Month’s ago most pundits torched UMI, Cisco’s high-end home telepresence offering.
They said it was too expensive. They said no-one would pay $24.95/month for video calling.
Oh and who were they supposed to call?
Yesterday, while flushing Flip down the toilet Cisco announced that UMI would be rolled into their business telepresence unit. I guess the pundits were right.
Or were they?
Cisco is a marketing machine. Anyone “in” the industry would’ve told you that UMI makes sense as a business product – not a consumer one.
But business products are boring. No one (even those selling) seem to care about them.
Consumer products? That’s the another story.
Launch a revolutionary new way to communication with friends and family right from the convenience of your own home? Now that’s going to get everyone talking.
Exactly what happened and though the overall reaction was perhaps not what Cisco had originally intended, it certainly made UMI a rather well known product.
The same would not have happened had it been a business product.
So like the marketing machine that is Cisco, they’ll take that initial awareness campaign, swallow their pride and deliver this solution into the small business.
Probably what they had planned to do anyways…
Not sure I agree with you on this one.
*Everyone* also knows what Cisco CIUS is, and this is a pure business product.
I think Cisco simply made a lot of noise of UMI, and priced it wrong, which got them the publicity around it.
“Cisco is a marketing machine”?? Are you serious? Yes, they made some commercials with Ellen Page regarding some of their products, but who exactly were they marketing those to? Consumers? Not a chance. Those represented by characters in the commercial? Really? Doctors are going to invest in that kind of gear just so they can be in Denmark on vacation? I don’t think so.
Sorry, man, but I have to seriously disagree with you here. Cisco is a network hardware company that seems to have forgotten its core business. It’s trying to be all things to all people and failing miserably in the process. It’s strength now lies solely in its market position (not unlike Microsoft).
I’ve always stated and continue to believe Cisco’s core business is networking hardware. Anything outside that sphere, including software to manage that networking gear, is NOT their strength and distracts them from what they should be focusing on. Ever USED CiscoWorks? Ever seen the UI for Cisco Unified Communication Manager? Powerful? Absolutely. User friendly? Not a chance. CUCM is great for Fortune 100 companies, but it’s total overkill for 98% of the VoIP market out there. CUCM Business Edition, aimed at SMBs, is painful when you consider cost/features/usability to almost any Asterisk or other FLOSS telephony engine based product such as Cudatel.
Cisco bought Flip in an apparent attempt to get into an emerging consumer market. They got torpedoed by Apple just a few months later releasing a Nano that did everything iPods did, was much thinner, AND did video… FOR THE SAME PRICE. Which to buy… oooh, tough decision. Did Cisco have the Flip folks improve their product or noticeably drop the price to truly differentiate it? Apparently not well enough.
As for UMI, you have GOT to be kidding. It was dead technology before, and they’re only going to have a tougher time selling it now. You honestly think small businesses look to Cisco for solutions?? Small businesses look to do as much for as little as possible, and Cisco is NOT known for this. They not only charge you for product (e.g., take a CallManager Express router config), but then also stick you for maintenance if you want updates on the software or firmware for the phones, etc. Odds are they’ll do the same with UMI. Compare that with most other solutions, where firmware updates/etc. for hardware are available typically for free (though in all cases, the onus is on the buyer to find/install those updates), and maintenance contracts for other PBX solutions are much cheaper.
Heck, used to be we referred to Cisco’s gear as “weapons grade”. We’ve seen their routers and switches operate in some inhospitable environments. But now the quality control seems to have even gone out of their hardware. We’ve replaced three Cisco 79xx series phones in the last 5 months, and not one due to something like being dropped or thrown. The one phone I recall breaking due to a fall fell 3′ onto a carpeted floor. Not exactly “weapons grade”. My personal Grandstream GXP2000 and Yealink T28P, on the other hand, have suffered far worse fates and been none the worse for wear.
