HP has announced that it will slowly phase out the VCX PBX, which it picked up when it acquired 3Com.

Sales of the PBX phone system, including gateways and servers, will stop at the end of December, and for those already in possession of the VCX, take note: Support for the PBX will discontinue in five years.

The news is probably not surprising to many — last year, HP-3Com resellers were encouraged to transition customers to other unified communication (UC) platforms, including market leaders Microsoft and Avaya.

At that time, HP stated it was not discontinuing the VCX, and would still sell, support, and maintain the 3Com PBX product family. However, in 2010, shortly after the 3Com acquisition, HP pulled the plug on the 3Com NBX VoIP product line — essentially signalling the company's intentions for other 3Com VoIP PBX systems, even while migrating NBX customers to the VCX line.

With the end of the VCX PBX, HP's romance with VoIP draws to a close. HP has also indicated it has no interest in other deep communications technologies, and will not pursue development in the UC field.

Earlier this year, HP announced a restructuring plan with the goal of simplifying business processes and focusing more on its three main goals: the cloud, big data, and security.

Servers, storage, and networking seem to be the primary objective of the cloud emphasis, and not VoIP or UC. The restructuring plan, intended to generate savings of about $3 billion, included an early retirement program designed to achieve an 8% workforce reduction.