Teams as the new Skype for Business client

Q: (from Janice)

We are developing an Enterprise Telecommunication practice to augment our Office 365 business. What is happening with Skype for Business? Should we hold off until the dust settles?

A:

You are obviously referencing some of the announcements that have come out of Envision and Ignite this week. Specifically the announcement that we will continue to work on improving the backend technology used for Skype for Business and will be moving the client experience toward Teams:

https://blogs.office.com/en-us/2017/09/25/a-new-vision-for-intelligent-communications-in-office-365/

But I think it’s important to understand that Skype for Business nor it’s client is immediately going away. If you have used Teams, you will recognize that the client experience is not comparable yet. But this is still GREAT news for us. It’s rare at Microsoft that we get this kind of insight regarding our product future. We now know that we can move forward with our PSTN Enterprise Voice plans but we MUST integrate Teams into our long-term strategy. Sure, you can deploy the Skype for Business client but Teams must be introduced at the appropriate time to prepare the customer for the future.

https://products.office.com/en-US/microsoft-teams/group-chat-software

  Steve