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Best Software Introduces New CRM Suite, New Company Name

Sage Software (formerly Best Software), a provider of business management products and services, has introduced Sage CRM, a full suite of configurable customer relationship management (CRM) software that is fully Web-based. Available both as a hosted service (at SageCRM.com) and for on-premises deployment, it includes the ability to move between either as their business needs dictate. Aimed at small and midsized businesses (SMBs), Sage CRM also provides its clients with more supporting technology options, including Outlook and Lotus Notes integration, plus IBM DB2, MS SQL, Oracle and Sybase database options. In addition, an ACCPAC edition provides bi-directional integration (both front office/back office) with the ACCPAC Advantage Series accounting and operations management software. The new product offering comes with a rent-to-own investment protection guarantee that provides businesses with a safety net for their hosted CRM investment.

Sage Software is formerly Best Software, adopting the new name for consistency with its parent firm, the Sage Group plc. As part of the branding transition, the company will also add the Sage name to its products’ naming structure as new releases occur. The transition began in May, and the full transition is targeted to be complete by March 1, 2006.
www.bestsoftware.com
www.sage.com

e-Glue Launches Guideline 5.4, Real-Time CIO Suite
e-Glue Software Technologies has launched Guideline 5.4, a new version of the company’s real-time customer interaction optimization software suite for contact centers. Guideline 5.4 is aimed at enabling companies to realize significant and sustainable performance improvements at their contact centers through personalized customer service, knowledge delivery and increased customer feedback through real-time surveys. Featuring an improved graphical user interface, Guideline 5.4 introduces new capabilities to the Builder, the suite’s authoring tool. The Builder enables non-technical business users to define the business processes and workflows that will impact the performance of their contact centers. Guideline 5.4 also adds one-to-one customer management capabilities to the Builder, enabling enterprises to define a set of treatments for customer groups or a unique set of rules for each customer. Business-to-business companies will be able to rapidly implement customer rules supporting complicated processes and business arrangements at their centers. In this new version, companies can create HTML balloons that interact in real time with knowledge management systems, ensuring agents are presented with relevant and up-to-date information.
Guideline 5.4 facilitates tailored customer interaction experiences by enabling business processes to follow decision-tree logic, and its real-time collection of customer data adds to the business intelligence of companies. In Guideline 5.4, enterprises can create real-time surveys that increase customer feedback and participation. Further, version 5.4 features a new content management system, enabling companies to define different levels of agent support based on experience levels.
www.e-glue.com

Compiere Releases Upgraded ERP, CRM Systems
Compiere, Inc., a provider of open-source business software applications, announced the release of Compiere ERP & CRM system, version 2.5.2c, with enhanced functionality and stability. The new version of the software features improved request functionality (issue tracking), batch (expense) invoice entry, and improved security management. This is in addition to the new costing infrastructure for the support of LiFo, FiFo and average costing. The upgrade was tested through a training process that involved the cooperation of more than 10 of Compiere’s 50+ worldwide partners, completing quality assurance evaluations and other testing for effectiveness and functionality. Compiere’s ERP and CRM systems have been downloaded more than 800,000 times throughout the world. The company provides an integrated, adaptable ERP and CRM application for small to medium-sized enterprises. The Compiere software application is primarily used in wholesale, distribution, retail and service environments, but it is also, according to a company statement, quickly building a strong user base in other industries.
www.compiere.org

Fused KnowPlex v5.0 Generally Available, CRM/Knowledge Base Management
Fused Solutions, a provider of help desk technology and contact center services, has announced the general availability of KnowPlex 5.0, its Web-native CRM and knowledge base management solution. Available either as an on-premise or on-demand solution, KnowPlex is designed to be suitable for both inbound and outbound customer care. It incorporates a script-based approach to knowledge base management. New or enhanced features incorporated into the 5.0 version include outbound campaign management, asset tracking, platform independence and enhanced business rules management. Also, API integration has been enhanced, and the application is both more scalable and more customizable than prior versions.
When combined with FS-Virtual Agent, the self-service application that shares the KnowPlex knowledge base engine, the solution offers end users a more seamless path for transitioning from self-service to agent-assisted support. Further, the addition of EmPlex — the company’s workforce scheduling and HR communications solution — and any world-class ACD/IVR platform enables contact centers and enterprise help desks to provision an effective and comprehensive “call center-in-a-box” platform.
www.fusedsolutions. com

