Internet Solutions (IS) has integrated enterprise-grade voice services into its Microsoft Office 365 Teams offering. From 14 March 2019, businesses running Office 365 can seamlessly use high quality voice capabilities within Microsoft Teams, allowing for the increased productivity and efficiency that the modern workplace demands, with direct voice routing via IS’ infrastructure.

“Driven by new demands and changing ways of working, we realised a need to evolve the productivity suite beyond what we traditionally know as email, spreadsheets and presentations, to something far more collaborative and instant. Voice for Microsoft Teams is our answer to creating a hub for even better team work from a single platform. We’ve been providing quality voice services for over 20 years and this is the next step in enabling unified communications,” says Basha Pillay, executive head: cloud and collaboration at Internet Solutions.¬¬¬¬

Microsoft Teams is a collaboration platform that brings together people, conversations, content and tools, with more transparent decision making and increased productivity as a result. It is used by over 200,000 organisations worldwide[1], and combines a chat-based workspace, seamlessly integrated third party applications, meetings, document collaboration and storage. This productivity hub includes embedded machine learning, artificial intelligence and integrated bots to automate mundane tasks. Ultimately, users enjoy a far richer experience, from any device with the flexibility of a consumption-based service.

Voice for Microsoft Teams is a fully integrated and managed service in Office 365 using ‘Direct Route’ between Microsoft and IS to enable public switched telephone network (PSTN) calling. This co-build allows organisations to add high quality voice breakout to their collaboration experience.

Understanding what the future of work will look like begins with new workplace needs, expectations and demands. The world is more open, connected and moves faster, and as a new generation enters the workforce, they want tools that are as efficient as those in their personal life. With more companies embracing flexible work styles it’s estimated that 50% of the work force will soon be remote[2], with team dynamics becoming more collaborative and cooperative.

“Flexibility and social collaboration are becoming a much more accepted work framework, and it shows that industries are willing to evolve. In return, we have to offer solutions that enable and support this new way of working. This means being able to communicate instantaneously and connect across multiple devices, and Voice for Teams allows us to do that,” concludes Pillay.