most influential CTI companies, The

Bayless, Jeanne

CTI For Management(TM) is pleased to present this special feature: The Most Influential CTI Companies. In our feature, we have invited the top executives from the leading companies in CTI to describe the industry's most important challenges and opportunities in the coming years .

We are very impressed by the quality of the essays contributed to our feature, and we thank the contributors for all the time, thought and effort invested in their preparation. We are certain you, our valued readers, will find the essays, all of which take a generic and tutorial approach, an informative and stimulating look at the fast-growing CTI industry.

The companies included in the feature reflect the variety of companies active in CTI. Of course, the firms behind the de facto interface standards are represented. That is, we have included IBM Corporation, which brought us CallPath; AT&T and Novell, Inc., which introduced the telephony services application programming interface (TSAPI) standard; and Microsoft and Intel, which developed the telephony application programming interface (TAPI) standard. However, our feature also includes many other companies.

Although we have not attempted to put together an exhaustive compilation, we do believe we have succeeded in presenting a fair cross-section of the CTI industry. We have, for example, included systems integrators, software developers, switch vendors, and others. CTI's giants are here, as well as a selection of smaller yet innovative companies.

While the companies helping to implement CTI constitute a heterogeneous group, we hope you will agree that our feature, as a whole, will help you "get your arms around" this emerging industry. Still, the main value of our feature is in the words prepared by the participants, who, by and large, address the future of CTI. Again, we must thank all the contributors for offering their insights on this exciting field, which promises to introduce profound change to the call center environment.

In order to compete more effectively in a global economy, many enterprises now view information as a strategic asset. Over the years, companies of all sizes have invested heavily in elaborate information repositories and networks. An array of technologies have been deployed for accessing and managing information for better decision support. Yet most enterprises have been unable to fully leverage their data for competitive benefit because the means of accessing this information have been cumbersome at best.

Information access is only one challenge. Other business processes, particularly those requiring both customer interaction and repetitive tasks--faxing, paging, e-mail, conference calling and schedule coordination--can also be streamlined to improve productivity, reduce costs and enhance customer service. Proactive anticipation of customer needs and rapid response are fast becoming the competitive strategies for the 21st century.

The convergence of desktop computing and telecommunications technologies provides a unique opportunity to develop a range of new applications that can be effectively deployed across the enterprise oriented toward integrating and automating business processes. The challenge now is to focus on tying a plethora of productivity tools together driven by the most readily available technology--the telephone.

A new generation of applications has emerged based on the concept that telephone calls (voice) are just another data type that can be integrated into and/or drive the flow of business processes. At its core is the belief that new age CTI applications must go beyond traditional computer-telephony middleware that simply moves data on the back end between a telephone switch and a personal computer. The opportunity for providing value in the future is to focus on seamlessly linking telephony into the client/server computing environment. Telephone calls and the information generated must be automatically integrated into applications across the enterprise. This integration provides an intelligent mechanism for delivering the right information at the right time to users who typically conduct their business by phone.

CTI, we believe, has spawned a new generation of telephony-based business process automation (BPA) software focused on automatically tying together the assets of the enterprise--employees, information, computers, communications and the customer--to enhance the way customer relationships are managed. The real opportunity for BPA software is to effect a change in the way individuals and organizations interact to compete more effectively.

CTI traditionally been in the domain of large and often expensive call centers as well as other high-end environments. As new BPA software is developed, independent software vendors must be willing to provide systems integration programs and consulting services to assist early adopters in design and implementation issues. Over the next few years, we believe BPA software will evolve to become as pervasive as the telephone itself.

Jeanne Bayless brings 16 years of management experience to AnswerSoft, specializing in high-technology start-up companies. Prior to founding AnswerSoft, Ms. Bayless was chief financial officer/chief operations officer for Blyth Holdings, Inc., a client/server software development tools company. Previously, Ms. Bayless was new product development manager at Texas Instruments' Information Technology division, where she launched the EDI business unit.

The pace of change in the CTI market is faster now than ever before. Manufacturers must be strategically placed to keep up with this change and be in the right marketplace to survive. At APEX, we see several challenges and opportunities in the very near future for CTI.

One of those challenges is picking the right place to focus development efforts. As standards like the telephony application programming interface (TAPI) and the telephony services application programming interface (TSAPI) emerge, the ability to create prebuilt solutions for CTI will give manufacturers like ourselves the opportunity to deliver templates for common switch interfaces.

Operating systems are also competing to be the dominant standard. We believe the main software environments are Windows 95, Windows NT, and UNIX. Picking a standard operating system gives manufacturers the ability to concentrate development around this core technology, but the challenge is keeping pace with the continual changes.

Another significant challenge we face every day is created due to the multiple standard hardware platforms such as PC, VME, and RISC (Digital Alpha). When we create a general purpose interactive voice response (IVR) product, we must use different software packages to be sure our product provides the same functionality on different platforms. A good example of this is 3270 host interface. The PC-based products are not available on VME bus systems and so on. We have to find an equivalent product and redevelop for each specific platform.

Voice card products and telephony protocols are also changing. For instance, Dialogic's PEB bus has evolved to the SC bus; E-1 signaling is gradually being replaced by ISDN; and analog is evolving to all-digital networks. With the new architectures and new protocols, there are new features that can be incorporated to provide more capabilities.

At APEX, our commitment to 32-bit computing under UNIX and Windows NT, Dialogic voice products, and now supporting versions of OmniVox across multiple platforms, places us in an ideal place for future growth and success.

In the long run, the ultimate beneficiaries of all this changing technology are the customers who can design their automated systems to work the way they work--tying together products from multiple sources with greater simplicity and less cost than was ever possible before.

Elhum Vahdat oversees the marketing, finance and administration of APEX Voice Communications. His active role in tracking industry trends allows APEX to position itself strategically in this fast growing market.

Companies have improved customer service and reduced overall operating costs through the implementation of CTI into the call center. Indeed, before long the nonintegrated call center will be something of an oddity. The ability to create market segments of one representing true, personalized customer service--while increasing productivity, will drive the enterprise toward increased reliance on CTI. Before that becomes a reality, however, several challenges will have to be met by call center providers and their customers.

