Unified comms market to explode

The unified communications (UC) market is set to boom in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) over the next three years, according to an analyst firm.

The market will be worth $16.6 billion by 2015, up from $5.7 billion in 2010, IDC predicted.

"IDC predicts a compound annual growth rate of around 23.7 per cent in the next five years and believes that the impact of the credit crunch and rumors of a double-dip recession make enterprises more cautious when deciding whether or not to invest in new IT equipment across the EMEA region," said Isabel Montero, senior research analyst for unified communications and collaboration for IDC EMEA.

"Budgets in this region will continue to be more closely monitored and unemployment levels continue to increase across the region."

The UK will have the second most valuable UC market in Western Europe, one place behind France and one in front of Germany.

Richard Ellis, director at IT services company 2e2, said the figures showed companies are still betting on UC, even though they are being cautious in other areas of IT.

"It's the need for businesses to cut costs that is driving this with UC enabling real estate consolidation and improved business process efficiency," he said.

"The challenge for a lot of businesses is to fully realise the business benefits of the technology."