Access4 chalks up 100th partner milestone with another large MSP win from a Tier 1 carrier

MSPs are at tipping point

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, announced that it recently signed its 100th Partner, with over 60 new partners signed in the past 12 months alone.

Tim Jackson, Managing Director of Access4, said that demand was being fuelled by MSP’s frustrations with Tier 1 carrier reliability and service delivery. “One of the key areas of our growth has been from large MSP’s joining our Channel Program. Their long-term issues with Tier 1 carriers range from network outages to the recent loss of offshore call centres. This, combined with unprecedented demand for work from home solutions during COVID-19, has become a tipping point for large MSP’s, who have frankly run out of patience. An example is our new partner, PConnect, who faced a major issue with former providers.” Geoff Boyce, Director and Founder of PConnect (owned by Precision IT) said, “Our solution was being impacted by network outages and a lack of platform stability, which meant we were not able to meet the commitments we had made to our clients. We undertook an in-depth market review for a new platform partner as our previous suppliers had completely let us down.”

The PConnect solution has since been transitioned to Access4, where the upgraded platform and portal has led to faster, more reliable use and provides the opportunity for customisation.

Boyce said, “The decision to move to Access4 was a simple one. At the centre of our relationship is a shared value system; we both believe in taking the complexity out of the service; making it transparent, dependable and easily understood. We are both focused on continued investment in new technologies and advancements. And we both value reliability and clear communication.”

Jackson said, “Our partners have found they cannot afford to take risks around service delivery and performance. I personally understand the pain MSP’s are experiencing. The idea of Access4 was born out of my frustration from trying to find a quality end-to-end UCaaS solution from Tier 1 carriers in Australia when I was running an MSP a few years ago.

The story of the Access4 beginnings was a simple case of identifying a problem in the market and then developing a purpose-built solution to eliminate every challenge and barrier to entry. Now, with the advent of COVID-19, as organisations pivot to working from home, we have quickly moved from a niche provider to partner of choice for MSPs and SI’s in the Australian and New Zealand market.”

More than ever, remote work solutions are mission critical for companies to stay in business and be competitive during these exceptionally challenging times.

“COVID-19 has been the catalyst for the ‘great working from home experiment’ as businesses are now required to implement an ‘any device, any time, any location’ approach, which is at the core of a solid UCaaS platform. Our robust, quality solution that includes a BroadSoft collaboration and an MS Teams Calling option is fundamentally why we have experienced significant growth in all areas of our business,” Jackson said.

Transitioning to remote work? Speak to a specialist

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, today announced it has appointed former Vocus Executive, Scott Carter, as Chairman of the Board.

Tim Jackson, Access4 Managing Director, said that the company had actively targeted Scott for the role given his significant experience leading fast-growing tech businesses.

“Scott has a track record of success with driving growth in the channel and our goal is to double our partner base in Australia and New Zealand over the next 12 months. He will provide the experienced leadership needed for this next phase of aggressive growth and also play a pivotal role in the Series C capital raise the business is currently undertaking.”

Scott Carter brings over two decades of industry experience to the business, most recently as CEO of

enterprise and government at Vocus Communications, CEO of Vocus Consumer and COO of M2 Group. Carter said, “I am excited to join this specialist fast growing business that has solved the challenge for channel partners to allow them to capitalise on the market opportunity presented by unified communications and grow their profits.

I have seen first-hand the cost, complexity, time to market and deployment issues encountered by the channel to deliver UC solutions and how this has held them back in the past.

Access4 solves these issues through its proprietary SASBOSS platform, a turnkey solution that delivers an intuitive suite of communication products from global leaders including BroadSoft (Cisco) and Microsoft Teams,” said Carter.

Jackson said, “We see exciting times ahead from a product development perspective, especially with the new Microsoft Teams product, which will open new partner markets. Demand is set to be high for hybrid business communication utilising BroadWorks and MS Teams Collaboration.”

Partnership to Deliver Cloud UC Over Super-Fast Internet

Unified Communications as a Service provider, Access4, today announced it has signed independent provider of Super Fast Internet, cloud solutions, unified communication services and Phone Names, Spirit Telecom Limited (ASX: ST1) (“Spirit”) as a Platinum Partner.

Access4 Director of Sales and Marketing, Ruy Franco, said that the company was excited to be working with Spirit, as the two businesses were a natural fit.

“Spirit delivers Super-Fast Internet, which is perfectly suited to voice and Cloud Unified Communication (UC) services. Spirit is a market leader and prides itself on delivering the best technology and products for its customers nationally. Its customers will now be able to access improved cloud services that meet the rigorous requirements of business over the high bandwidth Spirit network.”

