Make Way for Microsoft

"Because you're reusing things like Active Directory and Exchange, the solutions will also be cheaper to operate," he said. "We believe we will fundamentally change the economics of the communications space."

Solution providers in the unified communications market, particularly those working with other vendors, are bracing for the Microsoft impact.

"Anybody that ignores that company does so at their own peril," said Mark Essayian, owner of KME Systems, a VoIP solution provider in Lake Forest, Calif. "Microsoft is going to be a big contender."

Microsoft's success in the market is by no means a given, however, Essayian said.

"They've entered a few arenas and fallen down, but I don' think they will with this," he said. "Microsoft can be an even bigger competitor than Cisco [Systems], but I don't know that customers will want to implement Microsoft [unified communications] systems at the 300- to 400-seat level."

Steve Marks, president and general manager of Starnet Data Design, a solution provider in Westlake Village, Calif., has a dimmer view of Microsoft's prospects, particularly in the midmarket.

"I think it's going to be a struggle for them, honestly," Marks said. "I don't know that SMBs will have enough staff to support it."

The leg up that Microsoft's unified communications competitors have is that they are already entrenched in the market, according to Essayian.

"The 3Coms and Ciscos of the world understand that they have to stay ahead of the competition. Microsoft has to catch up," Essayian said.

That's exactly the point Cisco makes when laying out reasons why it thinks it's got Microsoft beat.

"We've got unmatched experience in VoIP and unified communications," said Richard McLeod, director of unified communications solutions for worldwide channels at Cisco, San Jose, Calif.

He also pointed to the breadth and depth of Cisco's end-to-end offerings, and the blood, sweat and tears Cisco has expended to build up a support infrastructure around VoIP.

As they butt heads in the unified communications space, there are two things that Cisco and Microsoft seem to agree on. One is that customers expect and demand technologies from the two companies to interoperate. The other is that someone has to put all of these pieces together, meaning that the channel's collective star is on the rise.

In practical terms, smoother technical interoperability between Microsoft and Cisco opens new opportunities for VARs, said one joint partner attending a late August press appearance by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Cisco Chairman and CEO John Chambers to tout their collaborative work.

"We want to have people do lots of voice communication from within our software. I hope most of it runs through our back-end infrastructure, but I suspect some of it will also run through Cisco's," said Ballmer at the event. "We will have that level of interoperability."