Why Old Telcos Are Embracing Direct Routing
We’ve talked a lot about the value of modernizing Voice with leveraging the benefits of Microsoft Teams. We’ve also talked about the merits and pitfalls of Direct Routing, how to create it as a service and why so many implementation fail.
12 months ago, virtually no one knew what Direct Routing was and selling the vision that SIPPIO created for Voice in Teams took a lot of effort, meetings and conversations trying to prove this was a viable line of business. I remember a certain CEO telling me ‘Teams will never take off’. Hmmm, hope he didn’t short the stock.
A year later, Direct Routing is a craze. It seems like everyone is cobbling together a solution by buying an SBC, using some string, a little putty and attaching a hefty professional services SOW. Since the solution is still nascent, there’s a very little expertise available in the marketplace so failed attempts are high.
About a month ago, the traditional telco PBX players started entering the world of Direct Routing. These guys figured out setting up Direct Routing for their solution with Teams might accomplish two things 1) Secure their legacy product footprint 2) Achieve the Teams checkbox.
Implementing Direct Routing in this manner causes us scratch our heads for a few reasons. First, why would you take a product designed entirely for the cloud native in Azure and push it back to earth. Next, they aren’t offering their customers the reduction of ongoing maintenance, cost and expense by gluing two solutions together. Finally, checking a box for Teams is simply that; an on paper answer with an app in an app.
As the world is working on finding the new normal, it’s time to really think about how create a more permanent plan to be agile, how to modernize the work experience and develop new lines of business because most organizations will have to reinvent themselves several times over in the coming years. Which means you shouldn’t be spending time and resources on a commodity.
If you have a legacy PBX, if you have Microsoft Teams, if you have struggled with Direct Routing or you are just curious about new, economical options for voice and meetings; we invite you to talk with our experts about what’s available in the marketplace today and what direction might be the best choice for you. We know Direct Routing and we built it as a true service by keeping it in the cloud.
No strings. No putty. No struggle.