features that are easy to use and the interoperation with other Microsoft solutions. Unlike other “unified communications” companies that have acquired their way into providing a “solution,” Microsoft built Lync from the ground up to be a single platform that can enhance, extend, and replace traditional and IP PBX systems.

With Lync, customers get more than a voice solution. HarborOne (Read the case study), a credit union, considered but rejected a telephony solution based on Cisco technology. “We didn’t just want to replace traditional telephony with Internet telephony,” says Wayne Dunn, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at HarborOne. “We wanted a unified communications and collaboration solution. For us, true collaboration was the key. Cisco didn’t offer that; it offered Internet or voice over IP [VoIP] telephony.” The interoperability between Lync and Microsoft Exchange, the ability to view presence or start a chat session through Microsoft Outlook—those things sold HarborOne on Lync. “Internet telephony, by itself, doesn’t justify the cost of the investment because it doesn’t include collaboration—as the Microsoft solution does,” says Dunn.

The voice capabilities in Lync are enhanced by features that make the whole system easier to use. Have you ever had to stick a list of your frequent contacts to your phone because it was too difficult to program them into the phone? If you have used a popular product from one of our competitors, the picture below may look familiar. Contrast this with Lync: all you have to do is right-click on any contact or email address in Lync or Outlook, and then select the option to add the person to your frequent contacts list.

Actual picture of a phone sent by a customer who recently switched to Lync.
We had to blur out the customer names on this picture to protect our customer’s personally identifiable information.

When EDB (read the case study), an IT Services organization headquartered in Norway, was looking for its next-generation communications solution it investigated options from IBM and Cisco. It found that those companies lacked the comprehensive solution that Microsoft Lync Server 2010 provides. “They can provide some of the same capabilities, like instant messaging and online meetings, but they are not all in the same application and they don’t work well with other solutions on the desktop,” explains Magnus Mühlenbock an IT Manager at EDB. “With Lync, all of the capabilities are available in one client.” Even though you might get the capabilities in some form, Microsoft pulls them together in a way that’s easy for users.

I’ve also talked in past blogs about the Colombia National Police (read the blog here) and AT Kearney (read the blog here). These two organizations chose Lync instead of deploying or continuing to invest in Cisco solutions, which helped them save money and gave them additional capabilities. With Lync, companies can provide employees with collaborative tools that make work easier and are available anywhere, anytime, and they can also offer IT departments a simple solution to deploy and manage.

Stories like these make me confident that Lync Server 2010 is the best communications solution on the market today. Microsoft Lync helps you to communicate with the right people easily, efficiently, and effectively within the business applications you use each day.

Kind regards,

Rainer Podjoutomo

Product Manager, Microsoft Lync

Interoperability

Lync Team — Mon, 23 May 2011 14:15:00 GMT

Interoperability (sometimes also shortened to just “interop”) is a topic that the Lync team pays a lot of attention to. And interop isn’t just a focus for us—it has been a huge topic in the unified communications industry as well. At the Enterprise Connect conference in March and the Lync sessions at TechED North America last week we featured a bunch of content devoted to interoperability (you can watch sessions from previous TechEDs here: http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/TechEd).

Another example of the Lync team’s focus on interop is through our participation in industry forums, such as the Unified Communications Interoperability Forum (UCIF), which is celebrating its one-year anniversary today (http://uciforum.wordpress.com/) . You can learn more about the alliance by visiting (http://www.ucif.org/), but this moment in time has put me in a reflective mood and I wanted to share a couple of thoughts.