Epiphany Makes Available Latest Version Of CRM Software Suite
Epiphany, Inc., a provider of CRM solutions, has announced the immediate availability of the latest version of the Epiphany 6.5 CRM software suite. The Epiphany 6.5 software suite is a family of modular CRM applications designed to assist the largest consumer-oriented companies (e.g., in telecommunications, retail financial services and insurance industries) increase profitability by making every interaction intelligent. For large enterprises faced with complex integration and deployment challenges, Epiphany solutions are aimed at providing an easier way to augment existing systems to generate rapid ROI. The Epiphany 6.5 software suite can drive measurable business value by enhancing existing systems and allowing new functionality to be incrementally deployed over time. By leveraging a J2EE-based, service-oriented architecture, Epiphany solutions are designed to co-exist with current IT infrastructures and plug-in to existing customer data and service systems. This means companies are enabled to unify previously incompatible systems and to add real-time intelligence without the need for systems replacement.

The Epiphany 6.5 software suite blends three product lines, Epiphany Marketing, Epiphany Advisor, and Epiphany Sales and Service, each of which is powered by real-time intelligence and best-in-class analytics. New features, functionality and enhancements in the updated version include the following: an updated Interaction Advisor Agent client; streamlined Campaign Management processes with new security improvements and integration with third-party MRM solutions; new Epiphany Service capabilities for e-mail response management; new advanced portal support for Epiphany Advisor, Sales and Service; continued improvements in performance, scalability and developer tools for Epiphany Sales and Service; streamlined integration to existing customer systems; and extended platform support.
www.epiphany.com

Kaidara Announces Enhanced Tool, Accelerates Knowledge Base Creation
Kaidara Software, Inc., a provider of software for building, managing and maintaining knowledge bases with problem-solving data, has announced the release of its Text2Data v3. The enhancements to the Text2Data tool, which is used in conjunction with Kaidara Advisor, assist customers in transforming unstructured (or semi-structured) data sources for inclusion in a knowledge base. The enhanced features in Text2Data provide advanced text mining and data modeling capabilities for accurate retrieval and rapid re-use of unstructured information in order to expand knowledge bases used to diagnose and solve complex customer support problems.

Text2Data is designed to add structure and meaning to textual information by extracting values and indexing the text with well-defined domain concepts. Text2Data mines text directly to find concepts and to help uncover syntactic variations and synonyms that can be included in a data model. This produces information that can be exploited to find similarities between situations, issues and questions for accurate capturing of knowledge and quick retrieval of answers from a repository of possible solutions. Text2Data can also be used to enrich textual material so it can be analyzed with standard reporting tools and statistical techniques for decision support. Using reporting tools and analytic methods, customers can identify common patterns (such as the frequency of a problem or the most effective path to a problem’s resolution). Further, the data can also be used to uncover problems caused by product design issues; and it can identify forthcoming customer requirements.
www.kaidara.com

Microsoft Announces Contact Center Solution
Microsoft Corp. has announced the general availability of Microsoft Customer Care Framework, an integrated software solution that streamlines call center operations for service providers. Microsoft Customer Care Framework is designed to assist call center operators in helping to improve customer service and reduce costs by decreasing average call times, eliminating redundant data requests and delivering better information faster to call center agents.

Microsoft Customer Care Framework integrates with service providers’ existing CRM systems, operations support systems (OSS) and business support systems (BSS), providing a unified platform that consolidates disparate applications and automates contact center workflow. Initially targeted at service providers, the solution is also applicable to any business wherein call center operations represent a significant part of its operations. Based on Microsoft .NET technology and Web services architecture, Microsoft Customer Care Framework is easy to implement, integrate and deploy. It works in conjunction with a suite of products, including Microsoft BizTalk Server, Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft Windows Server and Microsoft Visual Studio .NET. In addition, Web services enable multiple data sources and applications to be accessed simultaneously, increasing overall call center productivity and improving the quality of customer service.
www.microsoft.com