Providers must adapt to the changing face of call center transactions and venues. Call centers will increasingly rely on media other than the telephone. There will be video kiosks in shopping malls, CD-ROM catalogs, personal computer entry, personal document assistant (PDA) entry, fax, the Internet and World Wide Web, interactive cable TV and other new ways customers will be able to place orders. To handle these transactions cost-effectively, and to tap specialized labor forces, companies will network their call centers around the globe, "following the sun."

Call center vendor focus will shift from building hardware to developing and customizing applications, as well as attracting the best and brightest third-party partners. Vendors will have to find ways to demystify the technology and bring it into their customers' business terms. Application development, systems integration and consulting services will become essential in this new call center paradigm.

Call center customers will face the corresponding challenge of shifting from purchasing technology to selecting solutions and solutions providers. With CTI erasing the traditional boundary lines between the call center and the rest of the enterprise, the schism between the telecommunications and information technology departments will no longer work. Customers will have to forge new relationships among those responsible for providing these services to internal and external customers.

The opportunities are exciting. For companies, the future holds new and creative ways of interacting with customers to make transactions even more responsive and convenient. For call center vendors, a value-added philosophy and systems integration will build closer ties with customers. At Aspect, we have taken this approach from day one. We began with the best standard components available and then integrated and optimized them for the call center. With our open architecture, our systems integrator roots, and our focus on value-added solutions, we feel uniquely well-positioned to provide CTI solutions that support our customers' mission-critical call center environments. This has been and continues to be our only business by choice.

Jim Carreker is a founder and a member of the Board of Directors of Aspect Telecommunications, guiding the overall strategy of the company. Before starting Aspect, he was senior vice president and general manager of the Information Systems Division at Dataquest. Earlier, he headed product development and product marketing of Datapoint Infoswitch and was also vice president and general manager of Datapoint's Communications Management Products Division. Mr. Carreker previously worked for Bell Labs, EDS and Action Communications Systems.

Before you talk about the future of CTI, it is important to remember the needs that drive buyers today. Communications, particularly in call center applications, are the heartbeat of your business, and you can't afford downtime. Equally important is manageability, with centralized control to ensure that you've got the reins of your business well in hand. Without dependability and manageability, all the latest greatest whizbang features aren't going to mean a thing.

Provided our industry delivers manageable, dependable solutions, CTI is going to explode. I think CTI has some similarities with the market evolution of the fax machine. Who, a few years ago, would have predicted we'd be faxing our lunch orders to the local deli? This technology is going to make new applications possible that we haven't even thought of today. It starts from the value of being able to integrate an intuitive screen-based user interface with the phone and grows from there. This combination of both the advancing sophistication of CTI platforms, as well as their dropping cost, make CTI solutions effective options where they wouldn't have even been feasible a few years ago.

Bringing together telephones and computers is only the beginning. The telephone, the computer, the fax machine, voicemail, e-mail and the like are all ways we exchange information. Part of the challenge today is that these objects don't easily interoperate, I can't fax you my voicemail, I can't pick up the phone to get my e-mail or faxes...yet. I firmly believe that the next major evolution in CTI will be the growth of integrated messaging.

Imagine inbound call center applications that weave together fax, voice, and electronic mail/communications along with more sophisticated voice response, allowing agents to respond to inbound calls with outbound e-mail, fax, or voice, all at the customer's choice. Imagine your professional staff having a single inbox for all these communications and being able to scan, process, forward--in short, truly use--the information it receives.

All of these things are easily within reach...if the vendors can work together to ensure product interoperability. This is where the critical work of interoperability groups like Versit, the Enterprise Computer Telephony Forum (ECTF), the European Computer Manufacturer's Association (ECMA), and CMC come in. Customers should look for standards-based solutions that open up their options. Standards ensure that customers can easily integrate from multiple vendors and that the systems they buy today will work with the systems of tomorrow.

I'm excited about the ways that CTI is transforming the way we all do business. I hope you are too.

Jerry Prestinario is responsible for new business development associated with the emerging CTI market including the Passageway products from AT&T. He has spent over 20 years in the computer and communications industries covering a host of businesses and markets. Most recently he was active in establishing standards and products associated with simultaneous voice and data, including images.

The main challenge for CTI in the next few years is to have the technology up and running on every desktop. Some claim that the CTI market is still in the early adopter stage and isn't moving quickly. On the contrary, we at Aurora Systems have seen the CTI market booming, and there is a clear demand for affordable packaged solutions. The CTI market is definitely driving away from custom systems and moving on to bigger and better things like packaged solutions that do not require costly programming and customization.

Systems integrators claim that a customized system is the best solution and can start for a little as $250. But we know that when you add the cost of installation and custom programming, plus additional training and development time, actual costs can be much higher. The average cost of a customized system starts at $200,000, and typically takes over six months to implement. CTI cannot succeed unless we reduce such high prices and lengthy implementation times.

The trend in CTI, as in all software, is toward off-the-shelf products. A new generation of products enables robust CTI for a fraction of the cost of a customized system, with installation times measured in hours, not months. Why go back to the CTI of yesteryear, when you can move forward with the new generation of shrink-wrapped products?

Another industry challenge is to instill trust and confidence in the technology. Accepted standards are the key to the continued growth of CTI. People are reluctant to make a large investment in a product that is not endorsed by the big players in the industry. Ideally, products should be compatible with both the telephony services application programming interface (TSAPI), developed by AT&T and Novell, and the telephony application programming interface (TAPI), developed by Intel and Microsoft.

With so many opportunities to implement affordable and robust CTI now, businesses are eager to take advantage of this technology. CTI promises to streamline the way we all do business, and ultimately lead to greater customer satisfaction.

