CSC Plunges into CaaS to Widen Its Appeal

| Dec 23, 2009 | Managed IT Services | Competitive Intelligence Report

| Analyst: Amy Larsen DeCarlo

Current Perspective: Positive
Vendor Importance: High
Market Impact: High

Event Summary

December 14, 2009 – CSC is launching its new managed Unified Communications (UC) as a Service (UCaaS) offer. CSC supports a delivery models for UC including premises-based, CSC-hosted or hybrid hosted/on customer premises. CSC supports telephony, messaging and collaboration platforms including Microsoft OCS and Outlook, IBM Lotus Sametime, WebEx, and Avaya Contact Center. The IT solution provider will offer a common user experience across all these platforms, delivering capabilities such as hot desking, click to call, click to conference and seamless call transfer (e.g., from desk to mobile), and UC integration with business applications (e.g., ERP, SCM, CRM).

Analytical Summary

• Current Perspective: Positive on CSC’s new Unified Communications (UC) offer, because the IT solution provider's approach should appeal to a broad client base. CSC is delivering UC as a packaged cross-platform, managed service. The service mixes a predictable and affordable per-seat pricing model with a tailored approach that incorporates UC functions directly into customers' business applications. This tight integration between collaboration and business applications should help enterprises compress and improve their processes.

• Vendor Importance: High to CSC, because the provider's UC solution gives customers a lower cost alternative to customized services by relying on a foundation built on standardized managed and utility services to customers. The company can reach a much wider prospect pool of enterprise clients than its traditional base with high margin services.

• Market Impact: High on the managed UC segment, because the company’s expertise designing, building and managing integrated unified communications and collaboration (UCC) have made the company very competitive for the highest-end customers. CSC can win more mass appeal if it can turn its experience integrating complex heterogeneous applications into a more packaged approach. This will make the IT solution provider more of a threat in the competition for a broader base of enterprise accounts while still delivering the necessary capabilities to support the requirements of its existing customer base.

CLIENTS ONLY

Current Perspective

Competitive Positives and Concerns

Recommended Vendor Actions

| Client access - Full report in Managed IT Services | More information

Recommended Competitor Actions

• Competitors should take note that CSC has developed a packaged UCC service that could apply down-market from very large enterprise customers. CSC's diverse UC solutions can be a real threat in this space. While CSC will be challenged to move down-market, rivals should educate their top-tier enterprise sales forces on the company’s capabilities, and its gaps, while emphasizing their own strengths in supporting this customer base.

• IT solution providers such as Accenture and IBM should depict CSC as having solid experience serving large customers in certain verticals but lacking the scale, the support structure or channel partners to leave its comfort zone.

• Global carrier rivals such as AT&T, BT Global Services, Orange Business Services and Verizon Business should deflect any comparison to their UC services to CSC’s offers. Instead, they should emphasize their native telephony strength and the ability their global network reach gives them to support multinational clients with cost-effective UCC solutions.

Recommended End User / Customer Actions

• Prospective large enterprise clients that want a managed UCC solution but don’t require a full-scale outsourced solution should take a closer look at what CSC is offering today – and what deliverables the company has planned in the near future.

CLIENTS ONLY

Current Perspective

Competitive Positives and Concerns

Recommended Vendor Actions

| Client access - Full report in Managed IT Services | More information

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