Introduction

When most of us think of “Cloud” solutions, particularly those related to Contact Centers, the attributes we think about most often include;

• Low-cost, subscription-based service
• Zero-install (no equipment to install, configure, or maintain)
• Ease of use and administration (designed for business users, not IT professionals)
• Rapid deployment (up and running in days, maybe weeks but not months)
• On-demand enhancements such as call recording, workforce management, and enhanced reporting/analytics that do not require complex installation and configuration and,
• Frequent, automatic updates that add new features as they’re developed

For most vendors that first came to market after 2001, these attributes pretty accurately describe their products. This is great news for those companies whose environments and business needs allow them to move to an entirely new solution. For many companies, and for a host of reasons, moving their entire contact center environment to one of the existing “True Cloud” solutions is not considered a viable option. At least, not yet.

This article will dive into the product histories of some of the leaders in both the cloud and legacy contact center infrastructure space and discuss how that history has impacted (and will continue to impact) their approach to delivering contact center solutions and applications in the near future.

The Vendors

Let me start by saying that it is not my intention to draw comparisons between the relative strengths, weaknesses, or viability of any of the vendor solutions or their go-to-market strategies in this article.

For the purposes of this article, I have broken the vendor down into 3 groups which are as follows:

• The “Old Guard”
  • This grouping includes vendors that have been in the market the longest and were “on-the-ground” and providing solutions to the contact center and broader enterprise communications markets before most of us were born.
  • Vendors in this group include;
    • Avaya (its roots go back to the late 19^th century)
    • Siemens/Siemens-Rolm
    • Rockwell (acquired by Aspect)
    • Nortel (acquired by Avaya)

• The “Early Disruptors”
  • This group of vendors came to the market later than the old guard and therefore had the advantage of being able to design and build their early solutions to address very specific market needs and/or newly available technology. This group includes the following vendors;
    • Aspect Software
      • Introduced the first purpose-built ACD (Automatic Call Distributor) in 1973 and was also prominent in the development of early Computer-Telephony Integration (“CTI”) solutions.
    • Cisco Systems
      • Founded in 1984 and largely known for producing industry-leading enterprise data networking gear. Through a series of acquisitions that started in about 1997 and culminating with the acquisition of GeoTel in 1999 Cisco is largely credited with being the first to enable the large-scale commercial deployment of VoIP (Voice over IP) and Unified Communications.
    • Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories (“ Genesys”)
      • Founded in 1990, Genesys recognized an opportunity to enhance the capabilities of existing contact center systems without replacing them. Genesys’ framework products ‘sat-on-top-of’ existing vendor solutions and offered enhanced intelligent call routing, enhanced reporting & analytics, and desktop integration (CTI) solutions like application integration & screen-pop.
    • Interactive Intelligence, Inc. (“I3”)
      • Founded in 1994, I3 released a first-to-market “all-in-one customer engagement software suite” in 1997. Often referred to at the time as a “call center in a box”
      • It can also be argued that I3 was the first contact center infrastructure vendor to actively partner with downstream applications like those from IBM, Microsoft, and Salesforce.
      • I3 was acquired by Genesys in December 2016.

• The “True-Cloud” Providers
  • This group of vendors all came to the market after 1995. Contact Center products and solutions in this group are all characterized by the fact that they were introduced after 2001. Vendors in this group include;
    • 8×8
      • Founded in 1987, 8×8 released its first contact center solutions in 2009-2011.
    • Amazon
      • Pretty sure we all know who they are but their relevant product “Amazon Connect”, was released in March of 2017.
      • Amazon is also known for Amazon “Lex”, the technology behind the Alexa voice-assistant as well as Amazon Lex Chatbots
    • Five9
      • Founded in 2001, Five9 started out as a provider of carrier services before releasing its first “Virtual Contact Center or VCC” solution in 2002.
      • Five9 was first-to-market with a cloud-based contact center solution for business (“CCaaS” – Contact Center as a Service).
    • inContact
      • Founded in 1997, inContact began as a unified carrier of long-distance services.
      • inContact’s first CCaaS solutions were introduced in about 2003

Vendor Paths to the Cloud

In any journey, the paths available to any destination are determined by where you start. This is no less true in the world of Contact Center infrastructure.

The “True Cloud” Path

The path to the cloud for the True Cloud providers was really easy; they started there.  One of the things that these vendors all have in common is that all of their solutions came to market between 2001 and 2011 with the exception of Amazon Connect which was announced just last year. This means that like people born in the same period, they never existed in a world without the Internet, smartphones, messaging of every type, and ubiquitous communications. Not surprisingly, all of these solutions support multi-channel and/or omnichannel communications out-of-the-box and have done so since their earliest incarnations.