Paul M. Gasparro, co-founder and CEO of Aurora Systems, Inc., has over 25 years of experience in the electronics industry, with 20 in the communications market. In his role as CEO at Aurora, Gasparro is focused on CTI and applications development for the call processing market. Prior to establishing Aurora, Gasparro served as president and CEO of Voicetek, Corp., where he pioneered the development of general purpose voice computers for the telephone information processing market. Gasparro has served as a member of the board of directors of the Voice Information Services Division of the Information Industry Association. He is active in both the Alliance of Computer-Based Telephony Application Suppliers (ACTAS) and the North American Telecommunications Association (NATA).

As a ten-year veteran of the software automation industry, I have seen many call centers adopt new applications, especially in the area of CTI. These call centers, which are charged with duties ranging from inside sales to customer service, are rapidly integrating their automation software with CTI for many reasons. First, the overall usability of CTI is improving daily, a trend that is causing CTI to become a commodity. The value is in the customer application and in how this application makes use of the instant access to knowledge provided by CTI.

A general decrease in the cost of CTI technology, coupled with a more widespread adoption of emerging interface standards, means less effort and money is spent learning and interfacing with proprietary systems and functions. Instead, more resources are focused on building creative customer applications. Experts predict that the latest offerings of application building tools, which are graphical user interface (GUI) based, will cause an explosion of call center applications because now it will be much easier to build them.

All of these advances are creating many opportunities for CTI. In fact, although 84 percent of the CTI market is in North America, according to Tern Systems, the growth rate outside North America is even higher. By 1998, these areas will constitute 27 percent of the total market. One reason for this growth in the worldwide market is that quality customer service, until recently, has received only limited business resources. However, as the economy becomes more service oriented, the need for customer service centers to utilize telephony increases. Sales and customer service departments in Europe are also just beginning to offer toll-free numbers.

This increased use of telephone services is creating a need for systems to accommodate additional callers. And, just as in America, deregulation in Europe is decreasing long distance communication costs, which in turn gives potential users more incentive to adopt call center environments.

With all these opportunities, CTI is still not without its difficulties. Although the number of nonstandard interfaces in this industry is decreasing, there are still enough of them to create a challenge for complimentary applications. And although CTI applications are becoming easier to build, it can still be a complex task to integrate sophisticated call center environments with interactive voice response, fax backs and screen "pops."

Even with these challenges, the future for CTI looks bright. Before long, we are going to witness even more exciting advances such as live video service applications. As you can see, the possibilities are endless.

Richard T. Brock is widely recognized as an authority on entrepreneurship and the field of sales and marketing automation. Since founding Brock Control Systems in 1984, Brock has been active in developing sales and automation systems that could be used to "close the loop" in a company's business cycle. Brock also founded Management Control Systems (MCS), a leader in minicomputer software sales, which has since been acquired by Prentice-Hall. Inc. Distinctions earned by Brock include being listed among the 1991 Who's Who Among Leading American Executives; being selected as a top "Research and Development Star to Watch" by IndustryWeek Magazine; and being named Georgia's High-Tech Entrepreneur of the Year in a contest sponsored by Ernst & Young, Merrill Lynch and Inc. magazine.

Our greatest challenge and our greatest opportunity is to deliver the benefits of CTI at affordable prices. As a pioneer in CTI that is strongly committed to its long-term success, we want to see the market grow. Making solutions affordable to businesses of all sizes is the way to make that happen.

The migration from proprietary solutions to standards-based solutions is already making CTI more affordable, at least for larger businesses. But to realize the full potential of CTI, the technology has to be affordable to smaller businesses--the six million or more establishments with 100 or fewer employees. Not only do CTI solutions for this market have to be affordable, they also need to be easy--easy to understand, easy to install and easy to use. We see a need for shrink-wrapped, integrated computer-telephony solutions (not just "telephone systems") geared to specific vertical markets like those comprising automobile dealers or stockbrokers.

Our challenge, and the industry's, is to deliver products like this at prices that are both profitable (to the supplier) and affordable (to the end user). This will mean a change from the traditional telecommunications philosophy of "one size fits all." That was OK for the past, but now it's time for a change. At Comdial, we think CTI is the best thing to happen to our industry since dial tone, and we are excited.

William C. Grover guides Comdial in its mission to deliver integrated solutions to a wide variety of business communications problems. Comdial specializes in supplying CTI-based systems solutions and developing and marketing applications software. Grover's previous positions include president and CEO of PICKTEL Computer Systems, a developer and distributor of multi-user database and management information systems and president of Sequoia Systems Inc., a manufacturer and marketer of fault-tolerant computer systems targeted to the on-line transaction market. Grover has also held executive-level positions at Norand Corporation and Sperry Corporation.

Computer-telephony integration is the integration of voice and data technologies with the goal of improving the level of service you offer your customers and at the same time reducing the expenses of providing that service. A simple idea? Yes. But getting there is another matter. Why? To to utilize CTI, some fundamental changes in your environment will be required. Traditional borders between departments will not stand; some legacy systems will need to be replaced if new ways of integrating them cannot be found; and your internal resources will need the vision--and, more importantly, the skill--to "re-engineer" your company. But how to accomplish such sweeping change?

The implementation of CTI will require a new level of teamwork that may not currently exist in your business. First and foremost, you will require a corporate visionary, a champion who understands that there are new and better ways of doing things. Your champion will understand that through the carefully planned implementation of CTI, your business can take its productivity, cost savings and customer service goals to new "enterprisewide" levels. Previously unimaginable organizational relationships and productivity gains are now possible through the implementation of CTI technology, not just in the call center, but throughout the entire enterprise.

However, the challenges facing re-engineering champions can be significant, particularly if individual managers think only in terms of their own departments. In the past, the department was the only way to think. There simply wasn't a way to develop systems that crossed over and seamlessly linked multiple departments. But, like the technology itself, times are rapidly changing. Today, CTI enhances current computer technology tremendously through its ability to synchronize data and voice transactions.

Advances in workstation and relational database technology have become even more significant since they can enhance your organization's ability to handle all aspects of your customer contacts, including follow-up activities (letters, faxes, invoices, etc.) that are required by the company-customer interaction. The concept of the "business enterprise" may not enjoy current broad acceptance, but I believe that today's CTI champions, coupled with vendors that share this same vision, will be the driving force behind the widespread implementation of this voice--data technology within a few short years.

