The Australian Unified Communications (UC) market was valued at AUD792.2m in 2009, representing a fall of 16.2%, compared with 2008, according to a report by Frost & Sullivan.
The report ‘Australian Unified Communications 2010’, revealed that the market decline was due to the recent economic downturn which saw a significant number of local information technology projects shelved or put on hold.
The research firm said that the UC activity is expected to pick up slightly in 2010 with a 8% compound annual growth rate between 2009 and 2016.
In addition, the report notes that only a small proportion of organisations such as banks and telcos are choosing to integrate voice, unified messaging, presence and mobility with their overall UC platform.
However, advancements in smartphone technologies and the development of richer applications drove the mobility sector to record the highest growth in the UC market, with an increase of 11.2% in 2009, and expects that mobility will continue to see high growth through 2016.
Further, the report notes that carriers enjoy a unique position in UC, using their expertise in networks and communications technologies to bundle UC applications and traditional communication infrastructure, to ensure that carriers continue to account for the majority of large deployments and revenues in the Australian UC market over the next six years.
However, issues such as security, privacy and the impact on employee productivity will limit the extent to which these applications are deployed, according to the report.
Audrey William, ICT research director for Australia and New Zealand at Frost & Sullivan, said: "Although awareness of UC is high there is still a great deal of uncertainty among IT decision makers about how to integrate UC with a company’s infrastructure.
"The other big challenge to deployment is the lack of clarity about how exactly UC can help an organisation to achieve better productivity and more efficient communications."