The vendors in this group already offer services that have most, if not all, of the attributes mentioned earlier that make cloud solutions so popular. Unfortunately, most of the vendors in the True Cloud group currently lack features and capabilities that are commonly available in some of the older, more established solutions. Having said that, we have seen all of the capabilities, stability, and scalability of the vendor solutions in this group grow substantially in the relatively short time they’ve been in the market. The question today isn’t if they’ll catch up but how soon and what the market will look like when they do.

The “Early Disruptor” Path

Given that all the “Early Disruptors” already had solutions in the market well before 2000 and a healthy installed base of customers using those solutions, the paths they are taking are a bit more divergent. For both Aspect and Genesys, the path seems to be to build (or acquire) and maintain three separate sets of products, each targeting companies based on the size and complexity of their Contact Center and broader Customer Experience needs.

Aspect’s Offerings

Aspect currently has three product lines (relevant to this article) designed to provide Customer Experience Management solutions for contact centers.

Aspect Via Cloud Contact Center is designed for customers that have 100 or more concurrent or named users[1] and provides a full suite of solutions including inbound and outbound voice, IVR, call recording, workforce management, omnichannel support and other features in a single cloud solution that is offered through a subscription model. Aspect Via is delivered through Amazon Web Services (“AWS”) and includes routine product updates and fixes that are automatically deployed. As with the solutions offered in the “True Cloud” group, Aspect Via customers can pick and choose the features and services they need (like call recording, WFM, enhanced reporting & analytics, out-of-the-box CRM integrations, etc.) through a simple online interface and enable them for use in their center(s) with minimal product configuration – and zero installation.

Aspect Zipwire is also an all-in-one solution and appears[2] to be built to target the SMB market. The solution is delivered via the “Aspect Cloud” and offers inbound/outbound voice, SMS, mobile web, self-service (across all channels), live chat, social media, and video.  Call recording and enhanced reporting and analytics are also available on the platform.

Like Aspect Via, the solution can be easily managed and administered via online tools and is, of course, offered to customers on a subscription model.

Aspect Unified IP is the company’s flagship solution and is available as either a hosted solution (e.g. hosted in Aspect’s cloud or that of a third-party) or may reside entirely inside the customer’s network (e.g. Today’s version of on-premise).  Aspect Unified IP is a robust, full-featured solution and may be enhanced with the addition of both Aspect-provided and third-party tools for Workforce Management, Workforce Optimization, and other business needs. Adding these features is not as easy as selecting a few options and agreeing to the per-month bump in license fees. Add-on solutions require traditional procurement, design, installation, and configuration but do offer capabilities beyond those available in the most “true cloud” solutions.

Considering that all three of these solutions are built on a different platform, it is unlikely that there is an upgrade or migration path between them that would not involve essentially starting over from scratch if you went from Zipwire to Via or from Via to Unified IP.

Cisco Offerings

Okay, um. Let me start by saying that I really love Cisco UC solutions!!

…But, I haven’t come across any Cisco “CCaaS” solutions in my career.

…I did, however, do my best to research options just in case I missed something.

It seems I didn’t.  But please do correct me if I’m wrong.

Genesys Offerings

Genesys currently offers three sets of products under its Customer Experience Platform to support the customer experience infrastructure and application needs of its customers.

PureCloud by Genesys is a True Cloud-based solution that was acquired with Genesys’ acquisition of I3 in December 2016. The solution is deployed on AWS and offers an all-in-one solution for small-to-medium sized contact centers. PureCloud offers inbound/outbound voice, IVR, multi-channel, call recording, workforce management, CRM integration, and other features out-of-the-box and can be easily managed and administered from a simple web-based interface. Pricing for the solution is subscription-based. PureCloud will also allow installation of gateways inside the customer’s network for added redundancy and routinely provides product updates which are automatically available to subscribers of the platform.

PureConnect is Genesys’ Contact Center solution for mid-sized to large enterprises and was also acquired with Genesys’ acquisition of Interactive Intelligence. This solution was formerly I3’s Customer Interaction Center (“CIC”) platform and supports both premise (generally installed in the customer’s data center) and cloud implementation (all equipment inside Genesys’ data centers).  PureConnect is also a full-featured solution and is capable of supporting the needs of most Contact Centers. As with other solutions in this class, enhanced features for Call Recording, WFM, enhanced analytics and other features may be added but these will in most cases require installation and configuration as well as training before they can be effectively used by the center(s).

