Verizon Business announced a new partnership with RingCentral to provide enterprise customers with cloud-based phone, messaging and video meetings. The service will be co-branded as RingCentral with Verizon.
This service is different from landline phone services that Verizon provides to enterprise customers via its Fios brand.
RingCentral with Verizon is based on RingCentral's message, video and phone platform that integrates with Verizon's global network, including its 5G network. From the consumer’s perspective, they’ll only to have deal with one supplier, one solution, one contract and one support center for all their unified communications needs.
Verizon Business says the offer will be a key component of its network-as-a-service strategy, which includes 5G, mobile edge computing, SD WAN and security.
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The new service joins a plethora of UCaaS offerings, which have become especially popular because of the work-from-home phenomenon caused by Covid. The most well-known cloud-based video conference application is Zoom. Verizon, itself, offers BlueJeans video conferencing. And Verizon sells other cloud-based calling solutions to global enterprises including Cisco Webex Calling and Verizon Calling for Microsoft Teams.
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About a year ago, Verizon bought BlueJeans, whose 390 employees, as well as its founders, joined Verizon Business. Verizon had been a BlueJeans distributor for several quarters and was considering buying the company even before the full impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
In terms of messaging, the RingCentral with Verizon service will include the ability to create teams to share files, calendars and tasks, similar to the capabilities of Slack and Microsoft Teams.
“The ‘work from anywhere’ model will continue to be a major factor for businesses, and we’ve seen the importance of cloud communications growing stronger for enterprises in the past year,” said Tami Erwin, CEO at Verizon Business, in a statement. “Through this partnership, we’re leveraging our best-in-class network with RingCentral’s expertise in cloud collaboration.”