Acceptance of CTI will make it possible to establish overall enterprisewide customer contact strategies, set and achieve more demanding goals for customer service and link all departments to effectively achieve those goals. The promise of CTI will require the considerable efforts of champions along the way, but the payback potential is great and well worth the effort.

Earl Steman has the responsibility for setting Davox's strategic direction around its introduction of a suite of computer-telephony integration products. A six-year veteran of Davox, Earl was part of the original team that designed Unison, the company's call center management system. He has been actively involved in marketing Unison internationally. Earl brings to this new challenge more than 25 years' experience in the voice and data industry. During his career in high-tech hardware and software marketing, Earl has contributed numerous articles and spoken frequently on call management.

What is today's greatest challenge for the field of computer-telephone integration? Without a doubt, it's the lack of clear, concise information for CTI shoppers.

By now, most of our readers have heard of CTI. They understand that CTI features will improve customer service levels and increase the efficiency of almost any call center. They have seen product information from the increasing number of hardware and software vendors who offer CTI-related products. They have heard testimonials from organizations that have already added CTI capabilities to their call centers. Many indicate that they want to undertake a CTI project in the near future. But, if they are truly honest, they admit not being comfortable making a commitment to CTI.

Why not? I believe it's because there isn't much easily-accessible information about how to integrate real-world CTI systems. CTI is, by definition, an activity that pulls together diverse systems from both telephone and data processing technologies. Most projects involve tying together pre-existing systems, a more complex and messy process than starting fresh. And call centers generally handle mission-critical business transactions, so CTI inherently involves mission-critical business systems. Hardly something to be undertaken lightly, or without study and planning.

Which brings us to the core of the problem. There is very little generally available information about the practical aspects of implementing CTI projects. Instead, the market is full of claims and counterclaims for a rich array of commercial products. And without a good knowledge base, a prospective buyer is poorly equipped to sift through these claims and decide upon a strategy. No one makes major commitments in the face of such confusion, so we have an industry where sellers have worthwhile product and buyers want to buy it--but everyone is too nervous to take any action.

The noisy debate over the two prominent CTI application programming interfaces (APIs), the telephony API (TAPI) and the telephony service API (TSAPI), is a case in point. It reminds me of the perennial debate between the IBM and Macintosh personal computers. What if no one had bought a desktop computer until this question was resolved? Not only would a major industry not exist, but the user community would have been robbed of an important business tool. In reality, of course, making a choice between these two computers is a case-by-case decision based on the availability of application software and on personal preference.

The same is true of the CTI API debate. What prospective buyers need is to understand the role of an API in a CTI environment. They need to understand that an API is only an interface specification, and that their CTI systems can support several APIs at one time--just like a computer network can support PCs and Macintoshes simultaneously. These alternative APIs have individual strengths and weaknesses--just as there is no one "best" personal computer. But by definition, the best API for any given project is the one which most readily supports the desired application and system environment.

I imagine a lot of CTI shoppers feel like many folks do when they begin a do-it-yourself plumbing project. They figure they're going to get a nasty surprise somewhere along the way, since they don't really know what they're doing. They'll buy all the wrong parts, put them together wrong, and end up with water all over the floor. Of course, they could call a professional instead--but if they know nothing about plumbing, they had better find a trustworthy tradesman] Either way, a quick trip to the library or bookstore would foster confidence, encourage action, and save a lot of aggravation.

The CTI industry needs to build that library: Books, articles, classroom training, videos...whatever it takes to make well-informed CTI shoppers. We vendors need to talk less about our individual products, and more about how all our products fit together. After all, when you understand what you're shopping for, it's easier (and less risky) to make a buying decision. We owe this to our customers if we want their business.

Carl J. Strathmeyer is responsible for determining and executing Dialogic's product strategy far CTI software products and related professional services. Before joining Dialogic, Strathmeyer had been with Digital for seventeen years in a variety of management, marketing and technical positions in the fields of CTI, public telecommunications network applications, computer network engineering, corporate telecommunications and business systems design. Strathmeyer is the chairman of the Alliance of Computer-Based Telephony Application Suppliers (ACTAS), the principal trade association for the CTI industry. He frequently contributes papers and articles on message systems and voicey-related computing to professional and trade publications.

The main challenges and opportunities in the CTI industry are as follows:

1. Adding value in the connectivity area. There may soon be very little value-add opportunity in the connectivity area. In the next five years, connectivity will improve in performance until this "free" layer is adequate for all but the most demanding environments. For now, though, being free does not mean connectivity is good or even good enough, and there is still opportunity to make the free layer really work. However, it is going to be difficult getting customers to understand and pay for your value add when they think they are buying TAPI-able (and supposedly fully integrated) high-performance connectivity.

2. Moving beyond the formal call center. The call center call handling automation and productivity imperatives are giving way to customer service quality issues. In addition, this trend is evident in places other than call centers. CTI will be an enterprisewide technology. For example, department-level database solutions and workflow systems "upstream" of the telephone call are major opportunities.

3. Adding value at the business solutions level. Integration at the application and solution level (beyond connectivity) is where most value will be added...especially if the call/workflow touches, even indirectly, customers. High-level solution design tools will enable business experts to add the value rather than having to rely on educating programming and technology craftpersons.

4. Changing the way we think about hardware and software. Applications and solutions will be developed in "smart" middleware. Huge amounts of very cheap memory will be accessible through nearly unlimited bandwidth. Memory and switching will move back to the center. In short, software will be "smart" and distributed, and hardware will be "dumb" and concentrated.

5. Seizing Internet Opportunities. The Internet will reduce voice and paper fax traffic. Such traffic will not go down in absolute terms, but the growth rate will slow. Internet CTI will provide opportunities to serve business customers.

