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

[JOSEPH GALEA]

John,

Does "Router+CME+CUE" and "BE6K" both support VPN with these phones?

Joe

[johschaf]

Hello Joe,

I honestly am not sure, as I only support the UC500 devices.

I did some research on the IP Telephony forums and found this: https://supportforums.cisco.com/docs/DOC-12173

That document references CUCM, which BE6K is based off of. Also, the VPN in those instances is terminated on an ISR or ASA.

I would post your question here, https://supportforums.cisco.com/community/netpro/collaboration-voice-video/ip-telephony, as that forum is probably better suited to answer your question.

Thanks,

-john

[JOSEPH GALEA]

Thanks

[aadamhassanali · Accepted solution]

This is absolutely ridiculous. WHY Cisco??
You've officially alienated and pushed yourself out of the small business market.

UC300 - perfect for small micro
UC500 - perfect for 90% of customers under 100 users

The only possible way, as pierrescotland said, is if we can get that initial server cost down or out.

Cisco has abandoned the SMB market.

Avaya IP Office (grudginly) and even *gasp* Asterisk are now the ONLY options.

I understand your push to video and Unified/Collaboration, but bulldozing your path is simply not the way to get this done.

Please re-think this stance.

Rees Roberts summed it up nicely:

The other beauty of the UC, was you didn't need a rack to deploy it. Sell it to a small office, mount it on thier back board and they now have a firewall, wireless, killer SMB PBX, and 8 port switch.

I'm sorry guys, but the more I think about this, the more I think you're blowing it.

Cisco has always been awesome about getting their partners input on products, you blew it on this one.

I would venture to bet, very few Select Certified people are aware of this, otherwise there would be WAY more posts in this forum.

[John Platts]

The UC520, UC540, and UC560 hardware platforms are actually outdated. The UC520, UC540, and UC560 hardware platforms use PVDM2 DSPs, whereas the 2900 and 3900 series ISRs use PVDM3 DSPs. The UC520 model was released over 6 years ago, and the UC540 and UC560 models were released almost 4 years ago. The UC520 and UC540 models have non-Gigabit ports, but most of the newer Cisco products have switched to Gigabit Ethernet or 10-Gigabit Ethernet ports. The UC540 still has a Wireless-G access point, but almost all of the other Cisco wireless products have Wireless-N capability. The UC500 series also does not have the video transcoding capabilities available on 2900 and 3900 series ISRs.

Cisco Configuration Assistant, which is the management tool for the Smart Business Communications System and the UC500 series, is not capable of configuring all of the features that are available on the UC500 series. Some of the capabilities of the UC500 series have to be configured with CLI. Even though Cisco has enhanced CCA since the launch of the UC500 series, Cisco has never gotten CCA right. The configuration GUIs found on other Cisco Unified Communications solutions, including CallManager, BE3000, BE6000, and UC300, allow all of the UC features to be configured through a GUI. Solutions from Zultys, Avaya, and other competitors also had the capability to have all of the UC features configured through a GUI.

The UC500 series does need to be discontinued since its hardware platform is outdated, its configuration GUI lacks capabilities that are available with CallManager, BE6000, and competitors' UC solutions, and the UC500 solution lacks telephony features that are available on competitors' UC solutions.

[paolo bevilacqua]

John Platts wrote:
The UC520, UC540, and UC560 hardware platforms are actually outdated. The UC520, UC540, and UC560 hardware platforms use PVDM2 DSPs, whereas the 2900 and 3900 series ISRs use PVDM3 DSPs. 

Maybe somewhat outdates, but these are PBX meant to last for many years, not bleeding edge routers.

PVDM3 has no signgicant advantage over PVDM2 (still supported on the ISR G2), and both do what customers

 The UC520 model was released over 6 years ago,.

And it had been EoS since years already.

The UC520 and UC540 models have non-Gigabit ports, but most of the newer Cisco products have switched to Gigabit Ethernet or 10-Gigabit Ethernet ports. 

There is no need for a PBX to handle more that 100 Mbps of traffic, so that was not a issue. Do we want a look at the surpassed hardware that competittors still have? One would have a big laugh then.

Cisco Configuration Assistant, which is the management tool for the Smart Business Communications System and the UC500 series, is not capable of configuring all of the features that are available on the UC500 series. Some of the capabilities of the UC500 series have to be configured with CLI. Even though Cisco has enhanced CCA since the launch of the UC500 series, Cisco has never gotten CCA right. 

So that means, since the GUI doesn't do all, Cisco has to take away also the CLI thaty worked just fine for many.

 The UC500 series does need to be discontinued since its hardware platform is outdated, its configuration GUI lacks capabilities that are available with CallManager, BE6000, and competitors' UC solutions, and the UC500 solution lacks telephony features that are available on competitors' UC solutions.

Again, for PBXs hardware is not important. but price is. Above I've mentioned some features that my customers love but  that are not present on CM. As many have said, Cisco decision is wrong and that can't be denied.

[John Platts]

UC500 and CME both support overlay buttons, but only on IP phones that support SCCP. Overlay buttons are not available on IP phones that support only the SIP protocol in CME, such as the 3905, 8961, 9951, 9971, and the Jabber client. CUCM does not support overlay buttons.

