Avaya and Polycom are expanding their existing relationship in a joint initiative to develop and market integrated video, voice and collaboration solutions.

The companies plan to deliver fully integrated, end-to-end unified communications (UC) solutions that use the Avaya Aura Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)-based platform and the Polycom Open Collaboration Network strategy.

The planned joint solutions will provide Polycom's full range of voice and video systems integrated with Avaya Aura delivering real-time collaboration to customers.

Avaya Aura will enable companies to administer, schedule and manage the joint solutions in a single, consistent manner, and control bandwidth to support a superior user experience and optimal deployment of network resources.

"Companies are the real winners in the unified communications market because UC can save time, money and other valuable resources," said Roopam Jain, principal analyst, Frost & Sullivan. "As more and more companies flesh out and execute on their UC strategies, interoperability and standards such as SIP are critical.

"Because every UC deployment has unique requirements, standards-based solutions are key. It's encouraging to see Avaya and Polycom team to enable this type of open collaboration and feature-rich, purpose-built solutions."

Alan Baratz, senior vice president and president, Global Communications Solutions, Avaya, added: "The Avaya Aura platform enables our customers to integrate, manage and use communications in new ways to improve business performance. Together we'll offer customers a choice of collaboration solutions with the flexibility and functionality they require."

Andy Miller, Polycom executive vice president of Global Field Operations, added: "We continue to deliver on the Polycom Open Collaboration Network strategy. Avaya is a significant global presence across multiple industries. These existing relationships give us an excellent opportunity to introduce customers to our new UC solutions."