Next Generation Communications

Working on the Railroads -Transforming In-Tunnel Communications
5/14/2012 - Along with tunnel digging capabilities, advances in ICT are helping transform underground transportation.

Smart Grid Communication Network Management and Security
5/14/2012 - A "How-To Guide" on the proper development, management and security of smart grid networks.

'How to Guide' - Extending Smart Grids with Next Generation Communications
5/7/2012 - Alcatel-Lucent in collaboration with Government Technology pulbishes, "Creating your Smart Grid - a How-To Guide."

Small and Medium Enterprises, a Missed Service Provider Opportunity
4/30/2012 - Too often, the small and medium enterprise (SME) market is overlooked.

Ensuring Seamless Collaboration Conversations with Alcatel-Lucent's OpenTouch Software
4/23/2012 - The latest step forward in UC, Alcatel-Lucent's OpenTouch Conversation software is changing workflows.

How Liverpool Hospital Overcame Network Challenges with Alcatel-Lucent Wireless Solution
4/15/2012 - Migrating to next-generation technologies is a significant challenge for urban hospitals. They must comply with strict industry standards while often remaining on a tight budget.

Using Communications to Change the Delivery of Education Services
4/10/2012 - Managing risks and costs while delivering improved quality experiences to internal users, ecosystem partners and customers is a challenge facing every organization no matter its size or scope. No other market feels the pressure to do more with less and find new ways to deliver services, than educational institutions.

Data Center Network Change Demands Application Fluency
4/2/2012 - Demand for increased capture, usage, storage and manipulation of data in enterprises has heightened the need for transformation of the data center network.

Improving Employee Productivity through Enhanced Communications and Collaboration
3/20/2012 - Enterprises have shifted attention from tactical concerns to more strategic ones, especially those regarding improving employee and customer experiences through enhanced collaboration.

The Data Center Revolution - Migrating to a Converged Data/Storage Network
3/15/2012 - The word "virtualization" has become pervasively used in descriptions of the revolution we are witnessing as data centers become the hubs of communications of all types. However, in many ways, we are on the on-ramp of the learning curve in terms of enterprises and service providers leveraging the true benefits of virtualization.

A Clear Strategy for Visual Collaboration Ensures Far-Reaching Benefits
3/12/2012 - Enhanced "visual collaboration" demands a clear priority on integration, forcing companies to weigh various options before deploying new solutions.

Alcatel-Lucent OpenTouch Helps Change the Conversation in the Workplace
3/2/2012 - Are corporations truly exploiting the available opportunities for helping employees manage the complexity of conversations that span multiple channels and devices?

Five Key Elements Support Conversations through Collaboration and Conferencing
2/17/2012 - Enterprises need to embrace new communications collaboration technologies to improve employee efficiency and effectiveness.

Network Convergence Critical in New Era of Virtual Computing
2/13/2012 - To exploit the true power of virtualization, IT managers will eventually need to network convergence of their data and storage capabilities.

Challenges and Solutions for Managing Cloud Computing
1/27/2012 - Managing the performance of traditional applications hasn't been a strong point for most enterprises. It has become more difficult as companies integrate cloud computing technologies.

Effects of Cloud Computing on the Wide Area Network (WAN)
1/24/2012 - With growing reliance on cloud computing and virtual machines, enterprises will need to adapt the way that they use today's WAN services or bite the bullet and significantly increase their WAN budgets to compensate for increased traffic.

How the Cloud is Changing the Data Center LAN
1/13/2012 - The introduction of cloud computing has a profound impact on a number of data center pieces, particularly the Local Area Network (LAN), which is being forced to evolve alongside the cloud.

Alcatel-Lucent Looks Back on the Year in Cloud Computing
1/9/2012 - Alcatel-Lucent recently put together an extensive white paper, "The 2011 Cloud Networking Report," which details all things cloud computing, including the importance of a cloud-enabling network and the many ways that the industry will expand in future years.

