Welcome to this week's No Jitter Roll, our regular roundup of product news in the communication and collaboration spaces. This edition of NJR covers Zoom Phone’s expansion into India, contact center enhancements to the 8x8 XCaaS platform and the launch of an SMB-targeted private-label CCaaS from Reinvent Telecom.
Government of India Grants Pan India Unified Licenses to Zoom Phone
Zoom has received the Unified License with Access – All/PAN India, National Long Distance (NLD) and International Long Distance (ILD) – from the Indian government's department of telecommunications. With these licenses, Zoom will be able to offer Zoom Phone, a cloud PBX service, to multinational corporations (MNCs) and businesses operating in India. Zoom has partnered with international telecommunication providers and offers phone numbers and calling plans in 47 countries and territories.
Zoom Phone offers various features that support an in-office and/or remote workforce, including intelligent call routing, auto attendants, interactive voice response, call queuing, call analytics, voicemail, recordings and transcriptions, desktop/mobile apps, and integrations with CRM applications. Note that Zoom Phone is bundled with the company’s UCaaS platform, as well. Zoom Phone was launched four years ago and has, according to the company, surpassed 5.5 million seats.
Abe Smith, Head of International at Zoom, wrote in a blog post that “In the coming months, Zoom will be working with regulators and partners in India to offer a complete telecommunications service bundled with its Zoom Phone PBX service.”
CallTower Expands Global Reach with Zoom Peering Availability in EMEA Region
CallTower has expanded its Zoom Phone Provider Exchange into Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). CallTower’s site has a full list of the individual countries where its Zoom Phone Provider Exchange is now available.
CallTower’s Zoom Phone Provider Exchange offering is a “bring your own carrier” (BYOC) cloud phone system which enables users to retain their current PSTN service providers by redirecting existing voice circuits to the Zoom Phone cloud or by implementing a hybrid solution with Zoom Calling Plans. This capability allows customers to use Zoom Phone while keeping their existing phone numbers, service provider contracts, and calling rates with their chosen carrier.
“[Expanding] our EMEA footprint,” said William Rubio, Chief Revenue Officer with CallTower, “positions us to better focus on global customer needs and support our growing network of partners and customers in this new market.”
8x8 Adds New Contact Center, Administrative Enhancements to 8x8 XCaaS Platform
The updates to 8x8’s XCaaS platform include a conversational AI self-service solution called Intelligent Customer Assist, a unified communications audit history feature and enhanced administration capabilities via the 8x8 Work for Mobile app.
The Intelligent Customer Assist includes pre-built integrations and built-in analytics for managers. The audit features provide system administrators with the ability to view historical configuration details, including what changes were made, when and by whom. The enhanced mobile application allows system administrators to execute operational tasks directly from their mobile devices while also providing visibility into incidents and updates, including activity metrics for inbound and outbound call volumes.
Reinvent Telecom's NewPrivate-Label MyCloud Contact Center Platform to Serve SMBs
MyCloud Contact Center is a private-label contact center as a service (CCaaS) platform designed for small to medium business (SMB) customers. It joins the Reinvent CCaaS portfolio, which already includes a contact center solution for enterprise-level customers and automatic call distribution (ACD) solutions for small businesses. The solution will be available through Reinvent’s private-label partner program.
Some of the functionality provided by MyCloud Contact Center includes multichannel support (the integration of voice, email, and webchat into a single workflow for agents), interactive voice response (IVR), Salesforce CRM integration and historical reporting.
“MyCloud Contact Center includes much of the enterprise-level functionality of the market leaders at a price point to win over SMBs,” said Jeff Kramarczyk, Director of Product Management at Reinvent Telecom.
CallMiner Boosts AI and Machine Learning Capabilities Via Microsoft Azure AI
The provider of conversation intelligence has augmented its AI capabilities via Microsoft Azure Cognitive Services, which is part of Azure AI. CallMiner now has access to early release versions of OpenAI models in Azure OpenAI in conjunction with Azure Speech to Text (which was the result of a partnership announced in September 2021). This will help deliver gains in the accuracy and comprehension of machine-learned conversation intelligence.
By combining CallMiner’s data science team and platform with Microsoft Azure AI, “We’re staying on the cutting-edge of AI in the conversation intelligence market,” said Jeff Gallino, CTO at CallMiner.
This Week on No Jitter
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