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When Avaya recently entered bankruptcy for the second time in six years, it's understandable even the most loyal of Avaya's userbase would feel the tension. Although the company has now exited bankruptcy, issues remain over Avaya's underwhelming performance in recent years due to its aging, single-tenant contact center and rapidly declining unified communications base. Users have expressed weariness from frequent pricing increases amid declining support and several unresolved known issues. Even with financials in order, it may be too late for Avaya to find relevance in today's UC market.
The irony of this transition is that Avaya is one of the biggest players in the premise-based UC space, serving major enterprise organizations such as hospitals, universities, and the public sector. Since a transition to cloud would be complicated without proper guidance, many of these organizations have turned to Microsoft Teams to bridge their existing gaps during the pandemic.
An expanded partnership with RingCentral also offers Avaya customers a path to modern cloud communications through Avaya Cloud Office (ACO). Still, to date, it has only been marketed towards net-new customers. It may not be an ideal fit for large enterprises already relying on Microsoft Teams with voice E3 and E5 licenses. There are several more affordable paths through RingCentral, 8x8, and other carriers to consider—contact us for additional information on optimizing Teams within your organization.
Where does this leave the Avaya faithful? Not with much enthusiasm for the future of the brand. Avaya hasn’t been included in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for several years since its core offerings have fallen behind and no longer meet today’s criteria. While their users are not looking for a quick exit to cloud, a sense of urgency has been building that they’ll wake up one day without support as Avaya simply disappears. And it doesn’t help there have been acquisition rumors for several years due to unsteady financials and a lack of an obvious path forward.
Since Avaya’s remaining userbase is mainly comprised of very large, slow-moving organizations, there is an understanding that time is no longer on their side. They are seeking partners that can offer product support during a transitional period since Avaya’s support levels have been steadily declining. Customers also report that resolution times have reached unacceptable levels, and it is time to find modern platforms with complimentary feature sets.
If you are an Avaya customer that needs clarification on your path forward, we would love to help you with transitional support and guidance evaluating new unified communications and contact center technologies. Contact us today to learn more and reach out to our transitional support team.
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