UMB Ditches Cisco Webex Calling, Launches Yearlong Microsoft Teams Migration by 2027

The University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) is ditching Cisco Webex Calling and moving its entire campus telecommunications to Microsoft Teams Calling by 2027. The university’s Center for Information Technology Services (CITS) announced on June 30, 2026, that it is launching training to prepare faculty, staff, and students for a yearlong migration that will touch every corner of the institution.

This move signals a significant strategic bet on Microsoft’s unified communications platform, consolidating voice, video, chat, and collaboration into a single Teams experience. UMB joins a growing list of universities abandoning legacy phone systems and standalone VoIP solutions in favor of deeply integrated cloud calling services.

The Great Migration: A Campus-Wide Shift

UMB’s timeline is aggressive yet practical. Training begins immediately, even as the technical migration plays out over the next 12 months. CITS has yet to disclose the exact number of users or phone numbers involved, but as a major academic health sciences center with six professional schools and a graduate school, the scope likely spans thousands of endpoints.

The migration will involve porting existing phone numbers to Microsoft’s Phone System, deploying Teams-certified devices, and potentially leveraging Direct Routing or Operator Connect to maintain carrier relationships. UMB has not confirmed which method it will use, but many large organizations opt for Operator Connect to simplify PSTN integration while keeping Teams as the front-end client.

Why Microsoft Teams Calling?

Microsoft Teams Calling has rapidly matured into a viable enterprise telephony replacement. For universities already invested in Microsoft 365, the economics are compelling: adding Teams Phone with domestic calling plans can often undercut standalone VoIP or PBX solutions. More importantly, it eliminates the need for separate apps, reduces training overhead, and weaves voice into the same hub where meetings and collaborations already happen.

Cisco Webex Calling, while robust, operates partly outside the Microsoft ecosystem, requiring users to toggle between environments. UMB’s decision suggests that the friction of managing two parallel systems—plus the administrative overhead—outweighed Webex’s native strengths. Cost comparisons are rarely public, but industry analysts note that Microsoft’s bundling in E5 licenses can make Teams Calling a no‑brainer for license‑heavy institutions.

Training Launches to Smooth the Transition

The June 30 announcement stressed that training is the first wave of the migration. CITS will roll out self‑paced modules, live workshops, and departmental champions to help users set up voicemail, learn dial‑pad basics inside Teams, and understand softphone‑only options. The training component is critical because the shift from a desk phone‑centric culture to a softphone‑first model can rattle employees accustomed to physical handsets.

UMB has not said whether it will fully eliminate desk phones, but the trend in higher ed is toward a mix of physical phones in shared spaces and softphones for personal use. Teams‑certified headsets and speakerphones are likely to appear in IT procurement catalogs as part of the rollout.

What Changes for UMB Staff and Students

Once the migration completes in 2027, every UMB affiliate with a university‑provisioned phone number will make and receive calls through the Teams app on desktops, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. Features like call queues, auto‑attendants, and voicemail transcription will be natively available, removing the need for third‑party add‑ons. External callers won’t see any difference, but internal users will notice deeper integration—click‑to‑call from Outlook, seamless transfer from chat to voice, and easier collaboration with external research partners.

For IT staff, the appeal lies in centralized management through the Teams Admin Center. Policy assignment, analytics, and reporting become unified with the rest of the Microsoft 365 stack, reducing the burden of maintaining a separate Cisco control hub.

Cisco Webex vs. Microsoft Teams: A Feature Face‑Off

Both platforms are mature, but for an organization already living in Microsoft 365, Teams Calling’s administrative and user‑experience coherence often tips the scale. Webex retains strengths in large‑scale contact center deployments and complex dial plans, which could impact ancillary UMB departments that require advanced ACD functionality. How CITS addresses departmental contact centers remains an open question.

The Bigger Picture: Higher Ed Embraces Teams

UMB is far from alone. Universities across the globe—including the University of California system, Australian National University, and several UK Russell Group institutions—have migrated or are migrating to Teams for telephony. The drivers are consistent: cost savings, simplified management, enhanced disaster recovery (voice goes where the internet goes), and improved accessibility.

The pandemic‑spawned hybrid‑work reality has only accelerated this trend. When faculty and staff split time between homes and campuses, a softphone‑centric solution that works on any device becomes indispensable. Cisco has responded with its own Webex for BroadWorks and Webex Go offerings, but the head‑start of Teams’ embedment in the productivity suite is formidable.

Challenges on the Horizon

No migration of this scale is without pain points. Porting thousands of phone numbers can be a bureaucratic slog. Network readiness assessments must ensure that every building has sufficient Wi‑Fi and Quality of Service (QoS) marking for voice traffic. Some older analog devices—elevator phones, fax machines, fire panels—may need ATA adapters or alternate solutions that Teams Phone doesn’t natively support.

User adoption is the wildcard. Employees who have used Cisco phones for decades may resist moving to a softphone. Training can mitigate this, but CITS will need a robust change management plan, possibly including executive sponsorship and early adopter programs.

What This Means for Microsoft and Cisco

For Microsoft, each higher‑ed win reinforces Teams’ position as the default UCaaS platform for enterprises and academia alike. With UMB’s migration slated to complete by 2027, it could become a reference case for other large universities still on the fence.

For Cisco, the loss of a flagship campus deal stings. Webex Calling is not going away—Cisco continues to innovate with AI‑powered noise removal and advanced analytics—but the competition is now largely about accounts that are not already locked into the Microsoft ecosystem. Cisco’s best defense may be in spaces where Microsoft’s telephony still lags, such as high‑compliance environments and large contact centers.

The Road to 2027 and Beyond

As UMB’s training programs kick off, the IT community will watch closely. The university’s decision to announce the move a full year ahead of completion suggests it wants to give the community ample time to adapt. If the migration proceeds smoothly, UMB will have a telecommunications platform that is modern, flexible, and bound tightly to its collaboration tools—fit for the campus of the future.

Other institutions considering a similar switch should monitor UMB’s lessons learned, particularly around number porting, legacy device handling, and user satisfaction scores. The journey from Cisco Webex to Microsoft Teams is more than a platform swap; it is a cultural shift that redefines what a phone call means in the modern university workplace.