Anecdotal evidence from several dozen Forrester IT client inquiries and consulting engagements during the past two years suggests that large MNCs are almost always multisourcing their international WANs and other global telecom services. We estimate that more than nine in ten large user companies (firms with 1,000 or more employees in overseas offices) buy international WAN, Internet access, and fixed voice services from three or more network operators or specialists. The larger the firm, the more likely they are to use one and sometimes two top-tier global telecoms providers (like AT&T, Verizon, BT, Orange) for multiregional international telecoms, and additional — often smaller players or VPN specialists (e.g., Level 3/Global Crossing, Azzurri, Virtela, Masergy) — for important international markets, or regional providers such as in Europe (e.g., BT Global Services, Orange Business Services, T-Systems) and Asia-Pacific (e.g., NTT, SingTel, Telstra). Global firms also increasingly are interested in buying some services from emerging market players like Tata Communications and Reliance Globalcom.

Global enterprises’ rationale for multisourcing falls into two broad categories:

1)      Global telecoms — networks and comms apps running over them — are considered “too strategic” to entrust to just one service provider.  

2)      As we keep hearing over and over, “There’s not actually a truly global network operator — they all rely on others, sometimes many others.”

How much of your IT operating and capital budget will go to UC related investments? I predict that spending by large distributed enterprises (defined as firms with 1,000 or more employees) on communications infrastructure and services will grow between 7% and 10% per year during the next three years. Moreover, there will be a gradual shift away from hardware to software, and wireless connectivity will account for MOST of the growth in communications services spending.

Momentum is building for broader UC adoption, and our Q1 2011 survey of 601 firms that have implemented or are piloting a UC solution showed that 55% of the respondents consider UC a top priority this year.

There are two BIG drivers of widespread UC adoption in large distributed organizations: Mobility and new business models (how UC technology and services are delivered). Mobility will become the “tail that wags the UC dog.” Why? Consider the management and usage cost efficiencies offered by fixed mobile convergence (FMC)  technology — least-cost routing savings including reduced international calling and roaming charges,  to name one.

A growing number of workers own personal smartphones that they might want to use for work. However, IT support costs and security implications for personal mobile devices connected to the corporate network are unclear.

As a result, sourcing and vendor management (SVM) professionals need tools to improve visibility into the real costs of their firm's mobile program. Moreover, this challenge will grow as most firms expand their bring-your-own mobile programs during the next three years.

SVMs also want tools that improve transparency and accountability around mobile work apps for things like enterprise software license compliance by personal device users. Smart SVMs at firms with many or a fast growing population of mobile information workers have already studied or are studying ways to mitigate mobile cost and security risks associated with allowing employees to use personal devices like smartphones and tablets for work.

See my report, “Personal Device Momentum Will Challenge Traditional Mobile Sourcing Strategies” for a more detailed discussion about what companies are doing to address these challenges, and empower employees in new ways by offering more options on how – and where – they do their jobs.

Business users often view IT SVM as a bottleneck to getting new technologies that will make them more personally and professionally productive and that also will help ensure their firm’s competitiveness. Affordable mobile technologies like smartphones (Research In Motion’s BlackBerry, Apple’s iPhone, and Google’ Android are the most popular operating systems), cellular data air cards, network-connected PCs and tablets, etc. make it a lot easier (and hence more tempting than ever) to bypass IT’s seemingly archaic and slow-moving sourcing practices.

As a result, employees are increasingly bringing their own technology into the workplace. Forrester calls this trend “tech populism,” and it’s quickly gaining momentum. It might be a personal laptop sitting on the desk next to the corporate PC, or a personal smartphone that’s loaded up with self-purchased applications and freeware, either or both connecting to the employer’s guest WiFi Internet connection.

Additionally, more and more, traveling employees are leaving their business laptop at the office or at home -- relying instead either on their smartphone for simple email access during one- or two-day trips, complemented by personal thumbdrive memory sticks onto which reference and presentation documents have been downloaded and will be viewed (and possibly manipulated or transferred between multiple noncorporate devices) using a hotel, public kiosk, customer, colleague, or partner’s PC. So much for IT’s security policy enforcement! If a file or document can be downloaded onto a personal external drive, what happens to it afterward is at the discretion of the employee –- who after all usually is just trying to be more productive while taking better advantage of easier-to-use hardware and software tools than those provided by the company.

At Research In Motion’s (RIM) WES event last week (April 27-29, 2010), there was a customer panel session on individual liable versus corporate ownership of BlackBerry devices. The panelists included IT decision makers from the education sector, local government, and a large entertainment company. The panelist and audience comments validated the ongoing debate within many IT client firms about the values and challenges of managing an increasingly diverse population of mobile users in the enterprise. The debate around individual liable (IL) vs. corporate liable (CL) mobile device ownership and services payment is heating up.