6. Thriving in the multivendor environment. Profitable solutions will be the product of highly collaborative creativity between the user and three or more aligned (perhaps only for this one opportunity) "vendors." Company size, market share and profit will not be the only defining factors for leadership in CTI. Influence and expertise will be recognized and rewarded with high returns on investment for smaller players. Value-added resellers and systems integrators will rise in status to the level (or even beyond the level) of product developers.

Pat Howard has more than 20 years of experience in the computer-telephony systems and solutions business. Prior to joining Digital Systems International in late 1994, he was president of VMX, a leading manufacturer of systems and software for multimedia messaging and call processing. VMX merged with Octel Communications in late March 1994. Howard also served as president and director of Opcom prior to its merger with VMX in 1988. From 1973 to 1984, Howard was president of ComPath, a nationwide telecommunications systems and service provider. He has also held positions in sales, sales management, sales training and marketing development with computer and communications companies, including Xerox Corporation.

There has been significant growth in the size and the number of call centers being established by companies in a wide variety of industries over the past few years. Businesses are investing millions of dollars in computer-telephony integration to improve the quality of customer service and satisfaction; increase the number of calls per agent; improve productivity; reduce telephone costs and cost of sales; and increase revenues resulting from cross-selling opportunities.

The challenge for companies making these investments in call centers is to automate the right way. The piece-meal approach simply won't give them the performance and return on investment they desire for such activities as customer service, loan by phone, claims processing, teleservicing, telesales, collections and other inbound and outbound applications.

Companies need to recognize that technology exists today to create an integrated call center--a system which manages both voice and data and has access to data from a wide variety of business applications and databases across the enterprise so that sales and service agents get the information they need, no matter where or how it exists.

The trend toward distributed, client/server computing is further enhancing the integrated call center through new, easier-to-use client applications built with modern graphical user interfaces. We also are seeing the beginnings of a trend toward distributed call centers, in which individual call centers--often geographically dispersed--need to pass information to and from each other.

This challenge to build integrated call centers creates opportunities on two levels: First, the company building the call center has the opportunity to create significant gains in productivity, profitability and service levels by creating an environment in which agents get the information they need instantly, enabling the company to meet or exceed customers' expectations for time convenience, immediacy of response and instantly available information. Second, vendors providing software and services for the integrated call center market have the opportunity to serve an expanding market with customer contact management systems, interactive voice response units, voice and data integration, integrated fax, automated dialing capabilities, enterprise information access and work flow management systems and systems integration.

In addition to his management of operations as CEO, Kevin Kelly has been responsible for the development of the company's software product offerings and is the co-architect of Early, Cloud & Company's core products. Kelly has directed the field services organization, and with more than 17 years of experience in the data processing industry, he has also been responsible for the direction of numerous systems consulting engagements and development projects for Fortune 500 companies. During Kelly's tenure on the Early, Cloud & Company Board of Directors, the company has grown an average of more than 20 percent annually over the past three years, while improving on its net income. This year, Early, Cloud became a wholly owned subsidiary of IBM Corporation.

As companies look for more effective ways to communicate with existing customers--as well as prospects--many are starting to turn to computer-telephony integration to help meet their business needs. By implementing a successful CTI program, businesses are beginning to see an increase in their bottom lines.

The future of call centers is one of integrated solutions. In addition to bringing together multiple vendors with varying levels of capabilities, this technology will enable companies to manage their resources better.

Just as with buying real estate, where the three most important factors are "location, location, location," with CTI they are "requirements, requirements, requirements." Businesses must have a clear idea of what their CTI needs are and what they expect the system to accomplish, both today and in the future. This can be determined by communicating with management and vendors to find out their CTI expectations.

In all CTI implementations, the two most critical areas are planning and training. Often neglected, these areas present companies with the greatest opportunity to influence a project and help ensure its success.

While there are no magic spells that will guarantee automatic success for every CTI implementation, planning, training and organization can make a huge difference in the ultimate outcome.

In addition to his roles as president and chief operating officer of EIS International, E. Kevin Dahill is a director of the company. Prior to EIS, Dahill sewed as vice president, finance and chief financial officer of International Customer Solutions, Inc., an IBM business partner engaged in the sale of software, systems and services for the mid-range computer market. He has also held various executive positions for Iomega Corporation, a disk drive and sub system manufacture and Bernoulli Optical Systems Company, a wholly owned subsidiary. He also served as consultant with McKinsey & Company and worked in product development at Control Data Corporation.

One thing is clear: CTI is taking off. Why? The reasons include improved customer service, reduced cost of conducting business and competitive differentiation. Nevertheless, there are several obstacles that must be overcome if CTI's explosive growth is to continue.

One of the key challenges that exists has nothing to do with CTI technology. That is, personnel issues in companies planning to implement CTI technology can be critical. Specifically, information services and telecommunications departments often differ with respect to philosophy, work habits, language and objectives. Since it is imperative for these departments to work hand in hand for a successful CTI implementation, overcoming these differences should be one of the first milestones in a CTI project. One way to minimize interdepartmental strife is to assign a project manager who has authority and responsibility for the entire CTI project.

Many integration issues have been overcome on the telephone side. Indeed, a CTI interface is now a common feature on most telephone systems. On the computer side, there are still many ways to connect the application to the telephone system--some proprietary, some built on open architectures. The biggest change that will occur over the next couple of years is the push toward standards-compliant interfaces that will allow much more flexibility in connecting computer and telephone systems. Industrywide efforts, such as Versit and the Enterprise Computer Telephony Forum (ECTF), will bring about the definition and adoption of specifications by a wide range of technology and solution providers. These specifications will dramatically simplify the technical issues encountered in the design of CTI solutions.

There will be a significant increase in the portability of applications among a wide range of CTI servers and telephone systems. As this trend continues, the installation of CTI solutions will become much simpler. Not only will standards for connecting the components of a CTI solution evolve, but vendors, application developers and end users will continue to enhance their skills and build on their experience. Ultimately, end users will have great freedom in putting together CTI solutions as technical constraints become less important. Decisions about CTI solutions will be driven by business requirements, not worries over how the various components of a proposed solution will work together.

