Avaya Announces New Communications Applications that Utilize Automated Speech

BASKING RIDGE, N.J. — Avaya Inc. announced new releases of its unified communication and contact center solutions, which deliver self-service functionalities across an organization through speech-enabled applications.  Avaya Unified Communication Center - which enables users to initiate conference calls and manage e-mails, voicemails and calendars using speech - extends its availability to a greater number of enterprise users.  Avaya Interactive Response, an automated self-service solution for enterprises, broadens its international reach with speech-recognition capabilities for an expanded number of languages.

The company also introduced a new set of software development tools and interfaces to develop and customize branded speech applications for Avaya Interactive Response. The new Avaya Speech Applications Builder lets developers design speech automation services using open standards such as VoiceXML (VXML) - which uses Internet tools in the development of speech applications.

One of the companies benefiting from Avaya's speech-enabled communications is Healthpoint® Ltd., a growing global pharmaceutical company that is using the new version of Avaya Unified Communication Center.  Healthpoint uses the application to let users have a single source where they can access e-mail, voicemail, calendars and other functions via speech.  This greatly enhances mobility for workers in transit, who need their information rapidly and conveniently.

"Avaya's speech access capabilities are a tremendous benefit, particularly for our field sales force, giving them the ability to maximize their productivity, even if they are in an airport waiting on a flight," said Mark Shane, Healthpoint systems technician.  "With this application, an executive in transit doesn't need to boot up their laptop to access e-mail, or press buttons to interact with business processes. Avaya Unified Communication Center allows them to maintain a complete connection to operations, and when you are in sales, the more connected you are - the more you sell!"

In addition to tapping the software's abilities to allow Healthpoint's workers to use a phone to check or schedule dates in an online calendar, Shane says the "Reach Me" capabilities of Unified Communication Center give Healthpoint's sales team greater access to customers, enabling them to remain reachable through just one number that will track down employees.

Avaya Unified Communication Center and Avaya Interactive Response are solutions within the company's portfolio of Internet protocol-based MultiVantage™ Communications Applications - which encompasses telephony, contact centers, messaging and unified communication.

With the introduction of Avaya Unified Communication Center 2.0, Avaya increases the scalability of unified communications, supporting up to 10,000 subscribers. Other new enhancements include integration with IBM® Lotus Notes® calendar and contacts, allowing users to utilize speech with this application to access schedules and contacts (in addition to pre-existing e-mail speech access).

Avaya Interactive Response 1.2 adds international support, expanding its speech recognition and text-to-speech capabilities to more than thirty languages, including Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Italian. It also operates on higher-capacity servers.