Last month, TMC (News - Alert) reported that Microsoft Office Communications Server 2010 was set to release for the last calendar quarter of 2010, highlighting that rumors in the industry had the company promising a beta version for testers by the end of March, as captured in a ZDnet blog.

Today, at the VoiceCon Orlando 2010 Conference, Microsoft’s (News - Alert) Unified Communications Group corporate vice president, Gurdeep Singh Pall, announced the next version of Microsoft’s unified communications software, for now code-named Communications Server “14,” will be available in the second half of 2010.

The platform will provide enterprise telephony and will allow customers to embed communications within applications. This new solution is positioned as providing “a familiar and powerful way to communicate and collaborate using Microsoft Office, SharePoint and Exchange.”

The solution aims to make communications simpler, available at a lower cost and more open so that it works with what customers already have, while also allowing them to embed communications into any application. Office Communications Server has grown double digits every year over the last three years and is used by more than 70 percent of the Fortune 100, the company claims.

Pall provided two predictions during his keynote presentation, including the anticipation that more than 50 percent of all VoIP calls will incorporate more than just voice and the “end point” will make UC possible with more than a billion people. He also predicted the rise of more connected communications and in three years, 75 percent of new business applications will include natively embedded communications.

This announcement is key for companies such as Zeacom (News - Alert) that offer solutions specifically for Microsoft Officer Communications Server 2010. This OCS is geared for the SMB that has deployed Zeacom Communications Center, but desires certain unified communications features or capabilities delivered through Microsoft OCS.

In November, Zeacom announced that it offers a direct gateway for Avaya (News - Alert) IP Office and Communications Manager users to Microsoft Office Communications Server (OCS) 2007 R2.

According to Zeacom, its new gateway for Microsoft OCS enables organizations to integrate and enhance Microsoft Office Communicator and the desktop phone in two important ways: First, users can have full desk phone features and functionality from Communicator; second, they extend Communicator’s “presence” capability to other systems and applications.

Reportedly, there are several new related software development kits and newly exposed programming interfaces in development for the OCS release that are expected to make it easier for both developers and customers to customize and maximize the experience through presence, telephone and other built-in OCS features.

Such extended values should help to create significant demand in the global market for both Microsoft and companies like Zeacom focused on supporting such new innovations.