While this evolution takes place, the overall costs associated with implementing a CTI solution (the telephone system link, CTI middleware, integration services and hardware) will continue to decrease. CTI technology will become available to an ever-widening range of users.

The future of CTI is bright. The industry is exploding, but this is only the beginning. In the future, a wider range of technologies will be integrated, leading to a true multimedia environment. CTI is the cornerstone, the enabling technology. Much more will be built upon the foundation that is being established today.

Steven M. Cawn, a 20-year veteran at IBM, is in charge of marketing IBM's CallPath and DirectTalk Voice solutions to customers worldwide. His current responsibilities include media relations, consultant relations, advertising, marketing strategy, product strategy, channels strategy, and support for the IBM Dedicated Voice Sales representatives. Cawn has also been responsible for managing the development of IBM's CallPath. Previous positions held by Cawn include call center planning manager (ROLM), systems engineering manager (IBM), and marketing support representative for Networking and Network Management Products (IBM). Cawn has over eight years of experience in the voice industry.

Every successful technology goes through a familiar cycle: initial development; early adoption by progressive users; and, finally, widespread market appeal and acceptance. Where is CTI in this cycle? For the past few years, as many have noted, CTI has been on the verge of spectacular success. So what has kept CTI on the threshold of triumph?

From a pure technological perspective, the CTI marketplace has been plagued by too many choices, too few standards and a segmented technological approach. The dynamics of the CTI environment have forced many suppliers to support piecemeal solutions due to disparate hardware and telephone system strategies. As a result, most implementations of CTI strategies use a variety of CTI link technologies, all with varying topologies and varying degrees of reliability and functionality.

I believe that the market has begun to consolidate, and that the trend toward fewer CTI link strategies, such as the telephony application programming interface (TAPI) and the telephony services application programming interface (TSAPI), will continue. IBM Corporation, Hewlett-Packard, and AT&T will remain dominant players in the CTI link marketplace. Since the technological offerings are becoming less numerous and more standardized, expect to see this industry grow exponentially in the next five years both domestically and internationally.

When analyzing how CTI fits into the business communications marketplace, we should avoid concentrating on CTI's technology. Instead, we should go a step further and understand all of the applications that CTI supports. My point is quite simple: CTI is a support element to a critical business strategy. If a company's business strategy (of more direct marketing, selling and servicing of products and/or services) is not well conceived, CTI is somewhat meaningless.

The final challenge for the CTI marketplace will be forming partnerships that promote common standards and enable widespread acceptance of technological solutions. First, CTI must become a requirement for many corporate business strategies. Second, its technology must become easy to acquire and maintain. That is, CTI should be supported by many suppliers in the marketplace. In addition, suppliers of equipment and services must all find common ground: consistent approaches need to be devised to accommodate disparate equipment and software. It is through common standards and agreed upon approaches that the CTI marketplace will flourish in the next three to five years.

If the current trend continues, the markets for both CTI and the products that require CTI links will be exciting places to offer products and services. My prediction is that CTI will proliferate over the next five years because of more aggressive selling and servicing strategies that are finally at the forefront of the business community.

One of IMA's founding partners, Al Subbloie has been with the company since its inception in 1984. Today, IMA stands as a leading provider of enterprisewide solutions for sales, marketing, telemarketing and customer service automation. Prior to IMA, Subbloie held a variety of management positions with the consulting division of Arthur Andersen & Co.

The demand for standards-based communications is growing daily. To satisfy end-user demand, the CTI industry needs to overcome several challenges: Coping With Emerging Standards: The industry is moving away from proprietary CTI and toward standards-based CTI The "de facto" standards include the telephony services application programming interface (TSAPI) and desktop and third-party versions of the telephony application programming interface (TAPI). Supporting the various standards is a challenge in itself. However, it is also necessary to be aware of emerging standards, and to anticipate the compatiblity issues that may arise.

With the challenges posed by the move to standards come great opportunities. For example, CTI standards have greatly enlarged the pool of application developers. As a result, PBX manufacturers will find it easier to recruit qualified engineers who have CTI experience. The explosion of CTI applications also allows PBX manufacturers to lower costs and reduce time-to-market by partnering with application suppliers instead of developing applications in-house. Partnering arrangements can be particularly useful in the development of product suites tailored for specific markets, such as call centers and health care.

Accommodating Diverse Platforms: Currently, CTI applications can reside on a variety of computing platforms. The move toward server-based CTI interfaces will help reduce, but not eliminate, the challenge of coping with all the different platforms.

Providing Application Support: More and more, PBX manufacturers are being asked to assume the role of systems integrators and to provide customized CTI applications. As a result, PBX manufacturers must dedicate management resources to forming and managing strategic partnerships with application providers. In addition, technical resources are needed to support CTI application development (in-house or out-sourced), testing and ongoing software maintenance.

Maintaining System Integrity: Many businesses can live without computer service for a short period of time, but most cannot live without dial tone. This makes it necessary to develop technical consulting resources to help the customer perform proper system integration analysis during the planning phases of a CTI project.

Delivering Multimedia Capabilities: The CTI industry must begin delivering the kind of intelligence and applications to allow for the seamless melding of voice, video and data over a single telephone type network. In fact, real-time, desktop-to-desktop multimedia is already moving into the market.

George C. Platt is the driving force behind Intecom's long-term strategy position itself as a leading-edge provider of multimedia networks, advanced switching systems and integrated applications solutions. Intecom, a pioneer in the early development of computer-to-PBX technology, actually coined the industry term "OAI," or open application interface. Prior to joining Intecom in 1991, Platt was president and CEO of Shared Resource Exchange (SRX), Inc. Platt has also sewed as vice president of Rolm Corporation's Business Communications Group, and has held various senior-level positions at Xerox.

Perhaps one of the lead challenges for CTI throughout the next few years centers on the problem of simplifying the physical interconnection of PCs to telephony equipment. The telephony applications programming interface (TAPI) was jointly developed by Intel and Microsoft for controlling the telephone network. TAPI gives application developers and telephone equipment makers their own standard, high-level interface for requesting and executing call control operations from a PC.