Pegasystems Announces SmartBuild For Software Design, Built-In Design Methodology
Pegasystems Inc., a provider of smart business process management (BPM) software, has announced the availability of its latest SmartBPM Suite release, featuring built-in design and implementation support. Pegasystems’ SmartBuild BPM release provides real-time feedback for software designers including, for example, an analysis of best-practice class structures and flexible property controls, providing built-in methodology diagnostics and intelligence. The release also includes ongoing enhancements for J2EE architects, including a new EJB (Enterprise Java Bean) interface to the business rules services, published rule services APIs to make it even easier for Java application developers to embed Pegasystems rules functionality in disparate applications typical in deployments that start with business rules, improved J2EE specific fail-over and reliability support for massively scaled solutions across a cluster of J2EE application servers.
www.pega.com

Talisma Releases KnowledgeBase.net 5.0
Talisma, a provider of multichannel CRM solutions, has announced the immediate availability of Talisma KnowledgeBase.net 5.0, the company’s Web self-service and customer support software. In addition to improving contact center efficiency, Talisma KnowledgeBase.net 5.0 is aimed at turning companies’ customer support centers into revenue-generating centers. As well, many of the new features and add-ons in Talisma KnowledgeBase.net 5.0 are designed to increase information accessibility and to further expand efficiencies in customer support centers.

The KB Ad Manager, a new add-on module unique to Talisma KnowledgeBase.net 5.0, enables a company to present, track and report product offers, advertisements and promotions when knowledge base portal searches are conducted. KB Remote Search leverages all sets of content and expands organizations’ searchable knowledge by enabling information to be searched for in disparate databases, external file systems and CRM systems via the KnowledgeBase.net search engine and portal.

Also new to Talisma KnowledgeBase.net 5.0, the KB Offline Portal and the KB Discussion Forum can enhance knowledge accessibility and sharing for Web self-service. Specifically, the KB Offline Portal (most suitable for sales and support employees in the field) allows end users to download and easily synchronize knowledge bases on their PDAs or laptops, enabling information to be found anytime, anywhere, even when offline. The KB Discussion Forum is a community discussion tool that allows searchable messages, threads and posts to be included as part of the Talisma KnowledgeBase.net portal for Web self-service. This new tool leverages individual expertise and is designed to improve knowledge sharing throughout an organization and among its end-user community.
The new offering also delivers more drill-down functionality.

KnowledgeBase.net 5.0 offers many other new and enhanced features. Suitable for organizations of all sizes, the offering is also available in a hosted version and two on-site versions.
www.talisma.com

KANA Unveils Agent Desktop Search Solution
KANA Software, Inc., a provider of service resolution management (SRM) solutions, has announced KANA Agent Desktop Search. The new solution is for enabling integration between KANA Agent IQ, the company’s contact center knowledge base, with leading desktop search applications. Additionally, agents can publish new data directly to the knowledge base with the click of a button. The combination of desktop search capabilities and the KANA Agent IQ database is designed to ensure agents have access to critical and timely information stored on the desktop directly from the knowledge base. KANA Agent Desktop Search allows agents to quickly search the stored information, and then submit it to be published in the knowledge base, helping result in faster and more accurate resolution of customer inquiries while reducing costs for the contact center.

The integration of KANA Agent IQ and desktop search enables agents to continue working in the knowledge base while more seamlessly pulling information from their own desktop. Additionally, leveraging the “publish to IQ” function enables the agent to immediately and seamlessly add the data to the knowledge base once it is used, ensuring it can be shared across the contact center.

KANA Agent Desktop Search includes the following functionalities: quicker and easier access to custom documents not stored within the knowledge base; easier publication of information from the desktop to the knowledge base; a familiar user interface for the agent; and quicker retrieval of answers, resulting in more efficient service resolution.
www.kana.com

SAP Announces New mySAP CRM
SAP AG, a provider of collaborative business solutions, has announced the newest version of mySAP CRM, a culmination of enhancements to deliver new abilities across key business processes for the telecommunication, public sector and financial services industries, as well as key cross-industry business capabilities (e.g., service management, marketing resource management and mobile sales for handhelds).

Powered by the SAP NetWeaver platform, with embedded analytics and enhanced dashboard-like analytical applications, the new version of mySAP CRM focuses on assisting customers in enhancing user productivity by empowering users with a complete view of all relevant information from diverse enterprise systems to drive insight, decisions and cross-enterprise collaboration.

Cross-industry additions include the following: enhanced marketing capabilities; enhanced sales capabilities; and enhanced service capabilities.

