What is Unison?
Hosted Unison is a unified communications service. It brings telephony, email, instant messaging and more together. There’s one interface for end users, one control panel for you to adjust settings, and one predictable monthly bill.
The advantage for your business: Critical information gets to the right people faster. Better decisions get made. Revenues grow.
All that’s required on your end: an Internet connection, computer and IP phone (we can recommend one). Intermedia delivers hosted Unison from our secure, four data center infrastructure. 24x7 support is included.
There are no servers to buy or maintain. Because telephony is part of the service, you no longer need to use a PBX or VOIP service. Keep the phone numbers you have today, or get new ones.
- Never check voicemail: A unified inbox means all your email, instant messages and even voicemail are stored in one place. Simply click to hear messages.
- Reach colleagues on the first try: Unison's "presence" feature shows you if your colleagues are available, busy or offline.
- Stop hunting for contact information: Just click to email, instant message or call your colleagues.
Business benefits of unified communications
43 minutes of added efficiency with a 'unified inbox'
Save each staff member 43 minutes per day* with a 'unified inbox' that integrates email, voicemails and chat into one place.
32 minutes less wasted time with free/busy presence
Eliminate the 32 minutes per day the average employee wastes on 'phone/email tag' by letting them see whether their colleagues are free, busy or away.
Reduce hardware and telephone costs
Replace old wired phone switches with a single-server IP-PBX and e-mail system, and save 60% on telephone bills by moving to VoIP.
Save on travel
Reduce the need to travel and lower mobile phone bills for mobile workers - up to $500+ in costs per traveling employee each month.
Reduce information overload
Unified inboxes reduce the bloat of unnecessary email chains - reducing the overload of information and letting them make smarter decisions based on more complete information.
Lower latency for faster decisions
Projects and tasks move faster as the 'lag time' between each decision (both small and large) is reduced.
Give customers faster and better service
Most employees spend around 3 hours a day away from their desks. 'Follow me' numbers reduces missed calls.
* Source of cost and time-savings statistics is a report from 2006 by Sage Research. The company surveyed 203 small, medium and large businesses which had adopted unified communications solutions. These businesses were in a wide range of sectors, including education, financial services, government, healthcare/pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, professional services and retail/wholesale.
External Unified Communication and Unison FAQs
What is Unified Communications?
Unified communications brings the most critical communications capabilities – email, telephone, chat, and more – together to improve your ability to get work done. Intermedia’s hosted unified communications is designed for SMBs in a single, simple to administer application developed by Unison – a UC software company.
What does Unison do for users?
Unison integrates email, chat, presence, contacts, calendar and phone into a single service. The software’s development began in 2005 with the results winning a “Best in Show” at the famed CEBIT event in 2008.
Unison end-users interact with Unison Desktop, which was designed to have a familiar look and feel – one comparable to Outlook 2007. Unison Desktop has both Linux and Windows versions. Unison also supports mobile synchronization of email, contacts and calendar.
What does Intermedia do to deliver Unison?
Intermedia manages hosted Unison from start to finish, including – through an affiliated telecommunications company – the provision of phone numbers and voice service.
If I get Unison, what systems does it replace?
Unison replaces your Exchange or groupware server, your PBX telephone system, your directory server and (if you have one) your instant messaging server. Instead of separate systems, Unison is hosted by Intermedia.
Does Unison use VoIP?
Yes, Unison's built-in PBX uses voice-over-IP (VoIP) for telephone calls.
Is the Unison PBX based on Asterisk?
No, the Unison PBX is not based on Asterisk. It was developed by Unison Technologies and is patented for its scalability.
Which telephones can I use?
We support Linksys and Polycom phones plus XLite softphones. Phone service is provided by Unison Communications.
Does Unison support mobile devices?
You can synchronize email to almost all popular devices, such as the BlackBerry, iPhone, Windows Mobile or Nokia smartphones via ActiveSync or IMAP. We will be adding broader mobile device support through the year.
What kind of uptime can I expect?
Intermedia supports Unison with a service level agreement guaranteeing 99.9 percent uptime for the hosted service.
Unison vs Exchange 2010
Typically, Exchange 2010 is more appropriate for companies heavily reliant upon Outlook plugins or other Microsoft products like SharePoint and CRM. Unison works well for companies who need a straightforward, all-in-one business communications tool, including telephony and PBX.
| Feature | Exchange 2010 | Unison |
|---|---|---|
| Groupware | ||
| Yes | Yes | |
| Instant messaging, including group chat | Optional with OCS 2007 add-on | Yes, Built in |
| Calendars | Yes | Yes |
| Contacts | Yes | Yes |
| Telephony | ||
| PBX functionality | No | Yes |
| Call parking/forwarding to mobile phone | No | Yes |
| Visual voicemail in your app | No | Yes |
| Conferencing | ||
| Voice and video meetings | Optional Peer-to-peer only, with OCS 2007 add-on | No |
| Microsoft integration | ||
| Works with Outlook | Yes | Email sync only |
| Connects to SharePoint, Dynamics, other MS products | Yes | No |
| Wireless sync | ||
| ActiveSync connectivity | Yes | Yes |
| BES connectivity | Yes | Email sync only |
Pricing
Unison is a powerful and cost-effective solution for business communication. Your business can have one system for e-mail, instant messaging, telephony with unlimited domestic calls and voicemail. Fully managed and supported 24x7 by Intermedia, it is a fraction of what you are probably paying today.
Here are some of the features included with our Unison hosting service:
| Pricing | |
|---|---|
| Unison Unified Communications Plan (Includes telephony) |
$50 per user per month (5 users by default) |
| Unison Unified Messaging Plan (Without telephony) |
$10 per user per month (5 users by default) |
| Features | |
| E-mail Including 5 GB storage per user |
 |
| Instant messaging | |
| Telephony | |
| Full PBX features Including auto-attendant (IVR), automated call distribution, parking, transfer, recording and more |
|
| Calendaring With shared scheduling and Outlook- compatible invitations |
|
| Contacts Including global address list, departmental, personal contacts |
|
| Service | |
| Fully-managed service Includes 24x7 telephone support |
|
| Unison setup Deployment done by Intermedia |
|
| Unison telephony included Creation of telephone numbers, provisioning of telephony service, unlimited national (U.S.) calling |
Yes - if Intermedia's recommended telephone provider is chosen. |
| All software included Desktop client for end users |
Yes - free download of Unison Desktop client |
| Web-based email client for anywhere access | |
