NEC is rolling out its cloud-based unified communications and contact centre systems to the UK and European markets. NEC Univerge Blue Connect is an integrated unified communications as-a-service platform, and Univerge Blue Engage, is a contact centre as a service (CCaaS) solution.
“Univerge Blue offers genuine differentiation,” said NEC’s UK & Ireland sales director, Andrew Cooper.
“As arguably one of the broadest cloud platforms available, it enables telecoms, collaboration, back up, security, webinars, file sharing and more within a single solution. If purchased from different vendors, all these have their own costs along with the resources to maintain and integrate them. If these are consolidated and streamlined, the cost of ownership is lowered considerably. Businesses can also benefit from monthly billing – users only pay for what they use, and user licenses can be altered month by month.”
The launch promises further benefits for NEC’s UK channel partners. “On-boarding partners should be empowering, not burdening,” said Cooper.
“Our partner program philosophy is ‘we work for you’ – with partners getting to maintain control of customer ownership,” he added.
The UK and European launch of Blue Connect and Blue Engage is the third phase of a global rollout due for completion by the end of the year.
The vendor’s go-to-market strategy is to maintain the 100% indirect sales channel using selected resellers across the UK. It has appointed Nimans, a telecommunications distributor, as its launch partner in the UK.
“Unlike other cloud telephony solutions, the Univerge Blue partner program enables resellers to stay close to their customers with greater control of pricing and billing,” said Tom Maxwell, Nimans dealer sales director.
“There's a real focus on making the initial on-boarding as simple as possible – resellers can choose the partner model they're most comfortable to start with and take it from there,” he added.