Alcatel-Lucent Building a Bridge to IPv6 through a Phased Transition Plan
1/3/2012 - Transitioning to IPv6 - the standardized protocol that provides more IP addresses than grains of sand on the world's beaches - eliminates the costs of temporary fixes and technology barriers.

Video Collaboration Enabled Through Alcatel-Lucent's OpenTouch Architecture
12/23/2011 - According to Alcatel-Lucent, video is becoming the new dial tone.

Best Practices in Social Media for Higher Education Institutions
12/19/2011 - The power of social media is extending into academia as higher education institutions identify creative ways to use it outside of the classroom.

Converged Network Solutions for Large Enterprises and SMBs
12/5/2011 - A converged network architecture from the ground up is required to effectively meet the demands of new devices, applications and the requirements imposed by the increasing trend of virtualization to support this new environment.

Corporate Networks Benefit from Data Convergence with Alcatel-Lucent's OmniSwitch 6900
11/29/2011 - A new approach to providing network infrastructure solutions in a converging world where enterprise networks need to be "applications-fluent" is required.

Overcoming Corporate Network Data Convergence Challenges with Alcatel-Lucent's OmniSwitch 6900
11/21/2011 - Network operators and enterprises are coming to the conclusion that it is not enough to hrow more raw capacity at the problem.

Workforce Optimization Proven to Ensure Quality Customer Service
10/28/2011 - Companies must be able to assess and improve the quality of the customer interaction experience delivered. Workforce Optimization tools can be critical elements in this process.

Alcatel-Lucent Addresses The Core Challenge in Enterprise Network Infrastructure
10/21/2011 - The explosion of new applications and devices proliferating in the market has intensified the pressure placed on the enterprise core network. Legacy networks are struggling to cope with the increased demand as smart devices coupled with the increased reliance on social networks, unified communications and VoIP are creating new challenges.

Ensuring Top-Tier Customer Service with a Workforce Optimization Strategy
10/14/2011 - Effectively managing customer relationships is more difficult today than ever before. Customer-facing employees are forced to manage multiple service systems, tasks and channels, including legacy mediums like phone and email as well as social media tools like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook.

Workforce Optimization to Drive Productivity, Enable Cost Containment
10/7/2011 - As the intensity of the competitive landscape continues to increase, companies must focus on improving business practices and performance if they hope to deliver on profit and revenue expectations. This includes implementing workforce optimization practices to drive productivity and enable cost containment. And, while a number of companies have proven their ability to contain costs, improving employee productivity appears to be a much more challenging topic.

Workforce Optimization Starts with Hiring the Right Agents
9/30/2011 - A recent Genesys white paper, The Importance of Proper Hiring, Training, Career Path Development, Skilling and Routing, focused on the importance of quality management and performance optimization for agents within the dynamic contact center

WFO - Quality Management Performance Optimization Critical in the Contact Center
9/23/2011 - Performance and Cost - how does the contact center of today balance these two critical measurement areas? The key is for the contact center to differentiate itself from competitors and meet the increasing service demands of customers, while also identifying new ways to be more efficient in its operations.

Best Practices for Deploying Visual Collaboration in the Enterprise
9/19/2011 - As more companies attempt to support an increasingly "virtual" workplace, they are faced with a growing number of challenges, including how to lower costs and drive productivity and enable free collaboration among employees, partners and customers.

Visual Collaboration: Boost Employee Productivity and Drive Customer Interactions
9/12/2011 - In an increasingly global marketplace, companies are more challenged today with reducing expenses and boosting productivity across geographical boundaries - these challenges are accompanied by the changing nature of business communications.

Applications in the Data Center and the Importance of Application Fluency
9/2/2011 - Application fluency is the ability of an application delivery controller (ADC) to manage both the network and applications for optimal performance, and seamlessly at that. The ADC adjusts the network conditions to accommodate changes in application environment; or manage access, availability, and performance of applications when the network fluctuates.

Enabling Business Conversations and Collaboration
8/26/2011 - Professional employees today rely on multiple devices and multiple communications to effectively drive one conversation. As consumer technologies continue to evolve and improve and younger, technology-savvy individuals join the workforce, the demand for innovation in employee mobility will continue to increase.

