Love them or hate them, if you’re in the business of providing any kind of IT solution you probably work around Microsoft in some way. As one of the largest tech conglomerates of the past couple generations, the thinking that you have to play well with Microsoft or one of their main competitors in the IT space is firmly baked in, because of course you do…they’re Microsoft.
But as Teams firmly plants its feet in the communications sector, a lot of providers, vendors and resellers are feeling the brunt of the disruptive moves that Microsoft are making, after all why wouldn’t they? Historically telco and IT have always been orbiting each other, but more often that not have also always had some distance between them. From the speeds at which they move, to the ways in which they think and behave, at a glance the two industries seem almost fully incompatible.
With this being said, the convergence of voice and IT that we’ve been seeing for the past few years has already broken down a lot of barriers to get where it is today. General ways of thinking across the globe have come around to the notion that when voice and IT are used in tandem, magical things can happen. A good chunk of providers are either ignoring this change or approaching it from the wrong direction, causing friction in their product strategies, but what these providers don’t know is that becoming a part of the business communications revolution is neither complex nor expensive - All you have to do is let everyone else do the hard work for you.
To be a little less cryptic, integrating into Microsoft lets you get the best of both worlds. If the PSTN enabled side of Teams continues to grow (and all signs are pointing towards it doing so) then you have an established avenue in which to sell your services. If Teams growth falters, you’re still appealing to a customer base that totals in the hundreds of millions with very little commitment on your end. Either way, and most importantly, you’re the one giving people what they want.
From getting an easy win to adding an extra layer onto what you can give your customers, leveraging the native power of Teams has a range of upsides. But why exactly should Teams integration be the way forward for you and how can this impact your current approach?
We get it, nobody wants to put even a small part of their roadmap in the hands of an external entity, no matter how prestigious, powerful or successful that entity is. We would all rather have the time, money, expertise and foresight to develop everything in-house, but the fact remains that this is near impossible at scale. Case and point even businesses like Microsoft rely on external providers to keep Teams telephony ticking – external providers like you.
If you’re looking at Microsoft with the mindset that they are overtaking the communications market then your thinking is wrong. Microsoft are relying on the voice providers of the world, providers like you, to work with them to bring telephony into the world’s most popular UC platform. This is why you need to at least be thinking about integrating your services into Teams, because if you’re not already, your competition are.
You may now also be thinking about the impact that integrating into Teams may have on your core product set, your brand identity and the future of your roadmap, all of which are a big part of the why equation. Becoming a part of the Microsoft Teams communication ecosystem doesn’t mean you have to give up on your trajectory or completely rehash your positioning. All of this is due to a number of factors:
Direct Routing as a Service (DRaaS) is one way that providers and resellers are using the power of Teams to reduce churn. If we take 8x8 as an example you can see exactly how this works in practice.
Leaning into the power of Microsoft Teams Phone used to be quite a difficult thing to do. Early forms of Direct Routing required a lot of investment and maintenance, calling plans were limited and the Operator Connect marketplace was just finding its feet. You’ll be happy to hear however that in terms of progress, the Teams Phone ecosystem has come on leaps and bounds. Now boasting a 99.999% uptime SLA and over 23,000,000 voice enabled users (who are almost half made up of those using third party providers), the Teams phone ecosystem is set to become one of the most dominant forms of business communications that the world has ever seen.
Depending on how you’re looking to use Teams Phone to your advantage, there are a few options available, but one of the best pathways available is Direct Routing. As I briefly touched upon before, Direct Routing allows you to tap into the power of Microsoft with very little risk or investment if leveraged correctly, and it can even be woven into your existing portfolio of products.
As more and more features and capabilities become commoditized in the modern market, its difficult to differentiate (and that’s putting it lightly). But with Direct Routing you can bring an extra level of service that not only eliminates a massive threat in Microsoft but also turns that threat into one of your biggest strengths. By acting as a bridge between Microsoft Teams and an existing phone system, you can get your customers set up to have their entire communications stack within their preferred platform and play a massive part in their voice strategy moving forward.
The key to playing well with Teams isn’t a secret, and you shouldn’t be viewing Teams as a threat. Because of the overwhelming presence of Microsoft and an over-reliance on the way in which things have always been it may have been lost in the noise for some providers, but the truth is unlocking the potential that Teams Phone has for your business is easy, because as I said before, all the hard work has already been done for you.
If you’re a Provider or Reseller and you’re interested in finding out how you can work with Microsoft Teams Phone, why not get in touch today?
Last updated: 04/02/2025