The Universal Serial Bus (USB) initiative, fostered by Intel and a host of leading PC and telecommunications companies, holds great promise in this area. USB provides a low-cost connection to the PC to conventional and multimedia input/output devices such as keyboards, mice, speakers, graphics tablets and digital PBX phones, consolidating the individual dedicated ports into one.

Another area we expect to see blossom next year is the development and marketing of digital simultaneous voice and data (DSVD). These high-speed modems designed for analog lines (POTS) will allow PC users to exchange data while at the same time talking to each other via the same phone line. This technology offers a fully digital voice and data stream transmitted over the phone line via a standard V.34 28.8 kbps modem, and is compatible with applications that presently use conventional modems (such as multiplayer games).

Moving from the PC specifically to the larger issues of CTI and networking, we are very excited about the potential of the WinSock2 standard to take hold starting next year. WinSock2 is based on the popular socket paradigm, and is derived from the WinSock1.1 interface. It is designed to provide a uniform programmatic interface allowing applications (for example, TAPI-based applications) to be independent of networks and protocols by "hiding" these specifics from the applications. WinSock2 will also help support highly time-sensitive network data like voice and video.

We're also excited about moving digital signal processing, when appropriate, to the main Intel CPU on PCs, which is an approach we call native signal processing (NSP). NSP allows tight integration between multimedia and communications processing at low cost by providing the PC infrastructure required to enable the gradual migration of signal processing functions to the Pentium(R) processor by creating a real-time environment for their execution.

While the above is by no means an exhaustive list of challenges and opportunities, these technologies nevertheless collectively describe a preliminary model for computer telephony for the next few years.

Dr. Guy Blair is responsible for advancing the PC platform architecture messages in the area of PC-telephone integration and was the marketing manager at Intel for the telephony applications programming interface (TAPI) for Windows, work done jointly with Microsoft. Prior to joining Intel, Dr. Blair was engineering manager for graphics software product development at Tektronix. He has also held positions at several scientific software application companies.

The main challenges for CTI in the last half of the roaring '90s are: 1) translating the bits and bytes and hype of CTI into solid benefits arguments for broader acceptance; 2) achieving true systems compatibility; and 3) integrating new features quickly without obsoleting the installed base.

CTI's opportunities are broad and deep, for example, bringing significantly greater information to the right parties and ensuring that the customer/caller gets to the right place the first time, every time while simultaneously reducing the delivered cost per call and increasing sales per call. Companies or organizations embracing CTI enterprisewide will reap competitive advantages; companies or organizations extending CTI to its various constituents (suppliers, service partners, customers) will achieve sustainable competitive advantages, often locking out the competition while improving service levels.

Too good to be true? Platitudes? No way] A leading money-center bank is already saving millions per year in avoided automatic call distributor upgrades and redeploying skilled telephone service representatives against higher-margin customers by deploying several integrated CTI systems in the MCI network. One of the fastest growing computer systems leaders is already servicing a manifold increase in service and sales calls effortlessly, routing anxious customers seamlessly to and among its own service centers and several outsource vendors including MCI by networking a first-ever help desk software system with CTI.

Both of these companies became leaders, and will push even further ahead of heel-biting competitors, by doing lots of things right (products, marketing, distribution, etc.), yet both share the same dedication to experiment with CTI, mold it and make it a key part of their fabric. CTI vendors, suppliers, and integrators certainly must address and conquer CTI's main challenges (distilling benefits from hype and bytes, achieving compatibility, and integrating the new without starting over). As these challenges are met, CTI's restless users will, in the process, reap benefits all over the place.

William R. Price, III, as vice president of Call Center Services for MCI Integrated Client Services Division, oversees the development, implementation and management of customized call center solutions for MCI's customers. His organization's offerings include workforce automated scheduling systems, network-based host-interactive voice applications, inbound telepromotions and automated surveys, call center outsourcing, site selection and systems consulting, and call center equipment leasing. Prior to his current position, Price helped create the MCI Custom Shop and seed as director of MCI Enhanced Voice Services. Before joining MCI in 1991, Price was CFO and COO of ACP Corporation, a pioneer in the use of interactive voice response.

Today, through computer-telephony integration we are experiencing the convergence of the computer, communications and telephony. CTI provides the functional integration of telephony and network resources, which include voice and data switching, enterprisewide applications/information sources, and voice processing. Working together, these resources make computer-assisted telemarketing possible. By utilizing CTI, call centers can benefit from integrated information sources, where everything that customers need is available at the workstation, allowing call handlers to respond to all customer inquiries and receive instantaneous access to all required information.

The greatest promise of CTI is its ability to coordinate disparate technologies such as automatic call distributors (ACDs), PBXs, predictive dialers, interactive voice response units, voicemail systems and desktop client/server applications. By coordinating these systems via CTI, companies can perform practical business applications, such as lead generation, prospect confirmation, customer satisfaction and support services, and product service follow-up. The opportunities to combine these existing technologies and provide business benefits are boundless.

The primary CTI challenge facing the call center industry is the need to establish standards and maintain openness. CTI is in its infancy, and further development requires foresight. Controversial questions abound: What should drive call routing and expert agent routing? Should it be the PBX/ACD or the business software applications via CTI?

In addition, CTI faces a challenge similar to that encountered with most new technologies. That is, a lack of standardization initially impedes progress. (A case in point is ISDN, or integrated services digital network.) Nonetheless, consumer demand for common functionality, total openness and control will eventually lead to standardization.

Standards are critical, yet how they are determined will significantly impact the end result. In order to uncover all requirements and ensure standards provide the functionality, security and openness needed to solve business problems, it's imperative to establish not just a standards committee, but a forum that consists of representatives from various sectors: call center management, consumers, technologists, integrators, etc. The future of CTI is promising, and we look forward to contributing to CTI standards.

As a pioneer in many important call center technologies and trends (synchronized "screen pops," call blending, integrated predictive dialing with PBXs/ACDs, customer care-oriented solutions), Melita appreciates the importance of standards based on a consensus of educated opinions. When the standards are set, consumers, integrators and developers will have the freedom to establish formats and processes that enhance communications between people. Technology, specifically CTI-based solutions, will continue to help transform the world into a better place to live.

