Cloud PBX with Microsoft Teams Basics – Part 1

Cloud PBX is the next step to deliver one of the important business cases to a Software as a Service. But what is Cloud PBX in detail and on which ways we can implement Cloud PBX? Let’s take a look at Cloud PBX in Microsoft Teams and how it works.

Basics of Cloud PBX

If we talk about Cloud PBX we need a look at the basics of telephony and the basics terms.

PSTN – Public Switched Telephone Network

PSTN is the public network of telephony. This network connects the different callers around the world and is the base of the traditional telephony. At home or at the company the PSTN ends at NTBA

NTBA

It is the endpoint of PSTN and connects the internal network with the public switched telephony network. All providers support you up to the NTBA. After it is your private network and you need your own support and experts to manage it.

PBX – Private Branch Exchange

PBX is your internal telephone system and it managed all numbers for your employees, connects internal calls and route calls outside of your company. Traditionally the telephone system was separate hardware. Over time, PBX switched to classic server software. A popular example is Asterisk.

Simple Network with telephony

Let’s take a look of a very simple example of how a network is designed with a telephony system

Here we can see how the telephony is integrated into a network. On the right side, we have the PSTN network with the NTPM (a business form of NTBA). Classically, analog systems like fax or a telephone are connected to PBX. On the other side, we see a classic LAN. The PBX is connected to this LAN and there is the possibility to connect softphone to PBX.

Mostly we find a network like this (definitely more complex) in a business context.

Benefits and the why question of CloudPBX

Now we know PBX is the telephone system.  Therefore Cloud PBX is a software to get the functionality of a telephone system as a service (in this case from Microsoft). Microsoft integrates PBX in Microsoft Teams. With Cloud PBX you switch from a classic ISDN connection to VOIP.

There are a lot of benefits and some changes if you use Cloud PBX and connect telephone and Microsoft Teams together. From my point of view, the biggest benefit is the lower administration of PBX systems. Telephony is a very specific system and you need a lot of knowledge to manage it. With Cloud PBX you can focus on your business with less administration and you get new features to grow your business. Also, your clients use only one software to collaborate with. Everything you need to communicate and collaborate (document management, chats, conferencing, etc..)  is in one application, overall devices (smartphone, tablet, pc). With Cloud PBX you can use your landline number with teams on your smartphone, landline goes mobile.

Last but not least, with cloud PBX there is no need to make a big investment with uncertainty about how your business is growing. Now there is the possibility to scale the telephone system per user, every month.

summary key benefits:

• focus on your business – no expert knowledge need
• integration in applications your clients know
• use your landline on mobile devices
• scale your telephone system per user

In the next post, we make a technical view of how we can integrate Cloud PBX and which decision we need to make if we implement Cloud PBX.