Cisco Call Manager

Cisco Unified Communications Manager (also called Call Manager) is an integral component of Cisco Unified Communications solution. Cisco Call Manager is an application that controls calls in a collaborative scenario among users with diverse requirements of tools and resources. Cisco Call Manager has evolved to its current 10.5 version with state-of the-art features and capabilities. Geared to an enterprise, Cisco Call Manager Version 10.5 can support as many as 40,000 users.  Most of these users in the enterprise are mobile. Cisco Call Manager is uniquely designed to support this mobility requirement: communication from anywhere and from any device.  An enterprise can choose to deploy Call manager in different configurations, such as on-premises or in public cloud.

The main role of Call Manager is the extension of telephony features and functions to IP or packet-based telephony and devices in an enterprise setting. Packet telephony includes several devices such as: IP phones, media processing devices, gateways, and multimedia applications. Additionally, CallManager implements – via Application Programming Interface (API) – other sophisticated features including multimedia conferencing. for the following:

Call processing: telephony call processing that is extended to IP based telephony; includes origination, termination, and routing calls to the correct destination. Call processing collects telephone and customer related (statistical) data in an enterprise and take part in the billing process.[spacer][spacer]

Signaling: supports call setup and teardown in an IP telephony setup.

Cisco CallManager offers users with a dial plan that is scalable and configurable. Users are able to use CallManager for call routing as well as administering phone features such as: conference, speed dial, or call forward.

For storing user information, Cisco CallManager has a database repository. So, it is easy for the CallManager to validate a user locally.  This is needed for and used in conjunction with the Contact Center. In addition, Cisco CallManager facilitates directory synchronization for managing users in a centralized manner.

Other unique features are: Offering of API that is used for external applications such as soft IP Phone, simple provisioning scheme, easy maintenance, backup tools, and restoring tools along with a sophisticated disaster recovery (DR) system. The later can be very handy in updating call details record (CDR), for example.
Cisco Call Manager is a software product. An enterprise must install it on Cisco server (called Cisco Media Convergence Servers or MCS, 7800 Series ) or on server platforms that have been approved by Cisco.

Cisco Call Manager Benefits for an enterprise:

• User-friendly communications increase productivity;
• Unified communication (voice, video and instant messaging) for effective work;
• Enhanced collaboration with simple click to initiate a video conferencing call.