Join the Conversation
8/18/2011 - Business success relies on conversations. Nothing moves forward without leaders talking to leaders, colleagues to colleagues, devices to devices and networks to networks. What conversations are you driving within your own environment to support your strategic vision? If you don't know the answer, it's time to gain a better understanding of the conversations taking place for your benefit.

Collaborative Conversations Demand Focused Approach to Corporate Communications
8/5/2011 - There are more choices available today for connecting with each other than ever before. Employees can leverage a wide range of smartphone capabilities within the business environment. To support this evolution, companies must be able to adopt innovative efficiency, as well as collaboration technologies that enable them to remain competitive.

Today's Business Environments Demand Collaborative Conversations Enabled through Conferencing
7/29/2011 - The choices that are available for connecting individuals today are constantly evolving. With so many tools at their fingertips, consumers and business professionals demand even more from their smartphones and in-office devices. This is especially true within the business environment. To meet these growing demands, companies must be able to adopt technologies that are efficient and collaborative. Such an approach not only aims to satisfy user demand, but also to remain relevant and competitive in today's market.

Measurable Results are Born of Proven WorkForce Optimization Methods
7/22/2011 - The channels companies have available today for customer interaction extend far beyond the telephone or the website. Customers today can also use e-mail, social media, Web chat and more to make direct contact. As a result, every employee is now considered to be customer facing and the lines between the front office and the back office are blurring. To manage the dizzying array of customer service systems and related tasks, companies need a proven WorkForce optimization model.

Social Media Engagement and the Dynamic Enterprise
7/16/2011 - Companies in all industries are coming to realize that their strategies for providing effective customer service and achieving bottom line results must include social media. It is not so clear, though, just how to create integrated social media engagement.

Changing the Workplace Conversation: Using Communications Solutions to Improve Employee Engagement
7/5/2011 - It seems logical to conclude that changes in communication technologies are impacting business performance, presumably for the better. But is that assumption actually correct? If yes, is technology being fully leveraged to reap the most benefits for enterprises and their employees? Alcatel-Lucent decided to find out.

The Dynamic Enterprise: Designing and Procuring Private and Public Data Center Clouds
6/30/2011 - Tablet computers, virtualization, and 'cloud-o-nomics' are driving a fundamental shift in data center design and IT delivery. At the center of the change is the data center network, which connects many devices and where greater speeds in smaller spaces are increasingly necessary.

Collaborative Conversations Drive Business Differentiation
6/9/2011 - How dynamic and collaborative are your employee conversations? Are you inviting creative banter to develop innovative solutions? Do you have the technologies in place to support team building among members located throughout the world? If you want to achieve differentiation in the market, employee engagement is truly the key.

Debunking Common Myths of the Single Vendor Network
5/29/2011 - Enterprises tend to assume that they will only ever work with a single vendor for all aspects of network management. But, recent research indicates this may no longer be the most effective approach.

Alcatel-Lucent's OpenTouch Drives Collaborative Conversations
5/13/2011 - Unified communications is a core focus for a number of companies and organizations as they have sought to streamline disparate systems to deliver the best experience for all users. To truly optimize the business-centered community, service providers need to extend unified communications over time and additional channels.

Application Fluency: A Unique Approach to Enterprise Networking
4/22/2011 - The opportunities for service providers are expanding, as long as these providers can embrace their network assets and develop new business models to drive the delivery of new services. The biggest opportunities are found in applications and an application fluency network provides the ultimate and unique approach to enterprise networking.

Leverage your Highly Available Network to Improve Employee Access to Productivity Tools and Applications
2/27/2011 - Enterprises often tend to think that the network is one area with a lot of potential for cost savings-and they're right. The trick is figuring out how to achieve the savings without negatively impacting network capabilities or going down a rabbit hole of upgrades with long-term ROI but significant short-term investment.