Embedded analytics in mySAP CRM 2005 aim to bridge the gap between operational, collaborative and analytical processes for “role-relevant insight” (e.g., new account planning capabilities). Also, ease-of-use has been enhanced in order to boost productivity (e.g., a more intuitive user interface leveraging the enterprise portal, Web application and business intelligence capabilities of SAP NetWeaver).

Modular elements of mySAP CRM 2005 are currently being evaluated by customers. The complete and newest version will be globally available in October of 2005.
www.sap.com

Amae Software Releases New Reporting Component Of CI Suite
Amae Software, a provider of a customer experience management (CEM) system with interaction and agent-level actionable information, has released a new reporting component within the Actionable Results Module of the Amae CI Suite. The newest component, the Performance Index, gives executives and management real-time performance rankings of customer-facing individuals, teams and facilities based on customer perspectives and any number of additional performance metrics. The Performance Index is designed to instantly identify areas for opportunity and attention within an organization. Then, using the organization’s internal productivity metrics, QA scores and actual customer feedback at the agent level, the Performance Index can save time and dramatically simplify reporting and management activity. The Amae CI Suite is aimed at offering all features necessary to understand and improve the customer experience quality while lowering costs. Amae CI Suite collects customer perspectives in a way that builds customer loyalty, and integrates them automatically with relevant data, delivering an advanced level of customer analysis and reporting, alerts and goal measurement and performance to all levels in an organization, the company states.
www.amaesoftware.com

Witness Releases Enhanced Workforce Management Solution
Witness Systems has announced enhanced capabilities to its workforce management software (following the company’s first quarter combined with Blue Pumpkin Software). The enhancements are available as part of the standard delivery for the company’s prepackaged workforce management solution, which includes key performance indicator (KPI) scorecards and actionable learning. The company’s inclusion of enhancements aim to further increase customer benefits through the following new capabilities: intraday management for improving planning; new configurable alerts, offering proactive results; advanced multisite management for delivery of more network control; renewed support for the Oracle database as further support of industry-standard databases; and easier upgrade management. Customers who have already deployed the company’s robust workforce management software have a growth path to Witness’ prepackaged workforce optimization solution, which includes workforce management software, along with performance management and e-learning capabilities. By fusing performance management and e-learning functionality with the workforce optimization anchor of workforce management, the company intends to provide customers with an entry point to a complete workforce optimization solution.
www.witness.com

CosmoCom Announces UniFrame Offering, Integrated With Microsoft
CosmoCom, a provider of an all-IP, universal-access contact center system, has announced the availability of UniFrame, an integrated combination of the company’s flagship CosmoCall Universe and Microsoft’s Customer Care Framework (CCF). UniFrame is CosmoCom’s attempt at dramatically stepping forward contact center technology unification. Because today’s entire contact center includes two main components — a communication platform and an information platform — unification, both within the many elements of each of these platforms and between these two main components, can reduce cost and risk associated with call center projects. CosmoCall Universe is an all-IP platform, of which its hallmark has always been the unification of the communication platform including the ACD, CTI, IVR, agent desktop, recording and reporting functions across all media and all channels. Microsoft Customer Care Framework creates an agile information integration and presentation framework that allows contact center agents to access service configuration and billing information in highly flexible and effective ways, no matter where and how that information is maintained.

“UniFrame is an easily integrated and cost-effective solution for customer care aimed at service providers, using Windows Server System as the carrier-grade server platform,” said Michael O’Hara, general manager of the Communications Sector at Microsoft Corp., in a statement. “The solution combines CosmoCom’s expertise in hosted contact centers and Microsoft Customer Care Framework to accelerate time to market and provide an overall lower-risk investment.”

In integrating these two components to create UniFrame, CosmoCom has offered a contact center combination that can be advantageous in complex information application environments, and can improve the time and cost of contact center implementation and ongoing operation.
www.cosmocom.com
www.microsoft.com

Atos Origin, Loquendo Present New Interactive Virtual Assistant Solution
Atos Origin, an international information technology services provider, jointly with global speech technology company Loquendo, has presented its new Web-based self-service and multiple-channel applications in new conversational interfaces and interactive virtual assistants.

Atos Origin’s new virtual assistants introduce the concept of emotional and social intelligence to virtual channels. They enable Atos Origin’s clients to foster a “greater degree of humanity in their business relations” by providing a more flexible interaction that adapts to fit each client’s specific business objectives. This new technology aims at offering more intelligence than that of the traditional self-service and virtual channel applications; making interaction easier; and guiding the end user by means of a lifelike dialog.

