The market for Unified Communications and Collaboration in Latin America grew 5.7 percent in 2012, according to Frost & Sullivan.
The growth will continue in a positive trend, regardless of a slowdown in the region’s largest economy, Brazil.
In 2013, many key suppliers are experiencing greater traction year after year in major countries and sub-regions. The proliferation of connected devices, the rise of small and medium enterprises, and a better understanding of the companies of the benefits of Unified Communications are among the factors that are driving sales of UC in Latin America.
UC vendors face some challenges that impede higher sales. Latin America is the fastest growing region in the world with respect to new Internet users, an increase of 12 percent in 2012; yet the investment in infrastructure voice / data / video regionally is not aware of this growth. This is negatively impacting the quality and reliability of IP and UC solutions, particularly the video, and thus discouraging companies to invest in these solutions.
Availability of free solutions like Skype is making it difficult for vendors to sell UC solutions for the segment of SMEs While these solutions will always represent a challenge for suppliers, there are indications that SMEs are interested in acquiring solutions UC enterprise level to provide more security and functionality than their free counterparts.
SMEs accounted for 24.4 percent of total sales in the UC market in 2012, and the share of this segment continues to grow as vendors are putting a greater emphasis on developing solutions designed for SMEs.
