Mitel 250 6.3 and new Cloudlink

[BlackSunshine]

Our company sat through Mitel Presentation of Mitel 250 6.3 and Cloudlink today . 6900 series phones will work in SiP mode and in collaboration with Mitel Phone manager. Cloud link will give you UC Mobile on 250 in the cloud.  UC mobile isnt Micollab or Phone Manager...from what I take it’s an app driven UC.  Mitel will supply Cloudlink gateway for free in exchange for minimum of 10 seat purchase at a 8 dollar month cost.  Cloudlink will not work on the desktop. Hopes is that phone manager will go Cloudlink.  Another thing is cordless attachments for 5300 series phones in manufactured discontinued.  We asked if 6900 series phones would ever work in Minet mode on Mitel 250....answers was no.  Lots of people not happy

[jbbts]

Who presented this info to you, was it your regional CAM?  Interesting about the 6900 in SIP only.

[acejavelin]

This is sad... The MiVO 250 was one of our most popular premise systems, but lately customers "see" it as old compared to it's competitors, and this really seems like a step in the wrong direction. I don't know what to make of the future of this product, and now the cordless accessories are being discontinued on the 5300 series phones?!?!? WTH Mitel...

That said, our hosted solution has been far more popular in the last couple of years... for everything from tiny offices to huge university campuses. This really seems to be the direction we are going, and most of our competitors as well.

[acejavelin]

How is the functionality of the 6900 series phones on the MiVO250? If they are in SIP mode, do the normal restrictions apply like a standard SIP device? How are keys and BLF's handled? Can the phone work without the desktop client (most of our customers have no interest in a desktop client)?

[jmarcwsp1]

I agree ACE- The 5300 series phones were introduced in 2009.  They seem dated compared to third party SIP phones.  The 5000/250 has always been an afterthought.  $750 million for Inter-Tel 10+ years ago.  The 3300/ Business solution was always their flagship.   The Mitel 250 is not competitive with cloud solutions for ACD, CRM, collaboration, mobile integration, presence, Call Recording, Ease of Programming, Setup, redundancy etc.  Even the good old days of moving Axxess customers to the 5000 are few and far between...

[Tech Electronics]

Guys,

My understanding of the situation is that the MiVO-250 is going to be slowly put out of service. Back in the day when Mitel bought out Inter-Tel they had a 10-year roadmap to discontinue to the product. To my delight that didn't happen, but they have been putting less money into R&D of the system; to be expected.

When they came out with the MiVoice Business Express with its "limitations" the first thing through my head was, "There goes the MiVO-250, the beginning of the end".

Now, the few things I have heard and read lead me to believe that they are going to implement more SIP features into the MiVO-250, such as Reverse Transfer to match what they could do with MiNet phones. Also, if the customer adds a Phone Manager server the 6900 series phones could run a lite version of the client within itself for presence management to provide some DSS/BLF type functionality.

I still think the MiVO-250 has a lot to offer for many of our customers who aren't looking for an Enterprise level phone system.

Thanks,

TE

[BlackSunshine]

All I can say is everyone call Mitel Rep and raise hell!!! We need 6900 phones in Minet Mode on 250.   From what I took in presentation the Mitel 250 isn’t going anywhere. Mitel I think realizes they need to keep premise based systems with cloud apps. They did say in the presentation they are seeking Beta testers who have phone manager and 250...in exchange Mitel will give customer free 6900 sets.  The discontinued cordless devices for 5300 sets is a killer for us. We have couple hundred 250’s out there and 95% have at least one cordless attachments

[jbbts]

We have heard (and all Mitel marketing docs say) that all 3 premise products are hear to stay: the 250, Connect, and Business. 

The 250 specifically because it is the only system that can support digital devices, which is still a factor.  it is also the only system that can be cost competitive under 25 users.

[jmarcwsp1]

Maybe Mitel will wise up on their licensing costs after the package price.  $140 list for CAT D and $1900 for a networking license is so 2007.  It gets very un-competitive once you need to add servers and software to accomplish mobility features that every cloud solution offers.