Avaya hooks the cellphone to the PBX

Avaya today announced it has launched a cellular extension application for enterprise PBX’s over Nokia’s Series 60 platform, allowing mobile workers to combine their office and cellular phone numbers and use PBX capabilities like conferencing and call forwarding from their handsets.

“This is extending the capabilities of a full office phone to the mobile phone,” said Dave Le Clair, director of technology partnerships for Avaya. “Cellular extension has been around for a while, but it’s always involved memorizing a long list of touch-tones. We’re providing that functionality through IP.”

The solution works as a software upgrade to Avaya’s Communication Manager IP PBX platform, which maps its PBX functions onto handsets through an application running on top of the Series 60 user interface. In addition, the PBX takes virtual control of the handset, causing the mobile phone and the office phone to ring simultaneously and to use the same office mailbox, as opposed to simple call forwarding or a find-me-follow-me feature. So far, Avaya has developed only an enterprise solution, not one for carriers, and the software effectively bypasses carrier voicemail and other features. But Avaya hasn’t ruled a carrier solution, which would operators to sell mobile enterprise services directly to enterprises. “We have no desire to lock out the carriers,” Le Clair said.

Le Clair added that Avaya selected the Series 60 because it was the most widespread of the mobile operating systems, but it plans to pursue other platforms though he wouldn’t say which ones. In addition, the solution is intended to integrate cleanly with upcoming IP network advancements like IMS, which will bring true convergence between wireline and wireless networks.

“But we think this is a good solution for today,” he said. “It gives users the services they want over the devices they have today.”