The European unified communications (UC) market is set to defy shrinking IT budgets and grow by almost two-thirds this year, research house Forrester has predicted.

The 2009 Outlook for Unified Communications in Europe report claimed that European spend on UC technology is set to swell from $792m (£545m) in 2008 to $1.3bn this year. Forrester predicts that the market will be worth more than $6.5bn by 2015.

The report claims firms are still spending on UC deployments as they reduce costs, streamline business processes and improve collaboration. Forrester also predicts that continual improvements to Microsoft’s Office Communications Server (OCS) are giving traditional communications vendors pause for thought.

Report author Phil Sayer said he knew of at least one mid-market firm which had opted for a full OCS deployment.

“Five years ago who had heard of Cisco in the voice market?” he said. “A lot can happen in a short space
of time.”

Simon Aron, managing director of VAR Eurodata, claimed that a full UC installation of OCS R2, launched in October, was a viable option for small and mid-sized firms. “A lot of organisations are running five different manufacturers to achieve what OCS R2 does,” he said.

“But some are worried about going completely OCS. People are still hanging onto their telephones.”