Atos Origin’s new virtual assistants and conversational interfaces result from a combination of technologies, which include, among others, Loquendo TTS synthetic speech engine, Loquendo ASR (automatic speech recognition), complex Web programming, virtual reality design, 3-D graphic design and display.

The avatar’s body language, expression and lip movements are synchronized following the pronunciation of each phoneme, consequent to the complete set of functionalities provided by Loquendo’s multilingual TTS engine.
www.atosorigin.com
www.loquendo.com

noHold Announces Upgrades InstantSupport In v4.3
noHold, a provider of Web-based self-service solutions, has announced the release of InstantSupport version 4.3. InstantSupport is designed to provide technical support and sales organizations with the tools needed to automatically respond quickly and efficiently to customer questions. Instant Support’s virtual agents are on duty 24/7 and deliver consistent, updated information and answers while providing ongoing customer behavior statistics. noHold customers use the solution to improve customer satisfaction, increase sales and reduce support costs. In addition to improved reliability, manageability and performance, new features in InstantSupport 4.3 include Asian language support; flexible CRM integration; and an additional user interface for allowing customers’ internal support agents to search for solutions.

“This was not a simple upgrade; rather, it was simply a well-executed ‘brain surgery’ of our virtual agent engine and supporting framework,” noted noHold VP of Engineering Felice Curcelli in a company announcement.
www.nohold.com

NetSuite’s New Hosted CRM Application Integrates Order/Partner/Incentive Management
NetSuite, Inc., a provider of integrated business application software, has launched NetSuite CRM+, a hosted CRM application that integrates order management, partner management, incentive management and project tracking. The application is designed to give growing businesses a 360-degree view of all customer interactions. The new application also offers eCRM, which includes Web site hosting, Web site analytics, customer portals, partner portals and partner management, all for making it as easy to sell and service customers via the Web as it is in person or on the phone. NetSuite CRM+ helps users automates the entire customer lifecycle — from a Web site visitor (i.e., a potential customer), to an interested lead, to a qualified prospect, to a customer who has actually placed an order, to servicing that customer and, finally, to guiding that customer to re-purchase. It manages the complete process from lead to prospect to customer in a single system, regardless of channel. It incorporates the corporate Web site into the selling process; and the system captures customer data natively, including customer purchases. The new NetSuite CRM+ further adds new functionality: order management; upsell/cross-sell; incentive management; project tracking; Web hosting and analytics; customer portal; and partner management.
www.netsuite.com

Salesboom Announces Multilingual Support In Web-Based CRM/SFA Solutions
Salesboom.com, a provider of on-demand CRM/SFA services, has announced the addition of multilingual support to coincide with its Salesboom.com v5.0 CRM release. The new Salesboom CRM improvements, already in effect, allow global users to type in any character set they desire, fully allowing users to store information in both their regional format and with accented and other special character types. Newly supported languages include French, Spanish, Mandarin, Cantonese, Arabic, German, Italian, Swedish and Dutch, amongst many others.

Salesboom currently has customers all over the globe, its strongest presence being in Central America, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.

The new multilingual support for Salesboom.com’s Web-based small business CRM software will allow users to enter records, such as contacts, leads, accounts or contracts, in multiple different character sets for numerous languages. This added support can help in transcribing regional information, such as names and addresses, in their proper and standard format, rather than necessitating English translation or removing accents.
The Salesboom multilingual CRM support enhancements have already been deployed to the Salesboom.com Web-based CRM/SFA software service transparently and seamlessly via the on-demand Internet.
www.salesboom.com

EnvoyWorldWide Releases EnvoyConnect v.2.0
EnvoyWorldWide, a provider of enterprise notification services, has announced the availability of EnvoyConnect v. 2.0, the company’s new campaign management tool. The EnvoyConnect suite has been enhanced to facilitate proactive automated outreach for a wide variety of customer care initiatives, including collections, renewal programs or new customer welcome plans. EnvoyConnect is a set of campaign management tools designed to enable organizations to make easier the implementation and management of automated outbound customer communication initiatives. Providing new personalization capabilities, EnvoyConnect enables voice messages to be professionally recorded and configured to include personal customer information, including account numbers and billing amounts owed; simultaneously, it provides message recipients with interactive capabilities to enable them to respond via keypad or voice or by transferring to live agents for transaction completion.