Lync was purposely designed to be interoperable; we designed Lync around ensuring customers have a great experience using what they have today and what they’ll buy in the future—this happened through a number of different efforts:
• The Office Protocol Documentation (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc307432(v=office.12).aspx) , which provides wire-level detailed technical specifications for Microsoft proprietary protocols and extensions to industry-standard protocols used by Office
• The UC Open Interoperability Program (http://technet.microsoft.com/UCOIP), where we test and qualify third party infrastructures with Exchange and Lync Servers
• Programs we run for endpoint devices such as for phones and video conferencing equipment that all interoperate and connect with Lync

With UCIF, it’s a longer-term horizon, but the opportunity is so much greater. We believe in the vision of the forum, which is why Microsoft employees are either participating in or leading study/work groups, in addition to Microsoft employee Bernard Aboba’s role as President of the board. As our vision for what UCIF can accomplish continues to grow, so does our participation and excitement. There are some really big issues out there that nobody alone will be able to tackle – crossing languages, protocols, codecs and signaling. How do you have left-to-right and right-to-left IM with different character sets work together well? Handling these issues elegantly will benefit the whole market, not just for vendors, but for our customers and partners to be able to get maximum utility out of our collective offerings.

Together, we can do so much more than working independently and apart. So congratulations to UCIF – we at Microsoft, and particularly in the Lync team, look forward to helping the growth and depth get better and better.

Thanks!
Jamie

Earth Day: Lync can make a difference

Kirk Gregersen — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 21:25:19 GMT

Microsoft News Center posted a piece yesterday featuring research from The World Wildlife Fund that calls out the benefit that increased telecommuting and virtual meetings could have on the environment.

With today being Earth Day, I wanted to take a few minutes to write about the various options that companies and workers are using to evaluate their carbon footprint and make their businesses greener. This can include offering different commuting options like free bus passes and carpools, or it can mean increasing recycling, composting and paper-free efforts in the office. And now, with UC tools like Microsoft Lync, companies can reduce travel and provide more employees with the option of working remotely. Here at Microsoft, and with Lync we are redefining what it means to be present at meetings. In house, we’ve already made huge strides in reducing our global carbon footprint by using Lync and other related technologies. With HD video and voice capabilities, Lync makes it easy to have virtual “in-person” meetings, which not only cuts down on travel costs, but also on Microsoft’s carbon footprint. For example:

By avoiding more than 45,000 trips per year on average, with an average cost of $2,050, Microsoft has saved a total of $92 million in travel costs annually.
According to Microsoft IT, Microsoft hosts approximately 100,000 conferences every month using Live Meeting, Office Communications Server and now Lync.
Microsoft Travel estimates employees have avoided flying more than 100 million miles annually when compared with travel in 2007, saving 17,000 metric tons of CO2 annually.

To read more about the cost and sustainability benefits we are experiencing here at Microsoft thanks to unified communications technologies like Lync, you can access the full case study here: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc982178.aspx.
For more information about how your company can rethink their business to save the environment, visit: http://www.microsoft.com/Environment/products-and-solutions/rethink-business.aspx.

Mobile Device Management Just Got Easier -- Announcing the Exchange ActiveSync Logo Program

Julia White — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 15:55:00 GMT

I am thrilled to announce the Exchange ActiveSync Logo Program that helps IT Professionals manage mobile devices more effectively. Many of you rely on Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) to provide security and policy control to smartphones and slates that access your Exchange Server. Today, the Microsoft Exchange team is announcing a program in which handset manufacturers agree to implement Exchange ActiveSync to a predefined standard or better. We are delighted to welcome Apple, Nokia, and Windows Phone to the Exchange ActiveSync Logo Program. (And, they are just the beginning – stay tuned!)

Customers consistently tell us that the increasing array of mobile devices employees use to access their company network is a top concern. While most smartphones use Exchange ActiveSync, an industry standard for mobile email, Exchange ActiveSync policies are not consistently implemented by the mobile device manufacturers. The lack of a consistent implementation makes it challenging to know which Exchange ActiveSync policies are supported by any particular device.

Nokia hears the same thing from its customers.

