What is TeamMate?
TeamMate is a gateway platform which provides Hosted PBX vendors like Ringlogix integration with Microsoft Teams allowing existing Teams users to have access to additional services like the PBX Connector.

How the PBX Connector works?
The TeamMate PBX Connector is a unique add-on to Microsoft Office 365 which allows you to natively integrate the Ringlogix Voip Platform into Microsoft Teams. It activates the MS Teams built-in softphone allowing users to make and receive calls in the same way as any other softphone, calls will follow the same rules configured in the PBX dashboard (Phone Number, Answering Rules, MOH .. etc), to achieve this functionality the PBX Connector uses a Direct Route between Ringlogix and the TeamMate gateways.

This video shows how the PBX Connector works


PBX Connector Architecture


What is a Direct Route, Enterprise and PBX?
A Direct Route is the connection between the TeamMate platform and the Ringlogix PBX, you can think of a "Direct Route" as a SIP Trunk interconnecting TeamMate and Ringlogix, although its configuration is quite different, SIP signaling and RTP are exchanged through a Direct Route. The PBX Connector requires at least one Direct Route configured per Enterprise (customer), without it PBX calls from the MS Teams app will not work.

An Enterprise is a Customer, Enterprises can be created in the TeamMate portal and it is the first step in the customer provisioning process, each Enterprise can have multiple PBXs to accommodate multiple PBX domains.

In TeamMate a "PBX" is a SIP configuration template that allows the MS Teams built-in softphone to obtain the necessary information to achieve SIP registration, make outbound calls and receive incoming calls.

During the provisioning of new customers, the first component to be created is the Enterprise, next is the Direct Route, after that the PBX and finally the users.

What Licenses are required for the PBX Connector?
The PBX Connector uses two Microsoft components, Users and Direct Routes, each one of these components require the following licenses:



Notes.
- While "Teams" is a regular license, "Microsoft Teams Phone" is an add-on license, it complements the "Teams" license by adding additional features.
- In the case of users, the Microsoft Enterprise Admin must assign the required licenses to each one.
- In the case of Direct Routes, TeamMate will create a Microsoft user at the moment the new Direct Route is provisioned therefore the Microsoft Enterprise Admin has to make sure there is at least one unassigned "Teams" and "Microsoft Teams Phone" licenses or comparable for the new Direct Route user, TeamMate will auto assign the required licenses to the new Direct Route user, if available licenses cannot be found the creation of the Direct Route will fail, there is more information about the user created during the Direct Routing provisioning in the following link: https://docs.connecttoteams.com/en/articles/13

"Teams" License
In most cases customers will already have the Teams app operational, therefore each one will have this license assigned, if that's not the case customers will have to purchase a "Teams" license for each user.
The following links show some Microsoft license bundles, new users will require one that include "Teams", these links are only examples about from where "Teams" licenses can be purchased, there are more ways to buy Teams licenses but is not the objective of this article to cover all possible sources.

Small Business Licenses: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/compare-microsoft-teams-business-options
Corporate Licenses: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/enterprise/government-plans-and-pricing

"Microsoft Teams Phone" License
Previously known as "PHONE SYSTEM", be aware that in multiple documentations it is still called "PHONE SYSTEM".
This add-on license complements the previous Teams license, each user must have it assigned, the same as each Direct Route.

There are some variants of the "Microsoft Teams Phone" license, they include different features, have different prices and different names, the one TeamMate recommends for direct routing is the "Microsoft Teams Phone Standard" which can be found in the following link: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/microsoft-teams-phone

If other than the "Microsoft Teams Phone Standard" is used with TeamMate it could create internal API conflicts because the set of features included will be different than the ones expected by TeamMate, besides the price of the other variants is also higher.

Inclusive Licenses
Finally, there are some Microsoft licenses that include "Teams" and "Microsoft Teams Phone" (PHONE SYSTEM), they are called "Inclusive Licenses"
The "Microsoft Teams Shared Devices" is an example of an inclusive license, however Microsoft has decided to set some limitations to this license, it cannot be used to login into the Teams app therefore it can only be used to license Direct Routes, as previously explained Direct Routes are only connections, there is not an actual Teams user login, chatting or using the Teams App, although a "Teams" licensed is required.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/teams-add-on-licensing/teams-shared-device-license

Microsoft Licensing Rules
It is very well known that Microsoft changes the licensing rules from time to time, bundles are break down, renamed or terminated and conditions modified, the explanations provided in this article are according to the current licensing rules. During 2024 Microsoft made some license package changes affecting the "Teams" license, more details can be found in the next paragraph.

Since April 1st 2024 all Microsoft Business Licenses no longer include the "Teams" license as described in the following article:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/licensing/news/microsoft365-teams-ww
Customers who purchased those licenses after that date will have to purchase the "Teams" license separately.
Business Licenses acquired before April 1st 2024 will keep including MS Teams, users can continue using them and renew their licenses as usual

TeamMate also provides additional information regarding Microsoft licenses, if you want to check it please use the following link: https://docs.connecttoteams.com/en/articles/11

Microsoft Slow Propagation
Microsoft sometimes takes between 24 and 48 hours to propagate changes in their systems which TeamMate requires to reflect the new license assignments, therefore buying and assigning licenses in advance can streamline the installation process, see more details about the Microsoft slow propagation in this link: https://docs.connecttoteams.com/en/articles/12
If the Microsoft Admin makes changes to some user(s) licenses please wait some time before making additional license modifications to the same user(s), continuous license modifications of the same user(s) can create platform inconsistencies produced by the slow Microsoft propagation not allowing TeamMate to work properly.