How to solve the virtual UC and VDI problems of enterprises?

The rapid development of virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and UC creates a serious problem, that is, how to support real-time applications in the data center architecture that handles all applications.

Enterprises are rapidly adopting Virtualization Technologies to Reduce infrastructure costs and improve flexibility. Running applications on virtual servers rather than dedicated servers means that hardware, energy consumption, and operation management resources are greatly reduced. Research data from Nemertes Research shows that many companies generally Virtualize more than half of their applications and plan to virtualize 78% of their programs in the next year.

In UC and collaborative areas, UC architects are also rapidly Applying server virtualization technology, of which 42% are deploying virtual UC applications, and the other 20% are evaluating the future deployment of virtualization.

However, virtualized UC not only occurs in the data center. The number of branches of an enterprise is increasing. This includes all office locations. No matter how small the branch office is, IT supervisors must deliver unified functions to all employees, no matter where they are located, and the device used. They must support new ways of work, such as electronic office and hotel office. Therefore, 52% of companies deploy VDI for some employees. According to the implementation method of VDI, it can reduce or completely eliminate local applications, so that many companies can extend the hardware life, support self-built devices (BYOD) own models, support flexible sharing of the workplace, it even extends enterprise applications to mobile devices.

Virtualization goes hand in hand with UC

As virtualization deployment expands, it is increasingly integrated with UC applications, such as software phones and desktop videos running on PCs, laptops, and mobile devices. 64% of companies are expected to have deployed a certain UC application, and 23% are evaluating or planning to be deployed next year.

The rapid growth of VDI and UC gave rise to a serious problem: how to support real-time applications in the data center architecture that handles all applications. Because of latency, bandwidth requirements, and the processing capabilities required to encapsulate Native audio and video, it is not feasible to transmit original audio and video from a virtual desktop to a data center.

As a result, many enterprises that deploy VDI or UC blindly deploy VDI or UC. A few companies are forced to postpone VDI or UC deployment because they cannot coordinate UC and VDI before deployment. Even in an extreme case, a company was forced to switch back to a traditional desktop because the selected VDI solution does not support its UC solution ,.

Fortunately, suppliers in the VDI and UC fields are introducing new solutions to the market, supporting local encapsulation of audio and video in the VDI environment. These methods usually run a lightweight application such as Citrix HDX locally to capture audio/video, encapsulate it before it is sent to the data center, or deploy dedicated hardware such, cisco's VXI), which runs audio/video on desktop devices, such as VDI devices, IP phones, or mobile phones that support video. Both methods can solve the problem of running UC on VDI, but the desktop team and UC planning team should be properly coordinated.

To fully utilize the advantages of virtual UC, enterprises must identify these problems, which are organizational rather than non-technical issues. By integrating these two technologies, we can leverage the virtualization advantages while achieving the UC goal.