“With the Exchange ActiveSync Logo Program, IT managers have assurance that the smartphones which employees bring into the network environment are certified and trusted. Nokia enables Exchange ActiveSync on a wide range of smartphones, giving IT managers and employees a large device portfolio to choose from. However, with this program, they can rest assured that any of these Nokia smartphones which they choose to use within their organization meet the relevant Exchange ActiveSync policies required for secure mobile working.” – Rauno Toivonen, Director, Business Solutions, Nokia

In the Exchange ActiveSync Logo program, participants agree to implement a predefined set of EAS policies (or more). You can get a full detailed list of the defined features here. Two of the key features required by the Exchange ActiveSync program are remote wipe and support for Allow/Block/Quarantine (ABQ) strings. Remote wipe gives IT administrators the ability to erase data on a device that has been compromised or lost, so company and personal information isn’t at risk. ABQ strings enable IT admins to identify the mobile device type and model trying to connect with Exchange 2010 in order to validate and enforce appropriate access policies. This means no more worrying about rogue or unsupported devices accessing the network.

IT professionals can now be assured that devices that bear the Exchange ActiveSync logo meet a consistent set of mobile device requirements. Currently, all Windows Phone 7 and Windows Mobile 6.5 phones meet the program requirements. Nokia devices with the Mail for Exchange 3.0.05 client adhere to the program guidelines, including the recently launched Nokia E7. Apple devices with iOS 4.X, including the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, and iPad are also compliant.

Microsoft customer Subaru Canada has always relied on Exchange ActiveSync features to help manage mobile devices connected to the company network. George Hamin, Director of eBusiness and Information Systems, personally experienced the value of the Exchange ActiveSync features when he recently left his smartphone in a taxi during a business trip. Like most people, George had his contacts, email, and personal information on his phone. Thanks to the remote wipe capabilities of Exchange ActiveSync, he logged onto his Exchange account and immediately erased the important data from his Windows Phone. His phone was returned a week later and he was reassured to find that his phone was cleared of data. And, with just a few, short steps, George re-synchronized his phone with his Exchange Server 2010 account and restored all of his contacts, calendar and company email.

“Exchange ActiveSync is an important tool in managing our mobile devices. Many of our employees like to have the latest technology gadgets. I only allow Exchange ActiveSync devices that I have verified to access company resources, and up to now, it has been Windows Phones and the iPhone. A program like this really helps me to get a better sense of which smartphones meet my security guidelines.” - George Hamin, Subaru Canada

To learn more about the Exchange ActiveSync Logo Program, go here. There is also a technical post today on the EHLO blog. And Microsoft partners can get more information on the Exchange ActiveSync program on the Exchange Partner Blog. Stay tuned in the coming months as we have a strong pipeline of handset manufacturers and wireless phone carrier partners to add to the program.

Julia White
Senior Director, Exchange Product Management

Forefront Online Protection for Exchange Service Update is Now Available!

Julia White — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 15:38:00 GMT

I’m excited to announce a new release update of our online email protection service Forefront Online Protection for Exchange (FOPE), which makes it easier for customers to manage hybrid email environments. Many of you already know that Forefront is Microsoft’s line of protection, access and identity management products. Microsoft Forefront Online Protection for Exchange is Microsoft’s online email protection service used by millions of users worldwide and placed in the leader’s quadrant in the 2010 Gartner Secure e-mail Gateways Magic quadrant.

Forefront Online Protection for Exchange also provides the email protection solution for the upcoming Office 365 service.

FOPE Release 11.1 Highlights:

With this new 11.1 release of FOPE, customers get additional e-mail routing flexibility, advanced Transport Layer Security options to ensure secure business communication and greater flexibility in spam filtering to help reduce false positives.

Manage your hybrid environments: FOPE 11.1, provides additional e-mail routing flexibility for hybrid scenarios between Exchange Online and on-premises Exchange Server mailboxes. Learn more about how the new FOPE connectors enable “smart-host” capabilities.

Reduce False Positives: You can now set up a trusted mail flow channel with business partners via Skiplisting - a capability that helps reduce False Positives.

Secure your business channel: Multiple new Transport layer security (TLS) options ensure emails always pass via a secure communication channel.