PureEngage is Genesys’ top-tier solution and is built on the Genesys Framework family of products. PureEngage is available in both an on-premise and Cloud solution.  Genesys’ Framework has long been recognized as having one of, if not the strongest CTI solution on the market but these products also have a reputation for being notoriously difficult to deploy and manage. Like most solutions in this class, effective training and certification of personnel responsible for deploying and managing the solution is critically important.

As with Aspect, all three of these product lines are based on different underlying architecture so migrating between them is not likely to be a viable option.  Genesys does seem to be making a concerted effort to unify its marketing and product development efforts across the three lines as evidenced by recent announcements at CX-18.  During the conference, Genesys announced that subscription-based pricing will be available for all three of its Contact Center infrastructure products.  Genesys also announced the release of “predictive routing” for PureEngage (release 9.x) and further stated that this feature will be made available to both PureConnect and PureCloud later this year.

The “Old Guard” Path

If you thought it was difficult for the “Early Adopters” to find their way, it seems doubly so for the vendors in the “Old Guard” group. I believe that at least part of the reason for this is that their solutions span not only Contact Center but also traditional Enterprise Communications[3] (e.g. PBX services, office dial-tone, etc.).  The remaining two vendors in this group do however appear to be taking the long view in their approach – probably a really good thing for their large installed customer bases.

Avaya’s Approach

Avaya is fortunate in that it has actively consolidated much of its Contact Center and other enterprise customers on the Aura family of products which has enabled them to create a solution that will be capable of addressing the needs of a wide swath of their customer-base rather than approaching the problem with a series of incompatible products. I should note that although I did have the opportunity to review Avaya’s solution just prior to the company’s bankruptcy in January of 2017[4] (they emerged in November of the same year), I have not implemented a solution using Avaya Breeze/Oceana™ and have not seen an implementation in the wild yet.

Avaya Breeze™, according to Avaya[5] “delivers proven Avaya communications capabilities in an easy-to-use development environment—a virtual toolbox of pre-programmed tools and snap-ins—that you can add to just about any business process and “pull things together.””

Avaya Oceana™ is built on Avaya Breeze and again, according to Avaya[6] is a “Solution is a multichannel customer engagement solution that provides seamless customer experiences across mobile, web and traditional dial-up channels. Built on Avaya Breeze™, Avaya Oceana™ Solution provides organizations with modular, scalable, and extended snap-ins. Organizations can use the snap-ins to manage customer-centric business in a unified way while supporting customer journey information across channels.”

All of which sounds great, the question is how are or will they perform in the real world.  If anyone out there has experience with these solutions in a production environment, I’d love to hear from you.

Siemens Approach

Siemens approach can best be described as a long-running clean break.  In about 2008, Siemens introduced the OpenScape product line which initially focused on enterprise communications. During this time, the company continued to develop its HiPath/HiCom line of PBX/ACD systems which were the workhorses in the company’s Contact Center product line. In 2013 Siemens Enterprise Communications was rebranded Unify and the OpenScape rolled up under the Unify brand. Two years later, Atos which is an IT services firm purchased Unify.

While Unify has taken over support for the HiPath line it appears that existing customers of these solutions will be migrated to one of Unify’s new platforms as their existing ones reach end-of-life. As with Aspect and Genesys, Unify is offering a range of solutions from subscription-based cloud solutions to on-premise and hosted unified communications solutions.

So Now What…

If your company is one of those that made the move to one of the “True Cloud” solutions, as long as your chosen vendor’s product development keeps pace with your business needs and your customer’s expectations, you’re golden.

If your company is currently on one of the “Old Guard” solutions, or one of those in the “Early Disruptor” group that do not currently provide a clear path to the cloud (I won’t mention their name again), the good news is that you have a lot of options to choose from. But in the words of the old Templar knight, “You must choose, but choose wisely”.

It would be our pleasure to help!  Contact us anytime at https://contactscope.com and we’d be happy to help you understand your options.

References:

[1] According to Software Advice – https://www.softwareadvice.com/call-center/via-profile/

[2] I have not implemented Zipwire personally and do not have experience with the product.

[3] Both Genesys PureCloud and Cisco also offer enterprise communications in their products.

[4] Source: http://fortune.com/2017/01/19/avaya-bankruptcy/

[5] https://www.avaya.com/en/documents/avaya-breeze-uc7744.pdf

[6] https://downloads.avaya.com/css/P8/documents/101029734