I’m even having my doubts about Cisco buying Linksys. I’ve used Linksys routers for years, but the last 3 I’ve bought (two version of the WRT54GS and one WRT160N), all after Cisco slapped their name on the product line, have suffered from the wireless portion dropping out, apparently due to heat. Yep, after all this time, they still can’t get heat dissipation right. So even the consumer product line they own is showing poor quality control.
Sorry, but if you expect me to believe UMI is going anywhere other than extremely niche applications, I can’t.
@ Frank
Yes I am serious. Your response only furthers my point; if all their gear is soo bad and they’re such a miserable failure how come people are still buying millions worth of their products when better alternatives exist? Marketing.
We sell millions of dollars worth of Cisco solutions into the small in small business each year. Small businesses are looking to Cisco for solutions. Just think, which would you buy if you new nothing about VoIP? Yealink, Grandstream or Cisco….
And despite what you think, both Flip and UMI are about Cisco’s core business; the network. You see the only way Cisco truly wins, since they are a core networking company, is when more is needed from the core network.
(I.E. you don’t upgrade or expand your network unless there is a reason.)
More is only needed from the core network when there are more bits and bytes to pass. What types of bit and bytes are typically the largest?
Video streams!
Exactly what Flip and UMI are centered around – video on the network. The premise behind these purchases were to increase the amount of traffic on network such that folks had to upgrade.
The more people streaming video and using video conferencing the more stress on the network. The more stress the more urgency to upgrade.
UMI is a great fit for the SMB. There is no SMB video conferencing product out there that is simple, easy and affordable. At $249, plus $10/m for service UMI is affordable for any business.
UMI will find a home in the SMB.
@ Frank
I’m not arguing. The only reason I’m continuing to post is that you are continuing to prove my point.
Cisco is a marketing machine. You say that Cisco products are crap or inferior. Then people must be buying them due to well, the name.
(No competitive alternative is BS.)
Name and brand recognition go back to marketing. So in reality they are buying the marketing.
To the technician (which I believe you are), working at a publicly funded university (which I believe you do), I would say to you too, “stick to what you know.”
Your position, the network you work on AND the resources you have at your disposal for said network is VASTLY different than ALL of the small business networks I speak of in aggregate. Comparing what your concerns are, what technology you are looking for, etc is like comparing the New York Yankees to my nephews little league team.
Video and voice are what’s driving new networking sales in small medium business. Enterprises, universities, sure it might be features and functions. But I was never talking about that.
Tell ya what. Let’s wait a year and then you let me know how many UMIs have been sold and what % of the market they are. I’d ask that you let me know how many you’ve sold, but apparently you don’t sell them. So either you don’t (or can’t) put your money where your mouth is, or Cisco is going it alone. If it’s the former (don’t), case closed. If it’s the latter, I’ll even put money on it (though then I’ll ask for independent verification of your sources, as if you’re relying on the vendor to tell you how well their product is selling, don’t think so). Again, Cisco may have brand recognition, but that alone won’t sell product. See my earlier post.
Keep in mind, I’m all for more usage like this. I just don’t think Cisco has the marketing chops to make this fly anywhere but niche markets. SMB in general? Why would anyone bother? The only companies I’ve seen put a dent in videoconferencing at that level are Apple with iChat AV and now FaceTime, and Skype. Again, NOT niche markets like law firms which might use Polycoms, Tandbergs, or similar. (Or high end ones which might use that fancy Cisco videoconferencing package they’ve done so well marketing in product placement ads in movies and series like “24″. But that stuff is clearly aimed at enterprise, and your initial post was about “small business.”)
Anyway, only time will tell. I’m hopeful if someone does manage to capture the SMB market’s attention in a large way that it’s a technology built on some kind of open standard, but that’s another issue entirely.
[Oh, and regarding earlier post, seriously, sorry about the crap formatting. Had that blockquote tag done all wrong. Seriously wish this blog would just do the quoting for you, or let you re-edit a post, or even just see a preview before posting, but ah well. My bad.]