Best Practices for Integrating Mobile Employees into the Business Communications Framework
2/27/2011 - As a matter of course, employees at many companies now carry around a variety of mobile communication and productivity devices, ranging from smartphones to netbooks and laptops to tablet computers. Unfortunately, often these devices operate in a way that's mostly or completely isolated from the enterprise network. This limits both the usefulness of these tools and the productivity of workers.

Drive Business Innovation by Integrating Business and Customer Data from Multiple Sources
2/27/2011 - Often, it takes more than one resource to be successful. That's certainly the case for today's contact centers, which are increasingly finding it necessary to extend customer service operations beyond traditional boundaries.

Best Practices for Utilizing BI Dashboards to Optimize Contact Center Operations
2/23/2011 - Information: you can't operate a business without it. But a jumble of disorganized information won't help you, which is why most successful businesses pursue the business intelligence that can be gained by operational performance management solutions so avidly. Contact centers are no different: in these environments, there's a real, driving need for operational performance management solutions that can help them gain meaningful, actionable business intelligence about the contact center's operations.

Reducing OPEX via Optimized Network Management
2/21/2011 - It's no secret that, given current market conditions, enterprises must find ways to reduce operating expenses without hampering their ability to continue effectively serving customer needs.

Best Practices for Improving Agent Performance by Optimizing Back Office Operations
2/17/2011 - Optimizing agent performance is a key concern for all contact center organizations. Consistently reaching this goal requires integrating front and back office operations. When this happens, agents are able to focus fully on providing outstanding customer service.

Best Practices for Providing Multichannel Customer Service
2/15/2011 - Customers today expect the companies with which they do business to be able to interact with them through an ever-greater number of channels. These channels - while still dominated by voice - increasingly also include text messaging, e-mail, live chat and Web self-service. Many companies have already begun adopting these Web-based channels to give customers service choices that transcend traditional phone interactions.

How Reducing Network Complexity Leads to Improved Energy Efficiencies
2/13/2011 - Enterprises seeking to cut costs by running more energy-efficient businesses are finding that the best way to achieve this goal is through reducing the complexity of their networks. This means converging infrastructures, a process that can be complicated in-and-of-itself.

How Can a SIP-Enabled IP Infrastructure Facilitate Managed and Hosted Services from the Cloud?
2/10/2011 - Business today is more competitive than ever, particularly in a wobbly economic climate. For many companies providing similar services, what separates them from the great herd is customer acquisition, customer retention and customer loyalty, and how you go about achieving those precious resources. As a result, many enterprises are looking for a sustainable strategy to improve customer service performance while lowering their operational cost.

Leveraging Web 2.0 Tools and Social Media to Enhance Customer Experience
1/17/2011 - Web 2.0. You've heard of it. Maybe even dabbled in it personally. But is it right for your business? If you're very, very brave, chances are you're a veteran with it, marketing via social networking and building online communities. But for the rest of you, it might seem like a scary prospect.

Utilize Business Activity Monitoring Tools to Improve Visibility to Operations
12/23/2010 - It's a challenge every business faces eventually: keeping your customers during an economic downturn. You may not have the marketing budget to prospect for more customers, and you may not have the budget to launch new, flashy product lines, but you have no choice about one thing: you need to keep the customers you have. In other words, you need to figure out how to prevent churn, oftentimes with fewer human and technology resources than you had just a few months ago.

The Application Revolution on Your Desktop: How Smart Desk Phones Will Revolutionize Enterprise Communications
12/15/2010 - Next gen communications technologies, including smart desk phones, are revolutionizing operations at enterprises. The ability to converge voice and data networks and provide real value to clients represents a major opportunity for companies like Alcatel-Lucent.

How Can Service Providers Participate in the Healthcare Revolution?
12/1/2010 - There has never been a more important time in the relationship between healthcare and communications. Alcatel-Lucent works with healthcare providers to develop a communications infrastructure that improves patient care. The company realizes healthcare operators need access to knowledge instantly and the right people connected at the right time. They have to improve responses and increase the time caregivers can spend with patients.

eServices Solutions Enable Enterprises to Offer Flexible, Yet Integrated Customer Engagement Strategies
12/1/2010 - In an effort to compete in today's competitive market, enterprises need to ensure that they are consistently offering a high-level customer service experience. To make certain that they offer adequate support, many companies have begun providing current and prospective customers with a myriad of different ways to stay in touch, including, email, instant messaging, SMS and a number of different social media sites.

