After completing its purchase of Nortel Enterprise Solutions (Nortel), Avaya unveiled its road maps for portfolios comprised of Avaya and Nortel products. Gartner analyzes these road maps and provides guidance for current and future customers.

• Avaya support for Nortel customers meets generally accepted industry practices.
• Avaya's implementation of software support and upgrade policies consistent with its own products and industry standards could increase or decrease costs for certain Nortel customers.
• The Avaya Aura platform will evolve to support Avaya and Nortel SIP phones, have a common user interface, and enable sharing SIP-based applications. Avaya IP Office will evolve to support specific telephones and features from Avaya and Nortel products for small or midsize businesses (SMBs).
• Avaya's next contact center offer will be comprised of Nortel Contact Center 7 and Avaya Contact Center components.
• Nortel's data networking products will be supported and sold by the expanded network of Avaya and Nortel dealers.
• Nortel Agile Communication Environment platform, which leverages its service-oriented architecture (SOA), will deliver enterprisewide, communications-enabled business process (CEBP) applications, unified communications (UC) and contact center applications.

• When buying Avaya for new implementations, choose its long-term products whenever possible, such as Avaya Aura and Avaya IP Office.
• Continue Communication Server 1000 (CS 1000) and Call Center Elite (CC Elite) investments when small or midsize adds and upgrades are needed, and for reuse of phones.
• SL100 users should consider upgrading to the CS 2100 to leverage Avaya's long-term road map, and to allow for significant component reuse.
• SMB branch office and contact center users should consider Avaya solutions that match current investments, as well as those from other vendors.
• Enterprises using Nortel data products should continue to consider Avaya solutions that match their current investments. Prospects should consider Avaya and alternate vendors.

Avaya’s announced road maps for Nortel Enterprise Solutions products should relieve a great deal of customer anxiety, especially for users of the CS 1000, CS 2100, Agile Communications Environment and Contact Center 7. Solutions will benefit from Avaya support that will extend for six years beyond end-of-sale dates, and customers will be notified at least nine months before these dates become effective. The clear road maps Avaya has provided should help clients make better decisions on new communications investments. With the exception of the Multimedia Communication Server 5100 (MCS 5100) and Nortel Multimedia Conferencing (NMC) products, which will reach end-of-sale status at the end of 2010, no other products will be end-of-sale in 2010.

On 18 December 2009, Avaya completed its acquisition of Nortel, which it had won at auction three months earlier. At the time the auction was held, Avaya announced that, within a month of closing the deal, it would lay out road maps for the Nortel products and their further evolution within Avaya's offerings.

On 19 January 2010, Avaya released road maps for a new Avaya product portfolio comprised of Avaya products, Nortel products and, in some instances, a blend of products for each product category.

Before this acquisition, Avaya and Nortel both offered complete product portfolios that included Internet Protocol (IP) telephony for enterprises and SMBs, as well as contact center, messaging, and conferencing solutions. Now that the acquisition is complete, the duplication across these product lines requires product mergers and rationalization. This is not a simple task, since the products of both vendors offer the functionality and scalability to support large, midsize and small organizations. Avaya's decision making regarding data solution products was likely easier, as Nortel also had a full data portfolio, which Avaya lacked.

Avaya's product road maps include product life cycle policies that provide clear timelines regarding future sale and support. Figure 1 provides a summary.

In general, Avaya will support essentially all products in UC, contact center and SMBs for at least six years from the time it ceases to sell them, which Gartner believes is a reasonable life span. Avaya Data Solutions will be supported for five years. However, as products move to extended support, customers can likely expect increased services and support costs, as Avaya seeks to migrate customers quickly to current products.

The market acceptance that Avaya Aura and Session Manager have gained since their 2009 introductions makes them prominent solutions in Avaya's long-term plans. Because the Avaya Aura software platform can integrate some of Nortel’s software capabilities, Nortel’s Agile Communications Environment Web services product will be used to accelerate growth of applications for enterprisewide CEBP, UC and contact center solutions.