Access4 delivers Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS) through the BroadSoft platform and ensures partners and their customers have the latest features and functionality delivered in a managed and tested environment, which allows them to truly take advantage of UC.

Spirit Telecom CMO Sol Lukatsky said,

“We’re thrilled to be partnering with Access4 as its solution and approach perfectly complement our technology and product leadership focus. To provide a modern voice solution for B2B customers, you have to offer a superior quality voice and data package. We were looking for a partner that could deliver the richest functionality in the market. Together, BroadSoft and Access4 deliver a best of breed solution. Spirit chose Access4 because of its product leadership in providing BroadSoft-based services and its investment in automation and provisioning tools. We believe this is the best product in the market in terms of both functionality and back-end billing capability.”

The Access4 provisioning and support portal, SASBOSS™ allows partners to manage their customers locally and seamlessly. SASBOSS™ provides billing so partners can track usage, costs and revenue. Consequently, customers can manage costs.

Reduces end-user customer upgrade risk for NBN and 5G

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, today announced it has released a Cloud ISDN solution that will allow companies to move away from traditional copper ISDN services without requiring upgrades to an existing PBX or configuration changes.

Access4 Director of Sales and Marketing, Ruy Franco, said that many small businesses are concerned about the closing down of the ISDN network and the impact of NBN and 5G on their business.

“Cloud ISDN from Access4 will allow companies to move their existing PBX without additional investment in cards, to an NBN or 5G network service. They can then upgrade their telephony to the Cloud when it suits them, not when their last mile telecommunication provider changes the technology. Many small businesses are confused by what options new technologies will present for their business and face very real issues that make them cautious about moving their telephone services across to the Cloud at this time. Others may have recently invested in a new PBX or have a desire to better realise their PBX investment to date. They also can see a potential negative impact of a ‘big bang’ transition to Cloud on their business.”

Access4 Cloud ISDN customers can opt to deploy a Hosted PBX or Cloud UC from one user to all users, at any time, or create a hybrid system with some users on the existing PBX and some in the Cloud. All users in the business can share the same number range and even have internal calling capabilities. Franco said,

“This allows companies to test Cloud PBX in their environment and migrate to new technology at their own pace, with no need for a big bang transition away from their current phone system. In this way, Access4 Cloud ISDN acts as a bridging technology that takes all the hassles and worries out of the equation.”

Access4 installs an Internet-based ISDN service, and an onsite device to monitor Internet connection quality. If the Internet link is not capable of supporting voice, the service can be cancelled. The service uses the onsite device to pass through calls to the existing ISDN service to ensure there are no issues with call quality or dropouts.

“With Access4, as your business requirements change, you can add UCaaS managed endpoints to the solution. You can migrate single users or groups at a time when you want additional features, such as mobile or collaboration features, or when a handset becomes inoperable and needs to be replaced by a SIP handset,” said Franco. When you are ready to decommission the PBX, you can migrate the existing users to Cloud PBX and UCaaS services. As the phone numbers are in the service provider network already, no porting or downtime is required. You can then disconnect the ISDN service and decommission your PBX,” he concluded.

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, today announced it has signed managed services provider Viatek Technology Pty Ltd and launched its integration of Microsoft Office 365 Active Directory (‘Office 365 AD’).

Access4 Director of Sales & Marketing, Ruy Franco, said that the Viatek partnership was a great example of Access4’s capability, agility and why the company chose to invest in its own platform and build systems internally such as SASBOSS™.

“Viatek needed a UCaaS solution that would allow them to quickly and easily scale services up and down, particularly for mid-market customers and some enterprise applications. In addition, they had recognised a need for Office 365 AD integration. We could see the strategic importance of this investment and so we built a seamless integration from our provisioning system SASBOSS™ to Office 365 AD, tested it with Viatek as our lead partner, and then refined it from their feedback,” said Franco.

Access4’s new Office 365 AD integration is the latest response to the market’s demand for the implementation of collaborative tools. Office 365 is built around flexibility and work-flow of different user profiles, which naturally complement UC solutions.

SASBOSS™ provisioning portal provides Office 365 customers with an authorisation link to create a trusted relationship between the two platforms. With it, customers can provision, manage and operate all their users across the business from one place in Office 365. If a company adds a user in Office 365 AD, it will add a UC service and the partner/customer can fully provision that service within minutes including automated handset configuration. SASBOSS will also import the company’s global address book making those contacts available on all users’ handsets (handset device dependant).

