Skype for Business Topology Support with Office 365, Cloud Connector Edition, Cloud PBX and PSTN Calling

Topology support in Office 365 with Skype for Business


A frequently asked question is the support for the different topologies. Later in this document I also provide a generic overview about a possible migration path towards one or the other topology.


The rudimentary described supported topologies are the ONLY possible setups.

There is not possible and supported way in combining any of those topologies!


On-Premise without any Office 365 connectivity


This is typically a solution, where you don’t own an Office 365 “E” Plan. Therefore, you are not entitled using any of the Office 365 features. Same is valid, if you own only an Exchange Online Plan, whereby none of the Skype for Business Online Services are subject to be used.
 

On-Premise with Office 365 connectivity (Federation to Office 365 and Cloud PBX and PSTN CALLING SERVICE)


This is the only scenario, where users are hosted either in Office 365 and some users stay SfB enabled On-Premise. Meaning you have a mixed environment.
This is the only mixed scenario, where local PSTN breakouts with your On-Premise Skype for Business enabled users and the other users enabled on Office 365 (which MUST use PSTN Calling Service or the local PSTN breakouts) are combined. It is not possible for Online user to be mixed for PSTN Calling Service and PSTN local breakout on-premise. This is technical limitation due to Voice Routes in the Office 365 environment.
Note:
A PSTN Calling Service is subject to the regional availability in the country where you required PSTN Calling.
USER LOCATION
PSTN breakout
Users enabled with SfB On-Premise
MUST be On-Premise with local PSTN Gateway
Users enabled with SfB Online in Office 365 (either or option)

PSTN Calling Service in Office 365 -> Calling Plan
On-Premise PSTN breakout with local Gateway -> CloudPBX

Advanced Voice Features (e.g. Response Group or Group Call Pickup)

In case any user requires Advanced Calling Feature, this user must be enabled for On-Premise Skype for Business.

Note:
In later updates, Microsoft will successively add more features to the Office 365 environment, making is obsolete running On-Premise installations.

Office 365 with CCE (Cloud PBX)


If e.g. the PSTN Calling Service isn’t available, or you required On-Premise PSTN connectivity (e.g. for Contact Centers) you can move all users into Office 365 and utilize the Cloud PBX feature in combination with Cloud Connector Edition.

With CCE you can mix online users with CCE On-Premise Voice PSTN breakout and Microsoft Calling Service.

Explicitly, CCE CANNOT be used with Skype for Business On-Premise Topology!


Office 365 with PSTN Calling Service (native Calling Plan)


If you don’t need either advanced calling features or any PSTN On-Premise connectivity, you can move all users into Office 365.


Author:

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Cannot join external Lync Meeting: Lync Edge Server Single IP Address (Lync Edge Server Single IP Web Conferenceing Problem)

MFA with Guest Access and different tenants settings

Skype for Business, Lync and Exchange Web Services (EWS) and different DNS Domains- Exchange crawling e.g. for presence