Forum will enable interoperability of Unified Communications hardware and software through inter-vendor openness and collaboration

SALT LAKE CITY, May 19 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- ClearOne (http://www.clearone.com) (Nasdaq: CLRO), today announced its membership in the newly formed Unified Communications Interoperability Forum (UCIF), a non-profit alliance of worldwide technology leaders working together to fully realize the potential of Unified Communications (UC). The UCIF is dedicated to enabling standards-based, cross-vendor interoperability of UC hardware and software across enterprises, service providers and consumer clouds and is designed to enable global businesses to be more productive.

ClearOne is joined by founding members HP, Juniper Networks, Logitech / LifeSize Communications, Microsoft and Polycom, as well as Acme Packet, Aspect, AudioCodes, Broadcom, BroadSoft, Brocade, Jabra, Plantronics, RADVISION, Siemens Enterprise Communications, and Teliris. Recognizing that seamless interoperability based on open standards is one of the key requirements to drive UC further into today's enterprises, UCIF members will collaborate to overcome existing interoperability barriers to widespread UC adoption and deliver a reliable and rich UC experience, with the goal of propelling worldwide enterprise UC adoption.

"In the dynamic and rapidly evolving unified communications market, interoperability among the components offered by various vendors is increasingly important in order to meet the performance and ease of use expectations of the end user," said Tracy Bathurst, Chief Strategy Officer at ClearOne. "The UCIF is well positioned to facilitate this broad interoperability and give users of UC the experience they are asking for. ClearOne looks forward to being an active participant in this important industry alliance."

The UCIF will work with existing industry standards, identifying and filling the gaps between current protocols and interoperability issues that have stalled broad adoption and deployment of valuable communications methods. UCIF membership is open to hardware and software solution providers, service providers and network operators. For more information or to join the UCIF, visit www.ucif.org.