Franco said, “That means a partner can deliver a 100-200 seat organisation in one day. No more manual data entry, no human error and no manual duplication of user data in multiple systems.”

James Veness, Sales Director, Viatek said, “We’re excited to be partnering with Access4 as its UC solutions and ethos perfectly complement our ‘customer-first’ focus. As a Microsoft Gold Partner, Viatek has deep experience in Office 365 migration and support. We recognised a real need in the market for Cloud PBX solutions with Office 365 AD integration, and we are looking forward to working with Access4 to solve this problem for customers in a cost-effective, low touch way. Viatek is committed to providing customers with high performance, user-centric solutions helping them embed operational agility and responsiveness into their business. Our software-defined approach across networking, cloud, threat defence – and now UC, ensures our customers reap the rewards of faster provisioning, flawless user experience and 24/7 support.”

BroadSoft service, support and specialisation key to effective UC deployment

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, is pleased to welcome automotive ICT specialist, Dealer IT, to its growing list of partners. Access4 Director of Sales & Marketing, Ruy Franco, said the company was glad to secure this IT specialist as the sign-up process had been thorough and detailed.

“We are really excited to be working with Dealer IT – they had some poor experiences with their former service provider and we were very pleased to be able to offer them a solution that was right for their business.”

Dealer IT Directors Michael Miloseski and Jackey Li said the company recently decided to add managed voice and UC to its product base after experiencing a rise in demand for the services from clients.

Michael said, “Our ability to deliver a seamless customer experience is paramount to our business and so we knew we needed to find a new partner to deliver these services. Access4 has been able to deliver this for us.”

Ruy said, “Access4 is able to provide a superior BroadSoft solution and give Dealer IT greater transparency and control through SASBOSS^TM, our proprietary provisioning and support portal. Our Technical Assistance Centre provides a level of support that will delight both Dealer IT and their customers. More importantly, our engineering team is available to assist on the phone and onsite when needed, to give Dealer IT clients the confidence that Cloud PBX and UC is not only viable but the best possible solution for their business.”

Dealer IT is a service provider that specialises in delivering and supporting ICT services for vehicle dealerships. They understand the technology of dealerships and their systems and have a deep understanding of the business needs of a dealership. They really understand what makes a good dealer great and this means that their customers don’t need to educate them on their business – they can trust Dealer IT to get on with the job.

“We have enjoyed migrating Dealer IT’s customer base across to Access4 and are looking for every opportunity to work with this partner to showcase their leading Voice and UC solution. Our intent is to be a superior BroadSoft solution provider and to deliver a customer experience that will get them excited about the possibility of UC and what it can do for their business,” concluded Ruy.

 

UCaaS provider Access4 awarded for delivering innovation to market

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, is celebrating a key win at the recent BroadSoft Annual Australasian Achievement Awards. Access4 Director of Sales & Marketing, Ruy Franco, said the company was proud to be recognised at the BroadSoft Connect event in Melbourne last week.

“It was an honour to receive the Millennial Leadership Award. This award recognises Access4 for providing all the latest BroadSoft features fastest to market. From day one, we made the commitment to our partners that we would deliver any new BroadSoft feature within six months of its release by BroadSoft and we have delivered on the promised time and again. This award both recognises and rewards the significant effort undertaken by the Access4 team to deliver on this key promise to market, something we made clear from the moment we started the business in Australia and New Zealand.”

Rob Wyatt, Managing Director, BroadSoft ANZ said,

“We congratulate Access4 on receiving the 2017 BroadSoft Millennial Leadership Award, which recognises their leadership and innovation in the Unified Communication market in Australia and for the breadth of services Access4 offers from the range of BroadSoft solutions.”

The Annual Awards highlight achievements by BroadSoft Australasian customers and partners and were announced on 24 May 2017 at the BroadSoft Connect Event in Melbourne. The event was attended by over 250 telecommunications professionals from the Australasian Region.

Market set for a shake-up as the pay-as-you-go promise of cloud becomes a reality for UCaaS

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, today announced it will no longer require customers to sign contracts for services, and that it will continue to offer zero set up fees for any new customer.

Access4 Director of Sales & Marketing, Ruy Franco, said the company has a clear goal to be a trailblazer in the industry.

“We are always looking for ways to shake up the market and help customers realise the true benefits of UCaaS. Cloud services are usually subscription-based pay-as-you-go, and we think businesses should be able to buy their telephony and Unified Communications services in the same way. Customers are also able to trial our services before they buy in the same way they would SaaS. “The Australian telecommunications market has for too long been dominated by the market incumbent and a group of second tier players that are more intent on maintaining their lucrative income streams than delivering new and better services for customers.”

