Gartner (News - Alert), Inc has included Critical Links, a global provider of unified voice, data, security and IT solutions for SMBs, to the list of "Cool Vendors" in the "Cool Vendors in Unified Communications (News - Alert)" on March 31, 2010.

The report of the Cool Vendor basically features smaller vendors that offer innovative or unique solutions.

"We are honored to be selected as a Cool Vendor by Gartner. This validates the innovation and impact that our edgeBOX solution brings to small and medium businesses", Abdul Kasim (News - Alert), VP of Worldwide Marketing and Business Development at Critical Links, said. "In the current environment, SMBs want to cut IT costs while leveraging the benefits of technology. Our edgeBOX unified communications solution brings state-of-the-art big business features previously accessible only to large enterprises, to SMBs. We are committed tocontinuous improvements and on-going design and integration of more and more horizontal and vertical applications around the edgeBOX platform."

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 is provided by Critical Links (News - Alert)' edgeBOX.

The equipment, communications, and maintenance costs for SMBs are dramatically reduced by the voice and data services integration. In addition to this, it also improves employee productivity, simplifies installation, maintenance and upgrades. It is available on a range of scalable platforms for companies with 10 to 300 users.

The target markets of Critical Links include SMBs, larger enterprises with multiple branch offices, Managed Service Providers who bring unified communications services to SMBs, the K-12 education market and hospitality. The SMBs currently receives fullfledged desktop telephony integrated with VOIP/IP-PBX (News - Alert), unified messaging, presence, collaboration, remote management and security services from edgeBOX.

In related news, Mashery, a premier provider of API enablement and management services, has announced it has been included in the list of "Cool Vendors" in the March 2010 Cool Vendors in Cloud Management, 2010 report by Gartner, Inc.