Make it easier for partners to manage your security service: FOPE 11.1 allows your IT Partner to manage and administer FOPE for your organization with the new delegated administration experience. Partners are now also provided a consolidated view of all the companies they manage.

If you are an existing FOPE customer, you are automatically provided these new updates. If you are an Exchange Server customer interested in moving to an online service for protection, I encourage you to learn more about how the full capabilities of Forefront Online Protection for Exchange. You can also find out how customers like International Speedway Corporation and Sunbelt Rentals have benefited from the move to cloud protection with Microsoft.

It is easy to get started with a 30 day Forefront Online Protection trial.

Julia White

Senior Director, Exchange Product Management

FOPE Acceptable Use Policy

FOPE Privacy Policy

Make Google Talk Straight to You

Julia White — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 17:49:00 GMT

I am guest blogging on the Why Microsoft Blog today and tomorrow with some thoughts about Google. Check out the post today here.

Julia White

Senior Director, Exchange Product Management

Enterprise Connect

Kirk Gregersen — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 21:26:00 GMT

Enterprise Connect – the event formerly known as ‘VoiceCon’ – is here again, bringing together a great collection of industry leaders in the business communications space. More than 5,000 IT administrators, IT pros and top decision makers are here in Orlando, and we couldn’t be happier to be here ourselves.

We are particularly excited about this year’s event being fresh off the heels of launching Microsoft Lync. Lync delivers on the vision Microsoft has been discussing for years – and as a result, it’s being embraced and adopted by customers and partners all over the world.

Today, Kirk Koenigsbauer, corporate vice president of for the Office Business Productivity Group – of which Lync is a part – will keynote for Microsoft. It’s been great to see how customers are already getting great ROI and end user adoption with Lync 2010, just three months after launch, and Kirk’s presentation will include some of these stories. While I don’t want to steal his thunder, here’s a sneak preview of two of these stories:

LA FITNESS

LA Fitness, widely regarded as one of the leading fitness and sports clubs in the United States and Canada, has more than 20,000 employees working for more than 360 clubs across North America. A short while ago, the business had an aging PBX and legacy VOIP solutions, and needed to reduce its telephony costs while continuing to open new clubs. The company also wanted new communications and collaboration tools, which could provide employees with an integrated solution for staying in touch with customers, colleagues and partners.

LA Fitness decided to deploy Lync, because it delivered the solution to the company’s telecommunications challenges, but integrated communication and collaboration tools as well. Ultimately, Lync provided LA Fitness with a much lower total cost of ownership for its telecom (saving over $500,000 per year), and better value to its employees through integration with Microsoft Office, SharePoint, Exchange, and the company’s own custom business applications. Today, the entire company uses Lync enterprise voice and is increasingly utilizing Lync as a platform for custom applications ranging from contact center uses to workflow. They’re also seeing video communications reach more parts of the organization now that Lync makes video accessible not just in high-end scenarios, but to a much broader set of employees.

REVLON

Revlon, the global cosmetics company that sells products across 100 countries and six continents, now also uses Lync to communicate and operate a virtual world-wide team, especially when developing new products.

Revlon replaced its aging PBX system, and changed its IT model by deploying Lync. David Giambruno, CIO of Revlon, says the company evaluated and chose Lync for its simple and more cost effective solution. Compared to competitor alternatives, Giambruno said Lync is easy to deploy, and brings all business communication and collaboration tools together in one place. Revlon has deployed Lync across the entire company, allowing employees to work anytime and anywhere, while reducing costs and removing geographical barriers. For this reason, Giambruno says Lync is the ‘most used solution within the company, bar none.’

As I mentioned earlier, customers aren’t the only ones excited about Lync – check out the latest from Network World, PC Magazine and Miercom. And of course if you’re at Enterprise Connect here in Orlando, come visit us at our booth 808 and try Lync 2010 for yourself.

