Products Solutions Partners Network Resources Support Contact Portals Resources / Unify Unify UCaaS crucial in coronavirus era The coronavirus has been a monumental catalyst for change in the way we all work, as ofﬁces, warehouses and high streets remain empty across the country. How businesses communicate and operate has had to evolve at lighting speed, fueled by remote working. What would have taken years to articulate has occurred in as many weeks, with uniﬁed communications now becoming a lifeline for organisations. This is set to continue. “In the last two months we’ve seen a vast increase in deployment. Companies are upgrading their solutions to include full, uniﬁed communications. Bringing video and audio conferencing, desktop sharing, data access, with both ﬁxed-line telephony and mobile, integrated together under one roof,” explains Alan Mackie, Chief Marketing and Product Ofﬁcer for Gamma, a leader in uniﬁed communications. “Access to an organisation’s resources remotely via the cloud isn’t a nice to have anymore, it’s vital if companies are to survive beyond the pandemic. Right now, business continuity is at the top of everyone’s agenda. Communications with clients and collaboration between workers must carry on unhindered if companies are to thrive. Staying connected, but apart, is crucial.” Unified communications are the new essentials With more than 49 per cent of the UK workforce now working from home, according to the Ofﬁce for National Statistics, employees are demanding new ways of doing business. Zoom and Microsoft Teams, both US imports, are now household names. Yet one British ﬁrm is underpinning this huge shift in how we work, providing tools and services that are keeping the economy running and communicating during unprecedented times. Gamma has more than six million business users in the UK alone. We’re providing support to NHS trusts and central government in Whitehall, major banks and super-markets, including many high street retail brands, large enterprises. Behind the scenes “We’re the uniﬁed communications company few have heard of, in part because we mainly sell through a larger network of resale partners. Yet behind the scenes we’re providing support to NHS trusts and central government in Whitehall, major banks and super-markets, including many high street retail brands, large enterprises and over 140,000 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We’ve been doing so since 2006, but never before have we seen such a shift in consciousness.” “Many are now looking for ﬂexibility because the future is uncertain and the landscape for business operations requires an agile and nimble approach. The good news is how employees work in an ofﬁce can now be easily replicated when everyone is dispersed remotely, with little constraint in terms of access to resources and communications, both internally and externally. Such is the power of uniﬁed communications as a service, or UCaaS.* Businesses will need to integrate all their communication and collaboration tools into the bigger business picture. This allows business leaders to direct their effort going forwards “We’re seeing not only a convergence of touchpoints – mobile, video, sales calls and CRM – but also data. This allows business leaders to direct their effort going forwards. UCaaS via the cloud is particularly useful when it comes to managing people and gauging productivity. That’s why we’ve seen demand grow,” says Mackie from Gamma, which is also active in the Netherlands and Spain, and is expanding elsewhere in Europe. “More companies are now looking at staff efﬁciencies. As we start to emerge from the pandemic and face a harsh economic reality, the C-suite will want to know how effective teams are in supporting customers and the business, especially with more ﬂexible working. Therefore, they’ll need to see assets all in one place and analyse them with the latest reporting tools.” The main challenge, particularly for smaller businesses, will be getting new customers Vast numbers of companies have had to move to a digital-ﬁrst approach. With shuttered stores and no in-person sales visits, the shift to online has fast-forwarded many into what they thought was the future. A recent survey by Gamma of 400 IT decision-makers found only 18 per cent of UK businesses are thriving in the digital age, while 79 per cent agree getting business communications – telephony, mobile and network services – right makes the difference between surviving and thriving. Omnichannel communications is also a greater issue now and not just for bigger businesses “This was before lockdown. The move towards integrated digital communications and collaboration is now on steroids. The competition is going to be ﬁerce going forward. Everyone will have to work harder to get new customers or keep their existing ones and do it remotely. It’s not just your business that’s changed the way it works, but everybody else’s has as well. The latest tools will be crucial,” says Mackie, adding that Gamma has one of the largest ﬁxed-line telephony networks in the UK and was AIM Company Of The Year in 2018. Omnichannel communications is also a greater issue now and not just for bigger businesses and those in retail. SMEs in business-to-business sectors are seeing a shift as well. Sales can come from Facebook Messenger or Whatsapp, a web post or chatbots. Only having a ﬁxed telephone line as a point of contact is not enough for many organisations. Everyone wants to communicate how they want to communicate “Everyone wants to communicate how they want to communicate. The challenge is how do you gather all that information together and have a single source of truth for the customer, when it comes via multiple channels? How do you support businesses that have to communicate in many different ways? They need to be able to deal with every request and cannot afford to lose any leads, especially post-coronavirus. This is where UCaaS comes in,” says Mackie. “If businesses don’t have uniﬁed communications in place, it’s best to do an audit ﬁrst. What are your needs? Where are you today? Where do you want to be in the future? Finding the right uniﬁed comms partner is crucial. Everyone needs to make the right investment in these challenging times. The future is already here.” Read more from Unify. .st0 { fill: #6800D2; } Gamma Group About us Products Microsoft Teams Telephony Horizon Business Phone System Horizon Collaborate Platform Horizon SME Contact Centre Enterprise Contact Centre SIP Trunking and Call Management Inbound Call Routing PhoneLine+ Landline Replacement Gamma Mobile Advanced Network Services Gamma SoGEA Gamma Access Why Gamma? 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