For many years, two companies at opposite ends of the
technology spectrum were best friends. Microsoft, the software
firm, and Cisco, the network company, worked nicely together, with
Cisco writing code into its environment to fully support
Active Directory and to
integrate its
services into Microsoft products like Exchange.
Both sides still say that all is well, and that they still are
holding hands. However, the protestations that all is fine may well
sound more like the dying days of a Hollywood marriage.
With both companies acquiring equivalent functions over the past
few years via acquisitions - for example SSL virtual private
networks, security and so on - it has been pretty clear that the
cooperation is rapidly reverting to straightforward
competition.
Now,
with Cisco buying WebEx, we see yet another complexion to the
whole relationship, and it may well be Microsoft that sees Cisco as
the one doing the sleeping around, even though the spat could well
be laid at Microsoft's door for its earlier antics.
At the basic level, it appears as if Cisco has just decided to
take a punt at the web conferencing market, possibly just as a
means of boosting its credentials as a company that can do a lot
across a network. However, I believe that there is something far
larger going on here.
Microsoft has just gone beta with its Office Communications
Server (OCS). In here is a little bit of extra functionality:
a voice over IP capability that it acquired through buying
Teleo in 2005.
Through this, users will be able to carry out low cost or free
telephone calls directly from their desktop, as the presence
capability built in to the replacement to the Live Communication
Server client (Office Communicator) will also be able to act as a
softphone. With
Session Initiation
Protocol (Sip) gateways, it will be possible to bypass the
existing copper line telephone systems and do all of your calls
through the Microsoft environment.
This leads to a slight problem. Cisco and Avaya between them
currently own the corporate VoIP market, and obviously Cisco wants
to continue to be a dominant player.
Cisco's unified communications play looks at taking many of the
coders and decoders used in audio and video communications and
pulling them closer to the wire through its Service Oriented
Network Architecture (Sona). This makes quality of service so much
easier and loses some of the weak links in a VoIP chain. Microsoft
is challenging this position - and Cisco needed to be able to be
seen to be pre-emptively fighting back.
Now,
Microsoft, through another acquisition, this time of PlaceWare in
2003, took a big bet on the provision of web conferencing and
sharing software.
This has been pretty successful through the newly-named
Live Meeting
- a solid second place behind
WebEx - even
though many users complain of difficulties in getting things set up
and working easily. However, this seems to be par for the course,
even for WebEx.
Cisco's purchase of WebEx means it now has both VoIP and web
conferencing capabilities with strong positions in the market. For
Cisco, this software as a service play is more core to its
strengths than Microsoft's Live Meeting equivalent.
Cisco's knowledge of networks, and of how to put in place
quality of service, means that WebEx's offering should rapidly
benefit from the acquisition. But beyond this, Cisco gets an extra
way to play VoIP: if Cisco makes VoIP available as an on-demand
service via an IP Centrex offering, we suddenly have a very
compelling offer to the small and mid-sized business market.
This has historically been Microsoft's home ground, where it has
been very successful in selling Exchange, Sharepoint and Live
Communications Server, especially when sold as a packaged part of
Microsoft's Small Business Server, or via hosting partners who
offer these products as an on-demand service.
Cisco, not so well-known in this environment, has been learning
fast.
Its acquisition of Linksys in 2003 gave it a consumer/small
office, home office brand that it has successfully pushed higher
into the SMB space. And it has used the experiences here to grow a
good understanding of this market.
By keeping the WebEx brand, Cisco can play this into the SMB
market without the preconceptions many have of Cisco being a
high-cost, large organisation supplier. Even within the large
organisations, WebEx is well-known enough that it should continue
to sell itself, and the Cisco backing should only breed greater
trust.
Another aspect then becomes the cost. Should Cisco be
adventurous through offering attractively priced all-you-can-eat
subscriptions or pay-as-you-go offerings, Microsoft would have to
fight back.
The resulting pricing war could be good news for users - even if
it would be bad news for others in the shared communication and
collaboration space, particularly for on-premise systems, where the
cost of acquisition is heavily outweighed by the cost of
maintenance and support.
Finally, there is the end-user experience. Although companies
such as
Skype have taken off successfully, many people either miss
having a telephone handset or go and buy a USB handset so that the
call feels more natural.
Microsoft may go down this route, but Cisco has a full range of
dedicated handsets that can integrate with the PC via standard
Ethernet connections.
These handsets range from the cheap Linksys One systems up to
full-colour executive handsets with web browsing capabilities -
something that mid-market and large organisations will be looking
for. Sure, Microsoft can link in these phones through Sip, but you
lose a degree of functionality that Cisco's system keeps.
It would seem that the gloves may well be coming off, even
though the forced smiles of a fading friendship may well look like
both sides have had large injections of Botox. Although now far
more competitive than we have seen for some time, both sides will
have to keep working with each other, as they are present in the
majority of shared accounts.
However, I believe that Cisco has taken the upper hand here, and
that the WebEx acquisition is inspired. To be able to pitch
directly against Live Meeting, and by timing the WebEx purchase
before Office Communications Server becomes generally available,
Cisco can plant the seeds of doubt in buyers' minds as to whether
it is worth looking at the Microsoft offering at all.
But Microsoft can never be written off, as has been shown many
times before. That Cisco may be a bigger challenge than Microsoft
has hitherto thought may just force it into faster action.
The communication and collaboration market is taking another
swing - and this falling out of friends should all be to the good
for the end-user.
How
Microsoft and Cisco collaborated to improve network security
>>Have your say
Do you agree with Clive Longbottom's views? If you have an opinion
about this or any article in Computer Weekly, e-mail
computer.weekly@rbi.c.uk