With equipment providers embracing Unified Messaging (UM) technology, UM and UM-capable seats will continue to grow while traditional voice mail systems will disappear from the market by the end of 2009, reports In-Stat. UM/UM-capable shipments will rise from 8.4 million seats in 2005 to 11.7 million seats in 2010, the high-tech market research firm says. UM is also beginning to grow beyond traditional voice mail, PC-based e-mail, and fax messaging.
Annual end-user revenues from UM/UM-capable equipment will rise from $506.4 million in 2005 to $628.6 million by 2010. While Avaya continues to hang on to the top position relative to the overall market, Nortel became the UM leader in 2005. New IP architectures put Microsoft and other large data players even more squarely in the middle of the communications picture.