EnvoyConnect 2.0 provides new and enhanced features that include the following:
• Delivery manager for agents. Building on the ability to pace calls, thus avoiding overwhelming phone switches and PBXs, EnvoyWorldWide has extended this feature to calibrate inbound traffic according to agent availability.
• Enhanced reporting. Administrators can track import statistics in real time, can select reports through a self-service interface, and then receive granular detail and analysis on completed or still-in-progress campaigns.
• Campaign management. Administrators may stop, start or reset a campaign at any point in the process, or to any recipient on the contact list.
• API enhancements. New methods have been added to the patented SOAP API for ease of import and campaign management.
New features will immediately be made available to current EnvoyConnect customers.
www.envoyworldwide.com

Siemens Announces v6.5 Contact Center Applications
Siemens Communications, Inc., a provider of convergent technologies, products and services, has announced Versions 6.5 of its HiPath ProCenter Agile and ProCenter Standard contact center applications, building further on the product portfolio whose demographic is small to large enterprises across numerous industry sectors.
Siemens’ HiPath ProCenter V6.5 portfolio aims to enable enterprises to drive greater first-contact resolution of customer calls with faster call center administration, call processing and multimedia routing and reporting, including enhanced user and management visualization tools. Presence-driven and permission-based collaboration tools have also been extended to reach enterprisewide communication sources (e.g., telephone, e-mail and instant messaging).

The upgraded HiPath ProCenter Agile solution offers new features such as easy-to-implement e-mail management, scheduled callbacks and agents in multiple groups. It also provides integrated design capabilities for a basic IVR, as well as integration with Microsoft CRM.

Agile can deliver intelligent call routing, graphical reporting and innovative productivity tools for agents and managers handling calls. HiPath ProCenter Agile includes an Associate Desktop that can facilitate enterprisewide collaboration and easily extend intelligent call routing features to employees who serve as overflow agents during peak traffic periods to ensure uniform response levels throughout the day.

The upgraded HiPath ProCenter Standard solution includes enhancements such as full IVR support, advanced multimedia skills-based routing and a software developer toolkit for vertical business process integrations. As with the HiPath ProCenter Agile, presence tools are integrated into the Standard’s application desktop. Also, as needed, agents can quickly engage colleagues with the solution’s one-click collaboration capabilities, whether in the office or remotely connected via an IP network.

The entire portfolio’s Agent and Associate desktop interfaces have been redesigned with intuitive Windows-based GUIs to reduce training time. User operating flexibility includes “tear-off-and-park” toolbars and an integrated ticker-tape display of real-time contact center operational statistics, and now includes outbound and callback capabilities. A contact log automatically tracks the details of all inbound and outbound interactions and provides single-click callback for added productivity.

Both systems run in TDM, converged or pure VoIP infrastructures.
www.usa.siemens.com/communications

Line4 Announces Latest CTI Product Suite
Line4, a provider of contact center applications, has announced the release of the company’s latest generation of computer-telephony integration (CTI) technology, aimed at bringing the small and medium-sized contact center market a cost-effective, simple-to-use CTI solution.

“ActionSuite has been designed as a simple-to-use system, allowing a contact center to migrate to a CTI environment quickly without having an in-house IT department,” said Line4 CEO Dave Shanahan in a statement.

Line4’s ActionSuite product suite is unique in the marketplace, according to the company, because of the superior value it provides its clients at a cost-effective price.

“With the ActionSuite family of products, we are able to offer this solution to contact centers with 20-250 agents,” continued Shanahan.
www.line-4.com

FrontRange Offers Enhanced IT Service Management To Global Market
FrontRange Solutions, a provider of IT service management, voice application and CRM solutions for distributed enterprises, has announced extended global access of its modular IT Service Management (ITSM) solution with a new version and new languages. FrontRange’s new release of ITSM 5.0.2 is designed to improve the performance of IT and support organizations for new customers as well as offer additional modules to increase functionality for HEAT customers. New updates to ITSM 5.0.2 include the following: localization releases in English, German, Polish and Russian (while Chinese and French will soon be available); dashboard enhancements offering real-time access to data to meet each user’s specific needs; and enhancements to the Licensing Module for robust monitoring and license management.
www.frontrange.com

VoiceLog Announces Quality Call Monitoring Service, TargetQM
VoiceLog LLC, a provider of on-demand call recording and monitoring services, has announced the availability of its TargetQM service, a quality monitoring process that leverages speech analytics to target calls for evaluation.