Current CS 1000 users will be able to add new lines and new systems. Release 7 of the CS 1000 will likely become available in 2011, with support continuing through 2017. Afterward, the upgrade path will be to Avaya Aura, which will support Avaya and Nortel SIP phones with a common user interface and can share SIP applications. In this way, Nortel handsets can be reused if the telephony application is migrated to Avaya Aura. It might also make sense for Avaya IP phones to be supported on the CS 1000, so existing CS 1000 customers could add Avaya IP phones knowing they could be used when migrating to Avaya Aura. Meridian 1 users will need to upgrade to CS 1000 Release 6 to stay on this road map or evolve to Avaya Aura today.

The CS 2100 is a specialized offer targeted at organizations with many thousands of users who require a carrier-grade Class 5 solution (e.g., the U.S. government). Customers will be able to add new lines and receive support through 2017. Nortel’s SIP-based Application Server 5300 (AS 5300) capabilities are available for CS 2100 users requiring secure communications with encryption for IP telephony, conferencing, unified messaging and instant messaging. In the longer term, Avaya will merge AS 5300 technology into Avaya Aura. SL100 users will need to upgrade to CS 2100 SE13 to stay on this road map.

Nortel Converged Office is an outcome from the Innovative Communications Alliance (ICA) that Nortel had with Microsoft. The ICA agreement ended on 18 December 2009. Current users of Converged Office will be supported in a manner corresponding to that described for the CS 1000. In addition, we expect Avaya to develop new capabilities that will increase its differentiation in the UC market.

MCS 5100 and NMC are the only Nortel UC products that will reach end-of-sale status in 2010, since Avaya Meeting Exchange supports audio, video and multivendor Web collaboration capabilities. Avaya has also specified that any future end-of-sale announcements for any product will come with at least nine months' notice; after that, customers will receive six more years of support. Based on the Avaya life cycle, six more years of life can be expected from these products.

We believe that MCS 5100 and NMS customers should take this opportunity to revisit their UC strategies, and to look at the bigger picture and what products should be part of it.

Nortel's CallPilot unified messaging application and Avaya Modular Messaging will evolve to a new unified messaging platform that will support CallPilot, Meridian Mail, Modular Messaging and Octel user interfaces. The first release, scheduled for late 2010, will support CallPilot/Meridian Mail prompts. Users of Meridian Mail (already discontinued) will need to upgrade to CallPilot 5.0 or Avaya Modular Messaging to stay on the road map.

Numerous SMB offers include Nortel's Business Communications Manager (BCM) and Norstar, as well as Avaya's IP Office, Partner, and Integral 5 (sold only in Germany). In the midmarket Avaya Aura is also available. Avaya plans to evolve IP Office to support phones from all these offers, because the latest version of Avaya IP Office includes improved modularity, capacity and resiliency. Since this is evolutionary, BCM and Norstar are still being sold, with Avaya committing to no end-of-sale announcements for SMB Nortel products through 30 September 2010. With Avaya planning another BCM release for late 2010, Nortel dealers should have time to gain proficiency with the Avaya SMB portfolio.

The Nortel Software Communication System 500 (SCS 500) product, a SIP software-based solution, will be the sole product for customers who want to manage UC that is integrated in their data networks. This is a new SMB product type for Avaya, targeted at IT-centric, rather than telephony-centric, buyers, and will require a good deal of market development.

Components of Nortel Contact Center 7 and Avaya Contact Center Solutions will evolve to form the company’s Next Generation Context Center (NGCC) offer, supporting a consistent software platform and code base for midsize and large enterprises requiring voice-only or multimedia contact center functionality. Avaya’s strategy is to have contact center services executing in the application layer of the Avaya Aura SIP architecture, allowing it to evolve independently from the underlying voice and video communications switching infrastructure.

Contact Center 7 will evolve as the core contact center applications platform, providing strong support for PBX interoperability, multichannel reporting, multichannel agent desktop, open SOA interfaces and SIP capabilities. Contact Center 7 will evolve to support Avaya Contact Center Solutions reporting and routing capabilities.

