Unified Communications Featured Article

Exploring Open Communications With Phil Edholm at ITEXPO

By Gerald Baldino
Senior Content Producer

Last Wednesday, CKE Consulting Co-Founder and WebRTC pioneer Phil Edholm (News - Alert) kicked things off at ITEXPO  with a session titled “Open Communications: The Next Disruption,” which explored how Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS), enterprise platforms and WebRTC are changing the way that organizations communicate.

As Edholm pointed out, over the last 17 years we have seen three major changes in the business communications industry. First, there was the rise of VoIP, which was followed by unified communications (UC) and eventually the cloud. Looking ahead, Edholm predicts that the next wave will be open communication in applications.

Edholm believes that app-based communication will become a major part of the enterprise landscape within the next five years. And by 2023, 45 percent of business communications will take place inside of applications, and outside of traditional business communications platforms.

This evolution in enterprise communication is creating many new opportunities—as well as challenges—for businesses. Spoofing and viral attacks, for instance, will need to be effectively managed and controlled in order to reduce risks. Edholm also touched on interesting topics like the role that net neutrality will have on IP communication over the next several years, and the reality that the industry is not going to become federalized like the PSTN.

If one thing is clear following ITEXPO (News - Alert), now is the time to start seeking ways to embrace real-time communication. Businesses that fail to do so now will get left behind the competition.

How is your organization using real-time communication?