Critical Links earns a "Promising" rating in leading analyst firm's latest evaluation which rates Unified Communications (UC) Solutions for Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs) in North America.

FAIRFIELD, NJ, June 3rd, 2010 - Critical Links, a global provider of unified voice, data, security and IT solutions for SMBs, today announced that top analyst firm Gartner, Inc has rated Critical Links as "Promising" in the "MarketScope for Unified Communications for the SMB Market, North America" report by Joslyn Faust and Megan Marek Fernandez published on April 9, 2010. Other vendors rated in this report as "Promising" include Cisco, IBM, Siemens, Microsoft and NEC.

This MarketScope report focuses on the premise-based UC market for SMBs and evaluated 11 vendors that offer UC solutions and platforms for SMBs. Critical Links' edgeBOX solution is described as a true all-in-one offering that is easy to implement and use. The report also highlights the ease of use and easy deployment aspects of the Critical Links edgeBOX UC solution. Gartner defines UC products (equipment, software and services) as those that facilitate the use of multiple enterprise communication methods. The report notes, "UC products integrate communication channels (that is, media) networks and systems, as well as IT business applications and, in some cases, consumer applications and devices."

“We are proud to be recognized in Gartner's MarketScope report and we believe it demonstrates the level of success that edgeBOX UC solution has achieved in the SMB market.” said Abdul Kasim, VP of Marketing and Global Business Development at Critical Links. “We feel this rating validates our growing stature in the UC market for SMBs and we thank our customers for their continued trust in edgeBOX. We continue to make significant investments in areas such as business app integration for various vertical markets and also in new initiatives such as edgeBOX ‘UC as a Service’ offered from the cloud”.

Critical Links’ edgeBOX provides a comprehensive solution for SMBs that includes a full-fledged IP telephony system, smoothly integrated with email, contact database, calendars, security, VPN, file sharing, and more. The voice and data services integration improves employee productivity, simplifies installation, maintenance and upgrades, and dramatically reduces equipment, communications, and maintenance costs for SMBs. It is available on a range of scalable platforms for companies with 10 to 300 users.

Critical Links’ target markets include SMBs, larger enterprises with multiple branch offices, Managed Service Providers who bring unified communications services to SMBs, the K-12 education market (Critical Links' Education Appliance), and hospitality (edgeHOTEL). The edgeBOX currently delivers full-fledged desktop telephony integrated with VOIP/IP-PBX, unified messaging, presence, collaboration, remote management and security services to SMBs. Features such as failover, load-balancing and comprehensive remote configuration capabilities should make it an ideal platform for UC Managed Service Providers.

About Critical Links
Critical Links is a global provider of converged voice, data and IT solutions for Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs) that dramatically simplify and cost-reduce by consolidating over a single scaleable and fault-tolerant platform.

Critical Links' flagship product, the edgeBOX™, is an award winning multi-function gateway appliance that includes VOIP/IP-PBX, VPNs, security, NAC, QoS and a WiFi access point as well as a fax-server, web server, e-mail server, print server and data storage. It is available on a range of hardware platforms that support up to 300 users, with different form factors and a host of broadband interfaces such as BRI/PRI(T1/E1), FX0/FXS, Ethernet, etc. Critical Links typically serves SMBs through a global network of VARs, System Integrators, OEMs and Service Providers.

For more information: www.critical-links.com or info@critical-links.com.

About the MarketScope
The MarketScope is copyrighted 2010 by Gartner, Inc. and is reused with permission. The MarketScope is an evaluation of a marketplace at and for a specific time period. It depicts Gartner's analysis of how certain vendors measure against criteria for that marketplace, as defined by Gartner. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in the MarketScope, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest rating. Gartner disclaims all warranties, express or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Editors Notes:
1. All brands and names may be trademarks of their respective companies.

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