Constellation ShortList™ Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS)

About This Constellation ShortList™

UCaaS represents a consolidation of core communications infrastructure and applications to provide a more sophisticated cloud-delivered platform that centralizes modern digital communications. Increasingly, UCaaS solutions are expected to be built around a hybrid-first work model that is flexible and configurable for changing work styles and spaces. These core functions of communications must include voice and telephony; meeting and conferencing; messaging; chat and mobile communications; dynamic collaboration; and customer-facing communication applications such as integrated contact centers, service, support, and help desk workstreams and knowledge content curation.

UCaaS emphasizes the channels and systems of communications internal to an enterprise, connecting those channels to systems and solutions that power external, often more-customer-directed engagements such as call centers. The convergence and consolidation of communications will continue as customers look to streamline the intersection of capabilities and capacity across both UCaaS and CCaaS platforms.

One key element of a UCaaS solution is the capacity to integrate communications and data across communications channels, specifically to improve performance and to enhance the quality and effectiveness of a customer’s experience. As greater emphasis is placed on effective and productive internal communications serving as a linchpin for more profitable and consistent delivery of positive customer experiences, expect to see a shift away from UCaaS as being thought of as solely an internal tool but also as one that unifies the entirety of the engagement ecosystem.

Threshold Criteria

Constellation considers the following criteria for these solutions:

• Comprehensive communications offering across phone, chat, social messaging, and video
• Web, desktop, mobile, smart TV, and embedded hardware clients
• Call routing, forwarding, conferencing, and voicemail functions, now enhanced and optimized with generative AI tools
• Collaboration tools such as messaging, automated workflows, and project management
• Cloud deployed across public, private, and hybrid options for organizations with complex internal systems
• Enabling work-from-anywhere, especially for telephony-reliant functions such as service and support
• 24/7 support and training for technical and business users in all major geographies
• Key voice-to-text services, including global transcription in common languages of business
• Ready access to uptime detail across a network
• Flexible, scalable pricing
• Robust security protocols and measures, including adherence to key global regulations
• Integrations with business tools such as CRM and core customer service and support platforms and tools
• Reporting and metrics on performance, application utilization, traffic, incident logs, and uptime metrics
• AI and ML applications, such as smart routing and analysis of transcribed calls and engagements, to improve performance and experiences
• New generative AI applications being included range from automated post-meeting task scheduling, self-service scheduling and team-level schedule collaboration, talent network identification for team and talent building