Monday, August 04, 2014

Broadsoft Explained

On Voiceops there has been an on-going discussion thread about Broadsoft - versus other platforms like Metaswitch and Asterisk; wholesalers; and Broadsoft's own offerings.


The person who started the thread is not happy with his current white-label provider because it isn't current or complete (meaning all the bells and whistles). Personally, I think that all the bells and whistles are nice IF your customers will buy them AND IF your sales team can sell them. For probably 85% of customers, a basic Broadsoft deployment will work.


To expect a white-label platform to be your be-all, end-all is kind of ridiculous. White-label is foremost about a stable platform, uptime and ease of use/ordering/support. That doesn't lend itself to upgrades often.


There are a bunch of confusing brand names for the services that BSFT sells. Here is they are:


BroadSoft - the company
BroadWorks - the software that BroadSoft write
BroadCloud - a cloud deployment of BroadWorks wrapped with a BSS/OSS system operated by BroadSoft. It includes a series of products (e.g. IM&P, SMS, PacketSmart, PBX) some of which can be used by BroadWorks customers (e.g. SMS and IM&P) and some of which offer an alternative to buying BroadWorks.
BroadTouch - a brand for a group of clients written by BroadSoft integrated with BroadWorks and available on BroadCloud
UC One - a branded bundle of BroadTouch software and BroadWorks services that provides a specific user experience.
BTW, there are 7 instances of UC-One on the Google store.

"BroadCloud has a very specific target market - it's designed to be a "standardised" deployment of BroadWorks coupled with Rialto, a "quote to cash" provisioning system (Broadsoft's marketing material)."


I understand not wanted to make the half-million dollar investment plus hiring the engineer who has to make the softswitch work. I have seen where service providers just can't get it done. Yet if you want full control of the servcie you offer, how else can you do it?


On the other hand, there are enough white-label providers in the US for Asterisk, Metaswitch and Broadsoft that you have a lot to choose from.


More on UC-One today from BSFT. "BroadSoft Introduces UC-One Hospitality, enabled by acquisition of SDD. BroadSoft has acquired SDD, a services provider to many of the largest and most prominent global hotels." [bsft]>/p>

No comments: