The Rise of Cloud Fax Platforms in Modern Business Communication

Fax machines recently celebrated their sixtieth anniversary in the world of business communication. When the original analog versions hit the market back in the 1960s, it didn't take them long to go mainstream. They revolutionized the way people sent and received information, allowing businesses to quickly and easily transmit documents over conventional phone lines no matter where in the world they needed to send them.

Over time, as is typically the case with technology, fax machines gradually became smaller, lighter, more efficient, and more affordable. That only fueled their popularity. An ever-growing number of businesses came to rely on them, and consumers even started purchasing them for at-home use. When the internet went public, many people thought the fax machine would become obsolete, but that didn't happen. Instead, the growth of the online world ushered in a new development in faxing: the cloud fax platform.

How Popular Is Fax Right Now?
Research shows that fax is no less popular now than it was in the past. In fact, it's still gaining ground. According to some reports, at least 17 percent of businesses across the globe still use traditional fax machines. When online and cloud-based faxing are factored in, an estimated 80 percent of companies rely on this form of document transmission to some extent.

Some industries use fax technology more than others. Healthcare certainly tops the list. Approximately 75 percent of organizations in this field are still using conventional fax machines at times. They're increasingly turning to more advanced options like online and cloud faxing. Government offices continue to use fax as well with almost 95 percent reporting that it's their preferred method of transmitting sensitive documents. With the rise of cloud platforms, the fax market is expected to grow by at least 10 percent annually for the next several years.

Why Is Cloud Faxing Getting So Much Attention?
Businesses are drawn to cloud faxing for several reasons. Many of them are the same ones that made analog fax machines so popular when they emerged. At the most basic level, it's a faster, simpler, more efficient way to send documents.

It's also a great deal more secure. Even analog fax transmissions are largely considered more secure than email because they don't require internet, and tapping into the phone lines they use isn't as easy as intercepting digital data. Cloud fax takes that a few steps further by encrypting information during storage and transmission. With the most secure platforms, documents can only be decrypted by their intended recipients.

Of course, cloud-based fax platforms bring even more benefits to the table. They send documents almost instantaneously. They're also more reliable than their early counterparts. With conventional fax machines, interruptions and lost transmissions were fairly common. That's not the case with online and cloud faxing. At the same time, senders get confirmations when their transmissions are received, which gives them added peace of mind. It also creates a paper trail of sorts to protect them against disputes and other potential issues.

Cloud faxing solutions help businesses remain in compliance with industry-specific standards and regulations as well. It also gives them an audit trail to prove their compliance. On top of all that, cloud faxing eliminates the need bulky machines and analog phone lines and can save businesses quite a bit of money over time.

Taking Fax Into the Future
Rather than becoming obsolete the way many people thought it would, fax technology continues to evolve. More than 40 trillion pages are faxed each year around the world right now, and that number is expected to grow in the years to come. Cloud-based solutions offer reliability, security, scalability, and many other benefits. They can integrate with a range of other platforms businesses often use as well. Moving forward, cloud fax is likely to become even more secure and advanced with AI and IoT integration, mobile use, and a range other advanced features projected to become more common.