A New Player in the Apps Game — Can Alcatel-Lucent Bring Its Vision to Reality?

In case you
missed the recent news from Alcatel-Lucent, the telecommunications
equipment maker is the latest to throw its hat in the applications
ring. GigaOm offers a good overview of both the future potential and current shortcomings of this new offering.

From a high-level, the primary benefit is tied to the open APIs that
will allow developers to tap the assets within service-provider
networks.  If all goes according to plan – the groups will then be able
to work together to differentiate their applications and build new
revenue streams. However at the moment, the options are limited and
only mobile location applications are supported.

BroadSoft is quite a few steps ahead in the application marketplace
arena. While we both use a RESTful API architecture, that is where the
similarities end.   With a full 18 months under our belts, the BroadSoft Xtended
program has attracted more than 2,000 developers. Plus our platform
enables applications that integrate with business-process software,
mobile clients, desk phones and other devices to offer a much broader
range of applications.

Alcatel’s marketplace-deployment model is also quite different than
ours —they give service providers a gallery of applications and then 
point you to the developer. And as we announced just this past quarter
at our annual users conference, we now have complete ecommerce enablement
of our marketplace. Consumers can now download apps directly and start
using them. Here are a few very cool examples of apps that can be found
on the BroadSoft Marketplace, which were unveiled at our annual users’
conference in our always popular “Show Me the Apps” session:

• Microsoft CRM intergration – this full-service CRM app,
  delivers streamlined communications options for users that enable them
  to quickly find and communicate with the right person, improving work
  flow and, more importantly, customer satisfaction.

• Our app that integrates with Mobile Max  extends real-time
  communications to the mobile device with one number, one device, and
  one address book.

• JoeDevloper’s app transcribes voice messages to text and email, and enables users to search messages by keyword in their inboxes.

In short, our business model is creating integrated, real-time
communication options that you can quickly take to market, delivering a
superior communication experience to consumers.  That’s where apps are
more than just the next big thing – they are a real game changer.