60 Seconds with Stephen R. Kowarsky
Co-Founder and Executive Vice President, CosmoCom

Editors such as Yours Truly are accustomed to getting a single press release per product. But when, in March 2009, CosmoCom (www.cosmocom.com) released Version 6 of their CosmoCall Universe (CCU) unified IP contact center suite, it took seven press releases to even begin to describe the immense enhancements that CosmoCom had made in 6 areas: Unified Customer Communications (a term CosmoCom coined in 2000), contact center mobility, real-time report and analytics, virtual outbound calling, screen recording and multimedia call recording, and better integration with Microsoft Outlook.

I asked Stephen R. Kowarsky, Co-founder and EVP of CosmoCom, to give me the rundown on his company's huge efforts in melding UC with contact centers.

RG: I must admit, CCU Version 6 is quite a Herculean feat.

SK: "Yes, we believe CosmoCall Universe Version 6 is an important advance in the state-of-the-art. We're claiming a leadership position and we consider each one of our six major categorical improvements to CCU to be newsworthy. Moreover, our website has a link to a movie [www.cosmocom.com/to/cgo-video] that explains how version Version 6 of CosmoCall Universe includes CosmoGo, a new smartphone technology that extends the functionality of contact center technology to mobile knowledge workers. I can't encourage everyone strongly enough to watch that 6-minute video. Any employee anywhere with a smartphone and access to a mobile network can be the recipient of automatic skills-based routing that directs calls to the right person, even if they're on the road. Additionally, screen pops can now appear to provide information about the caller and the call, there's inquiry and transaction enablement for recurring subjects, and tracking and reporting functions are also accessible from the mobile to manage the operation.

Another video describes our new CosmoDashboard [http://www.cosmocom.com/video/cosmoDashboard.asp], a real-time and historical reporting tool. CCU 6.0 provides truly comprehensive and completely configurable real-time historical and analytical capabilities, so you can achieve maximum value you're your contact center.

RG: People forget that contact centers had what we now call UC technology years ago. It started when the old call centers needed to bring outside experts into a customer-agent call situation.

SK: Yes. For example, in addition to the traditional CosmoCall Agent who is completely dedicated to the contact center, we've introduced two new user types - ReadyReps and Business Users. ReadyRep licenses are for users having responsibilities outside the contact center, but who must occasionally be brought into the customer service process because of their knowledge, skills and so forth. Our competitors' 'expert' licenses simply involve overlaying instant messaging to the Agents. ReadyReps, however, are completely integrated into the contact center, with access to all agent capabilities, such as the automatic skills-based routing, the application integration for screen pops, and the tracking for management reporting. Business User licenses are for people who are part of the contact center user community, but not part of the automatic routing feature. You can set them up with just one of our new CosmoPhones, or with our optional computer desktop interface called CosmoDesk, which is included with Agents and ReadyReps. When equipped with CosmoDesk, Business Users can also use the contact center's application integration features.

Just as today's most advanced IP PBXs project PBX features to mobile users, so too does our CosmoGo Smartphone technology extend the benefits of contact center technology to mobile knowledge workers. CosmoGo, a Smartphone and a mobile network can mesh to provide mobile users with automatic skills-based routing that directs calls to the right person. It can also do screen pops that provide information about the caller and the call, inquiry and transaction enablement
for recurring subjects, and tracking and reporting that make the whole operation manageable. Moreover, we now offer virtual outbound calling, enabling agents to be anywhere, which means that there's now unlimited resources that can be brought to bear on any dialing campaign. Also, our Linked campaigns feature allows multiple lists in different formats to be combined into a single campaign.

CCU 6.0 also does multimedia recording, including screen recording. You can capture an entire user's desktop during contact sessions of all channels, including phone, email, and chat. A complete record of what's said and done during a call is kept, all in WVM format.