Intelligent Networks, Smart Metering Technology Can Help Enterprises Lower Energy Consumption
12/1/2010 - In today's volatile economic times, enterprises and SMBs of every size and stature are looking to lower operating costs to improve their bottom line. To achieve this goal, a growing number of companies have made the decision to embrace green energy solutions, which can help eliminate the incredible amount of power that is wasted each year in the course of delivering electricity through a traditional grid. These cost-saving initiatives are also being adopted by companies that are looking to become more eco-friendly.

How to Simplify Network Management via Centralized Network Administration
11/23/2010 - Managing complex, high-performance communications networks can present significant challenges for companies of all sizes. Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise has the product range and expertise that providers need to overcome these barriers and strengthen the core of their business.

How Can Smart Devices Help to Unify the End User Experience in Diverse Settings
11/19/2010 - A variety of smart devices can be used with great results employing the technology from Alactel-Lucent. The settings can be diverse as educational institutions, banks and businesses of all sizes.

Improve Workforce Optimization and Back Office Productivity with Intelligent Workload Distribution
11/5/2010 - To drive productivity, you must be able to distribute the workload intelligently throughout the organization. This is especially true within the call center environment where managers struggle to match the availability of the agent with the skills the customer needs. Throw into the mix the volume of staff and things can get dicey.

How Cross Channel Conversations Create Customer Loyalty and Improve Satisfaction
10/27/2010 - In today's economy, if you only have one channel through which to communicate with your customers, you are missing key opportunities to deliver the experience they want that will build the loyalty you need. Did you know you can drive considerable satisfaction simply by offering multiple ways for customers to interact with your company?

Empower Employees by Providing Real-Time Visibility to Performance and Productivity
10/1/2010 - To help employees to gain access to the information they need, enterprises today are implementing business intelligence and operational metrics. Such tools help the organization and its employees to understand performance.

Unified Video Communications - Four Key Benefits
9/10/2010 - Basically, Medium and large enterprises are finding new opportunities to reduce costs and improve team collaboration and customer service by deploying the latest enterprise video solutions. Unified video communications can help, as these products bring UC and video collaboration together.

Five Best Practices for Operational Performance Management Products
9/3/2010 - But the tool needs to be "comprehensive," say Alcatel-Lucent officials: "This means that it needs to offer both real-time response and long-term historical analysis, and it needs to give you the flexibility to achieve a true enterprise view of your contact center operations."

How Can an IP Network Management Tool Unify a Multi-Vendor/Multi-Technology Environment?
8/26/2010 - Within the IP network, it is common for the IT manager to be faced with the challenge of handling a variety of vendors and multiple technologies. Such variety is needed to effectively transport voice, data and video traffic.

Utilizing Open Communications Platforms to Improve Emergency Notification and Response Times
8/20/2010 - Emergency response is a key point of consideration for a number of organizations as of late due to changes in technology and the way in which we communicate. This is especially true for school and college campuses throughout the United States.

How Can you Use Customer Service Delivery as a Differentiator?
8/19/2010 - Service providers everywhere are facing a common challenge - delivering content-rich data to a growing customer base.

Using eServices for Cross-Channel Customer Service Improvements
7/15/2010 - Alcatel-Lucent officials say that a "significantly expanded eServices" offering for customer service and sales is key to improving customer service. As an example they point to their recent work with the Genesys Knowledge Management, Genesys Web Callback and Genesys SMS.

Optimize Network Resources to Decrease Power Usage and Improve Efficiencies
7/2/2010 - To help try and embrace these pressures to produce change, companies are turning to intelligent networks and smart metering in cooperation with their utility company partners.