Kirk Gregersen

Senior Director of Microsoft Lync

Lync PIC Trial Discontinued, Free PIC remains

Lync Team — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 03:49:00 GMT

The Lync marketing team continues to see the value of Public IM Connectivity (PIC) capabilities as a fundamental part of the Lync federation experience. With PIC, Lync users can connect to customers & partners and friends & family who are on public IM networks such as Windows Live, AOL, and Yahoo!. This is a great feature for our customers that do business with organizations not yet on Lync, allowing our customers to communicate across network boundaries.

As of January 2011, we have decided to discontinue Lync’s free 120-day Public IM Connectivity (PIC) trial due to low demand of PIC trials. In place of the trial, we encourage customers to sign-up for the free PIC service: https://pic.lync.com. At no cost, customers can still be provisioned for Windows Live and AOL with the free PIC service. However, to obtain PIC with Yahoo!, customers will need to purchase a PIC license.

Please see the PIC Provisioning Guide for eligibility details.

The Lync Team

New Exchange Server 2010 Solution from HP and Microsoft Delivers Large, Low-cost Mailboxes with Ease

Julia White — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 16:35:00 GMT

A year ago, Microsoft and HP undertook a challenge to provide our customers with solutions to deliver faster business results. Our approach would be to create new appliances for key IT workloads, including virtualization and management, business intelligence, and email. We called this partnership “Infrastructure To Applications” (I2A).

On the one year anniversary of I2A, HP and Microsoft disclosed the HP E5000 Messaging System for Microsoft Exchange Server 2010. I am very excited today to announce the availability of the E5000.

What is the E5000?

The E5000 is a solution which incorporates everything required to run Exchange Server 2010. The solution has been jointly engineered by both companies, and includes (in a single piece of hardware) the following:

Two blade servers
Direct attached storage disks
Redundant networking and power
Pre-loaded and preconfigured Windows Server 2008 R2 and Exchange Server 2010 SP1
HP’s 3 year, 24x7 hardware and software support

Large, low-cost mailboxes made easy

In this age of high email volumes and large attachments, a 100MB mailbox doesn’t provide sufficient storage. By using low cost, direct-attached storage, the E5000 is optimized to deliver Exchange 2010’s promise of large, low-cost mailboxes, offering either 1GB or 2.5GB mailbox sizes by default.

The all-in-one solution ships pre-configured and optimized for Exchange Server 2010 using best practice architecture from both HP and Microsoft. We’ve also included specially developed quick deployment tools preloaded on the E5000. These two elements significantly reduce your Exchange 2010 deployment planning and configuration time to just hours.

And in the spirit of keeping costs down, the E5000 offers a few additional benefits. Its 3U form factor saves at least 25% space in the datacenter, and saves up to 50% on power consumption as compared to a similar configuration using multiple hardware components.

And last but not least, the solution is backed by HP’s 24/7 hardware and software support, including a four-hour on-site hardware response.

Why you should take a look at the E5000

Easy to deploy, feature rich, and with large, low-cost mailboxes, the E5000 is a fantastic way to upgrade from Exchange 2003 or 2007, or to migrate from Lotus Notes to Exchange 2010. The E5000 also has the ability to scale, both in mailbox size and number of users, making this a great solution for single site deployments, distributed IT environments, and remote office scenarios. And in HP’s words:

“The E5000 has brought the best of HP and Microsoft together into a single all-in-one solution for email. Our customers will be able to realize the benefits of Exchange Server 2010 with HP hardware specifically designed to make the E5000 easy to deploy and manage with large, low-cost mailboxes and high availability already pre-configured and ready to go.” - Tom Joyce, Vice-President, StorageWorks, HP

With the joint engineering investments made by both companies and the hardware from HP, we are so excited by the result that HP and Microsoft are calling the E5000 a “preferred solution” for Exchange.

To learn more about the E5000, visit Exchange’s E5000 website.

Julia White

Senior Director, Exchange Product Management