TargetQM, powered by CallMiner, is designed to identify calls that meet a call center’s specific quality objectives. VoiceLog Quality Agents then focus on the calls that provide the most relevant information to help agents improve their performance and better serve their customers (rather than listen to random samples). TargetQM was developed to address the need for statistical relevance in typical quality monitoring processes. TargetQM is designed to solve the problem of statistically insignificant quality samples by identifying calls with relevant content in a highly cost-effective manner. Using TargetQM with speech analytics, a significant sample of 100 calls per agent can be captured for about $10, then delivered to trained and experienced VoiceLog Quality Agents for further analysis and evaluation. (Clients can also use their own QA staff if they prefer.) The aimed result is attainment of more targeted evaluations that directly address call centers’ key performance indicators for improvement.
www.voicelog.com

New Knova SRM Suite Highlights Search Ability
Knova Software, a provider of service resolution management (SRM) applications, has announced the general availability of Knova 6.5, the newest version of the company’s application suite for automating the service resolution process across all customer service channels. Designed to reduce costs and to improve customer satisfaction, Knova 6.5 is highlighted by a new version of Knova’s natural-language search engine, a core component of the Knova 6.5 Knowledge Platform. Knova 6.5 also features Knova Field Service, a new SRM application for mobile support professionals.

New and enhanced features of Knova 6.5 include the following: a next-generation search engine, featuring enhanced natural-language processing and contextual-proximity indexing that “leapfrogs competitive approaches”; Knova Field Service, a mobile support application that can enable field service professionals to resolve customer issues on-site; new authoring and content management features that support personalization and compliance goals; and extended international language support and localization capabilities for global deployments.

The next-gen search engine has been added for improved relevancy and resolution; the Field Service application, for powering remote, on-site service resolution; the rich content management, for enhanced personalization and compliance; and the improved internationalization, for supporting global deployments.
www.knova.com

Cisco, IBM Plan To Deliver New Speech-Enabled Self-Service Solutions
IBM and Cisco have announced the two companies’ joint plan to deliver speech-enabled self-service solutions to contact centers by combining IBM’s WebSphere Voice Server product and Cisco’s Customer Voice Portal.

The solutions would combine IBM’s integration and application infrastructure software and speech technology with Cisco’s IP communications, focusing on self-service speech applications, which together are aimed at enabling easier deployment of customized speech applications that enhance the customer experience. By using IBM WebSphere Application Server middleware, the solutions would allow contact centers to leverage open standards, including Voice XML and J2EE. Combining Cisco’s Customer Voice Portal with IBM’s WebSphere infrastructure software would also enable enterprises to incorporate speech into a range of functions. These include customer service, sales and marketing, human resources and inventory management.

The IBM/Cisco offerings will be designed to let businesses extend enterprise-class speech self-service to remote locations across both IP and non-IP networks. The combination of Cisco Customer Voice Portal with IBM WebSphere Voice Server for Multiplatforms provides businesses with a single integrated platform upon which to develop a new generation of speech applications.
www.cisco.com
www.ibm.com

Loquendo Announces Optimized Speech Recognition Performance With Loquendo ASR 6.6
Loquendo, a speech technology company, has announced the release of Loquendo ASR 6.6. This new version of the Automatic Speech Recognition engine assists in enabling a more powerful use of speech recognition for voice application development. Loquendo ASR is a next-generation speech recognition technology the makes possible the creation of automated voice solutions that are “accurate, flexible and robust, even in the noisiest of environments.”

Following are some of the new features included in Loquendo ASR 6.6:

• The barge-in functionality has been significantly improved as regards speech input detection to allow the interruption of text-to-speech playback. The major enhancements integrate a variety of technologies to better discriminate user speech from noise or background speech, and to guarantee a quick and reliable response.

• Loquendo ASR now ships in a variety of tiers, providing integrators with greater licensing flexibility.

• The compilation process of very large grammars has been further optimized.
Loquendo ASR offers a wide range of available languages. Upon request, certain languages can be provided as a single module.
www.loquendo.com

 

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