Global market for unified comms will be driven by mobile, BYOD and the cloud

UC market shows no signs of slowing down

The global unified communications (UC) market will top $57 billion in value by 2024, thanks to the (still-) growing penetration of mobile devices and increasing adoption of the BYOD trend across enterprises.

Global Market Insights made the prediction in a new research report. The firm points to the evolution of mobile devices over the last decade, away from a focus on purely voice and towards other functions including internet access and email. The increase in mobile internet consumption is expected to act as another boost to the UC market over the coming years.

BYOD, meanwhile, has been adopted by many companies for a variety of reasons. As well as the convenience of only needing to carry a single device, firms have been able to cut hardware and service costs dramatically. Employees able to use their own phones, tablets and laptops have also been found to be more productive.

Traditional infrastructure networks are expensive to upgrade and work with, hence an increasing number of firms are adopting the cloud and hybrid UC solutions to scale their operations. Market growth is forecast to rise further in-line with the growing global cloud ecosystem.

Telephony platforms are expected to represent more than a quarter of the UC market by 2024, due to large-scale deployments by enterprises. IP phones will hold a large share of this sector due to their benefits over traditional analogue devices and comparatively low costs. However, it is the collaboration market where GMI predicts the highest growth, due to the development of new systems and platforms.

The cloud-based UC sector will grow quickly, but IT & telecoms will take the largest share of the overall market due to their high adoption and wide potential applications - especially among global businesses.

North America will ‘dominate' the UC market by the end of the forecast period, mostly due to the availability of a robust telecom and cloud infrastructure in the region; as well as support for BYOD. APAC will grow faster than any other region, though, with a CAGR of more than 13 per cent.