Using an Intelligent Infrastructure to Create a Safe Campus
6/20/2010 - Emergencies on campuses are changing the process of communications.

IT and Telecom Convergence in the Enterprise Delivers Measurable Value
6/8/2010 - The demand for the convergence of IT and telecom within the enterprise continues to grow and with this change comes the transformation of the network to improve business processes, innovation and collaboration.

A 'Smarter Desktop': Desk Phones and the Application Revolution
6/4/2010 - The new phone is designed to bring together "enterprise reliability," as well as a way to access multimedia communications capabilities and Web applications "to create personalized mashups or industry-tailored applications."

Alcatel-Lucent Outlines Benefits Driving Converged Networks
5/13/2010 - A converged network can bring many business benefits to an enterprise, primary amongst them are including increased productivity and positive effects to an enterprise's financial and business goals.

The Benefits of Convergence for the Enterprise
5/7/2010 - There is a growing need for IT and telecom convergence within the enterprise. As this happens, network transformation can improve business processes, innovation and collaboration. One prime example of this benefit is in the 10-year global alliance of Alcatel-Lucent and HP.

Alcatel-Lucent Extends Genesys Portfolio of Contact Center Solutions
4/28/2010 - The Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise Market Group has placed a focus on leveraging the Genesys brand and tap into the Genesys best-of-breed offerings that were traditionally separate from Alcatel-Lucent's enterprise portfolio.

Securing the Enterprise from Core to Edge
4/20/2010 - The enterprise security challenge can be seen from three perspectives, Alcatel-Lucent finds: Managing risk, protecting data and managing costs.

Partnering to Deliver the Dynamic Enterprise
4/9/2010 - In the case of Hewlett Packard and Alcatel-Lucent, they come together to form a 10-year global alliance that knits together and jointly markets IT and communications technologies for service provider and enterprise customers.

Embrace New Technologies to Improve Energy Efficiency and Reduce Cost
4/1/2010 - Alcatel-Lucent officials say they believe that a holistic approach to eco-sustainability "focuses on building intelligent and environmentally responsible end-to-end communications networks that add value to our customers' business."

Alcatel-Lucent Unveils 'Smart Desk Phone'
3/24/2010 - Similar to what the BlackBerry and iPhone did to transform mobile phones, Alcatel-Lucent could do the same thing for traditional desktop phones.

Overcoming Transformation Challenges with a Centralized IP Server
3/10/2010 - The IP transformation resulted in a vastly simplified network operation and management through a single, easy-to-use interface.

Improve Collaboration and Streamline Business Operations with Unified Communications
3/5/2010 - Companies are realizing that all operations can be streamlined and collaboration is improved when UC is a strategic priority.

Going Beyond the Triple Play to Deliver Dynamic Hospitality Solutions
2/25/2010 - In the world of hospitality, it is no long enough to offer simple telecommunications if top industry performers hope to stand out from the competition.

Alcatel-Lucent and HP Form Alliance to Harness ICT and Leverage Assets for Dynamic Enterprise
2/12/2010 - A company's greatest assets include its people and knowledge. In order to leverage full value from these assets, the company must be able to effectively blend them with the network and processes.

Simplify Network Management to Enable Next Generation Wireless Services
11/16/2009 - On the positive side of this movement, wireless operators can leverage their industry knowledge and experience about building, operating and optimizing wired IP networks to efficiently build and operate wireless networks.

Ensuring Enterprise Security in a 2.0 World
10/16/2009 - According to next generation communications experts at Alcatel-Lucent, security must become a positive enabler for driving business performance.

The Changing Landscape of Wireless Networks
10/5/2009 - The growth in demand for advanced mobile devices is proof-positive that networks must provide smarter, faster and more efficient technology.

How Green is Your Network? Increasing Operational Sustainability
8/10/2009 - For an enterprise network with 6,000 1Gb access ports and 3,000 IP phones in a 10Gb backbone configuration, Alcatel-Lucent equipment can save businesses more than 1,000 megawatt hours and more than $150,000 over a five-year period, the company said.