UC500\UC300\BE3000 EOL

[crowe]

https://communities.cisco.com/message/128811#128811

End-of-Life Announcement: Cisco Business Edition 3000, Unified Communications 500 Series, and Unified Communications 300 Series

Cisco®  Business Edition 6000 is Cisco’s leading midmarket on-premises  solution, providing right-priced, optimized collaboration for companies  supporting from 25 to 1000 users, and partner-hosted collaboration  powered by Cisco enabling customers to collaborate directly from the  cloud. Together, these two solutions options are addressing the trends  that midmarket companies are facing across the globe. With these trends  in mind, Cisco is simplifying the small and midsize portfolio to the  Business Edition 6000 and cloud collaboration.

Figure 1  Cisco Unified Communications and Collaboration Portfolio for Small and Midsize Businesses

To  do this efficiently, we are reducing today’s portfolio offers with the  end of life of the lower-end on-premises unified communications  platforms, effective July 22, 2013. The Cisco Business Edition 3000,  Unified Communications 500 Series, and Unified Communications 300 Series  will be available for partners and customers until January 2014.

Please refer to Q&A below, and contact us with any questions.

Q&A

Can  I continue selling the Cisco® Unified Communications 300 (UC300),  Unified Communications 500 (UC500), and Business Edition 3000 (BE 3000)?  Will they be supported?

Yes, these products will be available  until January 2014. However, customers and partners are encouraged to  deploy the BE 6000 or cloud-hosted collaboration moving forward. The  end-of-sale announcement will describe support timelines.

What is the replacement product options?

Cisco Business Edition 6000 for up to 1000 users

Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express on the Cisco Integrated Services Routers (ISR) for branch offices

For  deployments of fewer than 25 users, we recommend the use of the Cisco  SPA IP phone series in conjunction with a hosted service provider, and  for deployments of fewer than 10 users, a third-party PBX service is  recommended. The migration program, planned for availability on August  1, 2013, will offer support for migrating SPA phones to Cisco Unified IP  Phones, which can be used on the BE 6000 and in cloud-hosted  deployments.

Is there a migration plan for UC300, UC500 and BE 3000 customers? And will my existing SPA phones be included in the plan?

Planned  for availability on August 1, existing customers on the UC300, UC500,  and BE 3000 platforms will be able to migrate to the BE 6000 via the SMB  Collaboration migration program. Support for migrating SPA phones to  Cisco Unified IP Phones is also be included in the program.

Is Cisco leaving the sub-20 market?

No. Cisco has multiple solutions covering the sub-20 small business segment,

including branch, networking, security, and voice and conferencing endpoints

Also, for more information about the Cisco Small Business portfolio, visit www.cisco.com/go/smallbusiness

What is the support model for the BE 6000 compared to the UC300 and UC500?

The  BE 6000 is supported by the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC);  the UC300 and UC500 are supported via the Cisco Small Business Support  Center.

How do I get updates on the BE 6000?

On the Cisco Support Community Business Edition 6000 page or on Cisco.com

Is the BE 6000 a real option for midsize customers?

Yes,  the Cisco BE 6000 has recently expanded its midmarket support by adding  a 25-user bundle to effectively support deployments with fewer users,  reducing cost and simplifying the ordering experience, and adding  support for Cisco Prime™ Collaboration. In addition, a new Express  Collaboration Specialization focuses on enabling midmarket partners to  have a successful business practice with the BE 6000. This new partner  program is designed specifically for partners who serve the small and  midsize customer segments, pulling together Cisco's flagship  collaboration, unified communications, and cloud solutions into a single  program. The Express Collaboration Specialization significantly reduces  the requirements and cost for partners desiring to develop a Cisco  Collaboration practice and resell the BE 6000.

How do I find more details about the Express Collaboration Specialization?

Visit Cisco Partner Central

End-of-Life/End-of-Sale Announcements:

Cisco Business Edition 3000

Cisco Unified Communications Manager 500

Cisco Unified Communications Manager 300

[CCMADM1N1_2]

and to add, theres only 1 way cisco can fix this:

allow SBCS / Select Certified partners to sell CME (1861, 2900, 3900) ISR's

i have ccna voice and soon will have ccnp voice, but because I work as a lean small business owner

I am punished and cannot sell CME even tho I am plenty qualified to do so, just because I wont hire people

that I dont need and cant afford? I can easily manage my customer base alone or with an occasional helper

installer/tech when needed. But because I dont/ cant employ additional techs I dont "qualify" for silver or whatever level

you call it now to sell and leverage promotions for CME, only the soon defunct UC's which are essentially the same thing

anyway...

ridiculous - give us CME

[rees]

This is a perfect example of why the EOL of the UC is such a bad decision....

Sad.

[paolo bevilacqua]

I recommend that you contact you distributor on the matter, and evaluate all possible ordering licensing options.

Also, is always possible to buy from other sources.

[eebarker]

We started down that route (asking the disty) 3 weeks ago.  No info yet.

We're now speaking to our inside Account Manager in Cisco.  He told us we're not the first to raise this issue and is asking his Product Support Specialists for some direction.  If I get an answer I can post I will.

As for other sources than distributors, I'm not prepared to risk my customers by going through a grey channel.  Or did you mean  non-Cisco options that we also don't want to do but may now have no choice if we want any business in this space...

[paolo bevilacqua]

I have bougth Cisco products from various reputable sources and never had any problem. You can also check Cisco refurbished offering.

[CCMADM1N1_2]

buying product is easy...but I want to leverage promotions, register deals, and be a legit cisco supported partner

not buy some random products from another reseller at higher prices,

no promo's, and no official cisco support and technically not

recognized as someone certified to sell/manage a certain product line

I know CME

better than 90% of the larger companies/partners that sell/service CME

because their focus is typically Enterprise client base and CUCM and Collaboration + Routing & Switching and UCS - even CUCMBE

CME BELONGS with the small business partners that sold UC's as well

I mean, a 2901 - 2921 = UC520 to UC560 (8 to 100-ish phones, SG300/200 switches,

ISA500 security, CUE, 7900 phones..)

Cisco has a few weeks to see the light here before I and my clients bail for

good..

[paolo bevilacqua]

Actually there is major savings buying from other sources.

Cisco gives technical support and hardware replacement only if you pay for a support contract. That can be done even if the product has not been bought  new from a distributor.

Cisco wail not change their decision on the UC500 and will not introduce a successor. Also, they made CME licensing more complicated and expensive.

Based on these facts any partner can make their decisions in their best interest.