Cloud communications platform provider Voximplant today released upgrades to its Connector for Dialogflow, aimed at making it easier and faster for developers to integrate Google's Dialogflow into its telephony platform.
With Dialogflow, developers can create voice- and text-based conversational experiences. In the context of the contact center, this means developing smart agent bots that are capable of understanding natural speech and can talk to customers like human agents would, Alexey Aylarov, Voximplant CEO and co-founder, told me.
When Voximplant launched its Dialogflow integration in May, Dialogflow only did speech recognition -- not synthesis, Aylarov said. But Dialogflow now includes speech synthesis, announced at Google's Next conference in July as part of the company's Contact Center AI solution (see related No Jitter coverage, "Google Enters the Contact Center AI Fray").
As a result, Voximplant has made some upgrades of its own to its Connector, Aylarov said. For example, Dialogflow agents that are integrated with Voximplant can now synthesize speech for live-call streaming. Voximplant's implementation reduces conversational latency because the speech recognition, natural language processing, and speech synthesis can be performed in one place on the Voximplant platform, Aylarov said.
The Connector also allows Voximplant to receive telephony commands from Dialogflow, meaning that during a customer call, pre-programmed call handling logic can execute actions. These can include transferring or terminating calls, or playing pre-determined sound files from Google Cloud Storage, for example.
Developers can implement simple call logic within Dialogflow and program more complex call logic in JavaScript using Voximplant's cloud application engine, Voximplant said. Because Voximplant allows inbound and outbound calls to connect to the Dialogflow agent, enterprises can more easily leverage rich IVR interactions in automated inbound call processing or intelligence voice-enabled bots for outbound call campaigns.
"Our goal is to simplify access to innovations in cloud communications, and ensure that robust communication app development is as quick, easy, and fruitful as possible," Aylarov said. While the majority of use cases for Voximplant's Dialogflow Connector are in customer service, Voximplant said some of its customers are piloting different types of integrations for HR use cases -- for example, using bots to reach out to and schedule interviews with job candidates, he shared.
While Voximplant has partnered with Google for a few years now, today marks a formalization of that relationship with the company's inclusion as a Google Cloud Technology Partner, Aylarov said. Vendors need to have built an integration like Voximplant's Connector to be able to become a partner, he explained.
Expect to see more integrations with Google's and other's products in the future, Aylarov said. While most of Voximplant's work revolves around voice today, the company has some efforts underway around video chats and conferencing, he added.