Access4’s range of UCaaS services will now be available through partners on month-to-month plans with no contracts to sign and no setup fees. Access4 partners will also offer the option of an annual subscription, which will be available for customers at a discounted rate.

The annual subscription fee also applies to call packs providing greater value to customers. Franco said,

“Unlike other providers, Access4 will not compensate for this new pricing policy by charging higher upfront fees, nor will it introduce set up fees in a cash grab attempt.”

McKinsey estimates that by 2018, more than half (51%) of enterprises will adopt cloud as their primary IT environment – up from just 10% in 2015.

“The take up of Cloud is rapidly escalating in Australia and along with it, customers are beginning to leverage the many services like UCaaS which have the ability to transform businesses and deliver greater efficiency and productivity,” concluded Franco.

Cloud-based contact centre solution CC-One launched at Contact Centre Week 2017

Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) provider, Access4, today announced it is the first service provider in Australia to host a deployment of BroadSoft CC-One, BroadSoft’s newly released contact centre solution.

BroadSoft CC-One is a cloud-based, omnichannel (voice, email, chat and social) contact centre solution that enables businesses to create exceptional customer service experiences, offering a smooth migration from legacy systems to a truly unified, analytics-driven solution. BroadSoft CC-One offers a proven cloud platform that can be optimised for businesses of all sizes, from SMBs to multinational, multi-site contact centre operators.

“The role of the contact centre is changing, and today it’s all about agent productivity and maximising sales and service business outcomes – in addition to operational efficiency. So many companies are running contact centre systems that have been cobbled together from different vendors at different sites. The Access4 deployment of BroadSoft CC-One enables partners to deliver a data-driven contact centre and telephony solution in one package to their customers. It also includes call recording through Dubber – making it a truly complete package without rival in the market from a partner perspective.”

“We are delighted to be working with Access4 to offer BroadSoft CC-One to clients in ANZ. As part of the BroadSoft Business suite, we see BroadSoft CC-One as having broad appeal to existing and new call centre operators. As a native cloud contact centre solution, we are seeing strong potential for growth – especially among small and medium-sized business who often were never able to afford expensive on-premise contact centre solutions,” said Jonathan Reid, Managing Director, Asia Pacific and Emerging Markets, BroadSoft.

Access4 Director of Sales & Marketing, Ruy Franco, said they are excited about the possibilities of this solution and the impact it will have on contact centres in Australia and New Zealand.

BroadSoft CC-One uses real-time predictive call routing and analytics to lower operating costs and improve business performance. It improves the efficiency of agents, contact centre managers and administrators, creating a seamless customer experience across all major communication channels.

Features include:

• Omni-channel customer interactions – Communicate via voice, web, email, chat and social from a unified environment
• Unified communications – an Easy collaboration between agents, managers and back-office subject matter experts
• Predictive analytics-based routing through CC-One Analyser – integrates call routing and external data sources to provide predictive routing for optimal agent performance.

“Final testing including customer trials are underway and we’re ready to go live this quarter. This is a really exciting solution and we’re proud to be the first in Australia to deliver it as part of our commitment to enable BroadSoft Business solutions for mid-market IT providers in Australia,” said Franco.

Access4 Partners with Oper8 to Support Communic8 Suite of Hosted UC Products

Unified Communications as a Service UCaaS provider, Access4 today announced it has signed Oper8 as a Partner. Access4 is providing its full range of Unified Communications (UC) solutions to Oper8; this includes Hosted PBX, UCaaS and Contact Centre as a Service (CCaaS). Built on the BroadSoft BroadWorks platform, Access4 is committed to maintaining and developing its products and channels in the region.

Oper8, based in Springfield, Queensland is a premium ICT provider with a visionary reputation and a strong customer focus. With a fast-growing customer base, Oper8 is geared to help mid-sized corporate and Government customers achieve more by providing products and services unfettered by legacy platforms. The key driver, for Oper8, is an “enabler”, all Oper8 solutions must make the end users life considerably easier by having a more consistent and intuitive experience.

Ruy Franco, Sales and Marketing Director at Access4 said, “We are delighted to have Oper8 on-board as a growing partner, their focus and style complement Access4 and we are already seeing results from the engagement.”

“The decision to partner with Access4 was made easier because of their investment in SASBOSS which was worth significantly more than the sum of the parts” said Managing Director Mike Andrea, he went on “the SASBOSS provisioning and support portal makes ordering and deploying solutions an open, transparent and automated exercise, this was important to Oper8, as a customer-focused organization with an eye to the future. We are excited about the possibilities this will bring to our customers and prospects.”