HP and Polycom team up on unified comms

HP's partnership with Polycom pits it against Cisco

HP has announced plans to partner with Polycom to deliver voice and visual communication systems which the pair claim will simplify communications and speed up collaboration.

HP will offer Polycom's integrated voice and video offerings on Avaya and Microsoft unified communications (UC) systems as part of its UC and collaboration (UC&C) offerings.

The move comes after Cisco dropped HP as one of its distributor partners, and pits the former allies against each other in the growing UC arena.

HP has also launched new services that it said will help firms simplify and integrate business communications at lower costs.

A new Strategic Architecture Service will help speed up delivery while reducing risk and technology redundancies, according to HP, and a Business Benefits Workshop will help firms identify the business case for UC&C technologies and ensure they deliver on expected benefits.

HP has also introduced a Network Equipment Technologies (NET) service that integrates the NET VX Series UC gateway into the HP and Microsoft UC&C systems to simplify management, and streamline messaging, video and voice communications, the firm said.

Mark Golden, vice president of network services at HP, claimed that the new offerings will help clients work more efficiently to maximise investment returns and meet technology and business objectives.

"A unified, connected and collaborative environment can speed up business processes, improve customer responsiveness and simplify operations to reduce costs," he said.

HP also announced that it will work with product safety testing and certification firm Underwriters Laboratories on a two-year project to standardise processes and technologies.

HP claimed that by using Underwriters Laboratories' Virtual Workplace system connected through the HP UC&C infrastructure firms could communicate with clients irrespective of medium or device.