In 2010, NGCC will be positioned for "greenfield" SIP deployments, upgrades for Nortel Contact Centers, and as an adjunct for Avaya CC Elite customers, replacing Avaya's Contact Center Express (CCE) as the primary offer for midmarket contact centers. Avaya will continue to support existing CCE customers, and plans another software release on the product. Avaya CC Elite and Interaction Center (IC) will continue to be sold. Avaya’s Intelligent Customer Routing (ICR) offers one of several transition steps to NGCC. In 2011, NGCC will be the product path for the Nortel contact center base and enterprise contact centers. Traditional Avaya contact center customers will still be able to purchase CC Elite and IC solutions as extensions of existing systems, and as upgrades to older systems, but NGCC will be the lead solution for new customers and sites. Beyond 2011, Avaya expects to sell NGCC as its primary contact center offer for midsize and large contact centers, while providing incentives for users of CC Elite, IC and ICR to migrate to the NGCC offer.

The Avaya Voice Portal (AVP) platform will be enhanced by technology from the Nortel portfolio, and will evolve to become a key element of the NGCC solution by providing a single, consistent environment for routing self-service and assisted-service contacts based on AVP's development tools. Existing Nortel customers will have access to Nortel's Interactive Communications Portal and Media Processing Server offerings in the near term. However, users will be provided incentives and application extensions to migrate to the AVP as a step toward the NGCC offering.

One of Nortel's most-significant assets has been its loyal base of customers for enterprise LAN switching and data networking. Others include the product family's resiliency and efficient design. Avaya must clearly commit and communicate its level of investments in a rapidly consolidating market to shift customers' perceptions in technology and marketing to demonstrate why these qualities matter.

The acquisition gives Avaya products in five core areas:

• The stackable LAN switching products are strong, but Avaya must demonstrate it understands emerging data center networking technologies, and must deliver a major upgrade to its core switching product when the new Virtual Services Platform (VSP) 9000 arrives later in 2010.
• Wireless LAN (WLAN) is another area of concern, due to many changes in past strategies. However, in 2010, Avaya plans to bring to market the WLAN 8100 Series, its own in-house-built 802.11n WLAN solution.
• Nortel's branch router platform has limited market presence.
• The access control product is interesting, but requires more investment in network security to establish a market presence.
• Avaya and other smaller players will have difficulty gaining enterprise confidence over larger, well-funded rivals. However, Avaya's plan to implement a dedicated data sales team and improve compensation on data sales for all channels may help.

Nortel's services will be merged into Avaya Global Services (AGS) and organized into three current groups: Professional Services, Support Services and Managed Services. Depending on the services' competency of the partner, a partner may resell an AGS-branded service, or may sell its own brand of service, backed by Avaya. Current AGS leadership will lead the new combined services organization.

A major change for Nortel customers will be Avaya's implementation of software support charges, and discontinuation of Nortel's time and material support. Gartner estimates the additional annual cost of software support and upgrades for CS 1000 customers will be from $40 to $50 per user.

Avaya has done a very good job mapping out its plans for IP telephony and UC products. However, the road for SMB and contact center solutions could present product migration and interoperability detours. Avaya customers and prospects should create a long-term vision and road map for their communications investments, and scrutinize how well Avaya is delivering on its evolution plans.

The road maps Avaya has provided should help clients make better decisions on new communications investments. As part of any product decision, there are considerations like cost, functionality and usable life. However, as organizations review Avaya purchases that consist of “midterm products” that we know will eventually evolve to Avaya platforms, such as the CS 1000, CallPilot, BCM and Avaya CC Elite, they should consider the following scenarios:

• For small or medium requirements expanding current midterm products, consider upgrades and don't discard existing systems.
• Consider midterm products for small and branch offices if the majority of locations are midterm products, such as BCM, especially if there is current internal expertise, a desire to reuse phones or it represents a small percent of the network.
• In certain installations with Meridian 1 or older CS 1000 systems, consider an upgrade to allow for a significant reuse of components and phones.

With a minimum six-year life span for new installations of what we have called "midterm products," we strongly recommend that enterprises consider depreciating the cost over a maximum of four years or less. In all these scenarios, we recommend looking at Avaya's long-term products, as well as other vendors' solutions. Many customers that have remained true to Nortel during the past year did so because they had huge investments, and the cost to migrate would have been significant. We believe there is still no reason to run from these midterm products. However, when decision points occur, such as those involving new locations, growth to existing systems, upgrades, etc., clients need to consider options that extend the use of midterm products or upgrades to Avaya's long-term products (such as Avaya Aura), as well as alternate vendor solutions.