Even though the UC500 platform does support multisite dialing and multisite VPNs, it does not have full support for multisite clustering that is offered on the Zultys MX30, Zultys MX250, or the full CallManager. Zultys and other competitors also offer many features in SMB UC solutions that are not even available on the UC500, UC300, or BE3000. I certainly do agree that price is important, and Cisco does certainly need to develop a suitable replacement for SBCS.

The full CUCM product actually does have CLI, but the telephony features are configured in a web-based GUI that is more advanced than the CCA program and the CUCM system settings can be changed through GUIs. The ISRs used in deployments of the full CUCM product are also configured using CLI.

[paolo bevilacqua]

It's not useful to be arguing on this or that feature.

Cisco will not develop anything like the UC500 anymore. Times have changed and who really want to get value with simplicity can use the ISR G2 - CME.

For me and the many others here, UC500 was a better proposition than BE, especially if updated to lates IOS, that was doable but Cisco did not wanted to do. Then if you think differently we can agree to disagree.

[rees · Accepted solution]

You guys who are argueing for the BE6K, or the virtues of the BE6K over the UC are missing the point.

As a vendor, I thought FINALLY we have a manufaturer who understand SMB and what they WANT/NEED. The UC fit the bill perfectly.

You can take all of the features tht the BE6K has beyond the UC and throw them out, they don't matter to 99% of the sub 100 employee companies. That's just a fact.

For 99% of deployments, I can use the CCA and deliver a feature rich, stable system. I could care less about 10/100 switch ports on the device, etc. If they need GB, we can get them a GB switch.

Here's the dollars and cents reality. With the UC I can sell a system for 20 users, installed for about $6500. Using Avaya IP Office it's about $12,000. by the time you ad all the voice compression modules, voicemail, etc.

Which is why we quit selling Avaya completly.

Unless there is some miracle, Cisco is going to be out of the sub 100 market in voice. And they are going to feel the hit in top line revenue. And, they are going to send a lot of VAR's with them to the company grave who have build the UC as thier main service offering.

It's a shame.

[eebarker]

I can only echo the comments above having only caught up on this news today. 

This is a real blow to plans for myself and a couple of other Voice/IT service companies I work with.  Cisco state on their EOL wording that they want people to move to BE 6000.  This just isn’t going to work for smaller companies/sites. Neither is the ISR G2 approach.  Both are too complex / too expensive for the customer base and suport model.

It looks like Cisco are walking away from this business segment.  Is that the case ?

Are Cisco assuming everyone with these smaller offices is going to cloud based services this soon ?? 

If so, that is a serious mistake.  In many parts of the UK and Europe the Internet services this target market has isn't reliable enough, and the features available aren't there yet in the service solutions.  Think Auto Attendant, call routing etc. for a doctors surgery as one example, there are plenty of others.

I have one partner that has in the last six months decided to ditch Avaya and go with Cisco and was really happy with the UC500 series, We even had a discussion yesterday about a number of potential projects coming up. This leaves us dead in the water.

Euan

[paolo bevilacqua]

CME/ISR G2 is not really much more expensive. Just buy sensibily, evaluating components and licensing carefully.

The advantage, as mentioned before, is that you get up to date software that is still evolving, and few more years of support and development.

[eebarker]

A UC560 T1/E1 with 24 user license for CME and Voicemail is USD 4245 list price.

If I work on specifying an equivalent 2901 with UC license, CME for 25 people, a VWIC T1/E1, a 2 port FXS card, SRE with CUE for 25 people, PVDM ugrade to 64 I am at USD 9665 list price.

This is over twice as much in a cost senstitive market. 

If you have a different suggestion on an ISR G2 platform that won't push the cost up as much please let me know.

Thanks

Euan

[paolo bevilacqua]

Without going into details, it's matter of configuring all options carefully for best savings. For example for small sites up to 15 phones one can a 1861. There also some 880V versions supporting up to 5 phones. Also, one can save a bunch using SIP trunks instead of T1/E1. All in all, ISR G2s with CME 10.0 are a superior platform that I think is worth the price delta.

If Cisco wants to be serious again in the SMB UC market again, all what it takes it to enable CCA and SPA phones on ISR G2, and create bundles. Both are low-cost activities requiring no significant resorces, we'll see if they understand that.

[jeliasoncisco]

Hi.
I was reviewing your bill of materials. I am in the same boat and have been doing a lot of research.

On the 2901 I recommend an ism 300 vs sre for voicemail. It has all the capacity you need. Up to 100 users. In fact there is an 2901 ism bundle with pvdm.

Also why use a 64 pvdm? You only need it when going to other codec or tdm and max t1 trunks is 24.

Thanks.

FYI... CCP is enabled on ISR and has same telephony function as CCA.


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[CCMADM1N1_2]

this is VERY disappointing. My client base is perfect for uc500 and they and I all love it

moving to the very confusing,very expensive, and likely less accessible enterprise style/class of

architecture is wrong and will not work, its clear cisco is prepared to lose the SMB market and its SMB "partners"

and be happy with the tiny percentage that can justify (or wants to) the newer design/systems

I will prepare to shut down my SMB BIZ AND go back to work in the enterprise

I dont trust cisco to keep an appropriate presence in the smb space if they couldnt see and continue supporting

a successful product like UC500. You change direction too quick and too often for us to keep up

- We spent TONS of $$ on small biz pro gear and Uc's and On-Net and SBCS support

and now its all garbage ALREADY and worthless minus ebay scraps and home labs

asterisk here we come...