When he founded Melita in 1979, Aleksander Szlam began by creating an autodialing and call receiving system in his own garage. Since then, Alek has collected nearly thirty worldwide patents for his technology inventions. Alek has pioneered various call center technologies, including predictive dialing and dynamic inbound/outbound calling. In addition, he is credited as being the first to use personal computers as workstations for outbound call centers, and the first to introduce local area networks for predictive dialing solutions. Alek's business acumen and his technology expertise soon earned him and Melita considerable recognition. He was named Inc. Magazines's Entrepreneur of the Year, Southern Region, in 1991, and Melita repeatedly made Atlanta's prestigious Fast Tech 50 list of growing technology companies.

Market pressures, rapid technological changes and increasing pressure to provide varied markets with specialized products and services are forcing service providers to redefine the role of customer service and telemarketing groups.

Implementing computer-telephony integration technology in customer service and telemarketing centers enables companies to define market share by enhancing customer care, developing products and services for target consumer groups, reaching new markets and increasing long-term revenues.

Successfully embracing and utilizing computer-telephony integration technology requires a firm understanding of the variables involved in the implementation process from hardware and software requirements, through training and personnel polices as well as the development of models to measure impact.

With the convergence of telecommunications and computer/video technologies, a powerful new kind of communications device is emerging. We call this new device the "communicating PC." The convergence of telecommunications and computer/video technologies, in conjuction with the advent of open standards for third-party applications developers, has helped realize the promise of integrated multimedia communications. Computer-telephony integration provides companies with the ability to turn a desktop computer into a powerful communications tool that can combine sight, sound, text, animation, video, graphics and other sophisticated telecommunications functions. Used effectively, these capabilities will allow virtually any organization to become more productive, increase revenues, improve customer service and gain a competitive edge.

David C. Caffey's responsibilities at Microsoft focus on the issue of customer management. By utilizing the best mix of technology and business practices to empower organizations to be responsive to its customers and better able to attract new ones, the Microsoft Customer Management initiative is designed to provide the medium for competitive advantage and business excellence for both solution providers and ultimately the end user.

The traditional definition of CTI is I based on the linking of telephone systems and computers, allowing data to be shared and functionally integrated through computer supported telephony applications (CSTA). The most common example of a CTI application is "screen pop;" the focus is on infrastructure and the functional integration of two distinct environments: computing and telephony.

While the industry concentrates on the technology of CTI, it is important to recognize that the people of a company and its customers interact through the voice communications system, whereas the business process is carried on the computing system.

Mitel believes that the real potential for CTI lies in the value that is created by the integration of the people and relationship aspects of business with its business process. We call this "BIG CTI," and believe that it will address a new dimension in business communications. Beyond the functional integration of computing and telephony, it refers to the entire convergence of multiple media at all levels within the business: user, workgroup and enterprise.

Each layer within business has its own distinct set of needs:

User: Being effective through personalization, the ability to interact easily with different media, despite increased mobility.

Workgroup: Group management, with focus on achieving common objectives through effective team interaction, and process/people interaction.

Enterprise: Optimum deployment of resources and managing return on investment (ROI). The challenge is in how to provide for heterogeneous services and homogeneous delivery of services where and when needed.

If we consider these needs, what are the challenges for BIG CTI?

* Marry the traditional strengths of telecommunications (such as uptime, reliability, manageability) with the best in computing (openness, graphical user interfaces, customization, ability to change).

* Support the delivery of high-bandwidth multimedia converged applications to the desktop, and enable the evolution to asynchronous transfer mode (ATM).

* Offer scaleability through a building block implementation.

* Incorporate voice as an integrated function within the overall information processing environment.

* Provide the guaranteed latency needed to support real-time communications.

* Develop open and standards-based systems, to incorporate best-in-class products, and offer choice to business.

* Provide easy-to-use and easy-to-manage technology.

* Integrated network management to manage ROI, and resource deployment.

BIG CTI will drive new infrastructure implementations within the telecommunications and information technology worlds. Mitel is following two strategies. On the one hand, we believe that the PBX must evolve to a mixed media server on broadband transport. On the other hand, within the information technology world, there is a drive to bring telephony functionality to the server. This application-centric solution will provide effective integrated functionality for the workgroup.

In his current position, Dr. A. R. Ian Munns has, since 1993, headed the company's initiatives in CTI and MultiMedia. In addition, he is responsible for the CTI Products, PBX Products and Network Enhancement Products Divisions. With extensive experience in the engineering and marketing of integrated solutions for communications systems, he brings solid product strategy expertise to Mitel's evolving technologies. Dr. Munns is also responsible for Manufacturing, Strategic Business and Total Quality Management at Mitel. Before joining Mitel, Dr. Munns worked for Northern Telecom. In 1981, he was director of marketing and sales for the data networks division; in 1984, he became the division's general manager; from 1987 until 1992, he held senior positions in communications systems, business systems and integrated office systems. Prior to Northern Telecom, Dr. Munns held senior positions at Bell Northern Research, the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, and IBM.

Over the next few years, I believe we will see an ever tighter integration of customer databases with all forms of electronic interaction. Already, high-tech business-to-business marketing requires traditional voice access, both live and via interactive voice response units; fax services (for ordering, order confirmation and fax-back information); and Internet access for e-mail and for interactive information retrieval. We can expect the practical details of Internet commerce to get worked out very shortly.

Additionally, we can already see the proliferation of PCs in the home. And, as the on-line services are demonstrating, and the recent success of Netscape shows, that truly excellent client software will be widely available for free. In the near future, consumer marketing and service will use all forms of electronic communication. The advantage will go to those who can usefully integrate all of these forms of communication with their customer database to provide better customer service.

R. Brough Turner is the co-founder of Natural Microsystems (NMS). In addition to his duties at NMS, Turner serves as chairman of the Technical Committee of the Global Organization for the Multi-Vendor Integration Protocol. Prior to co-founding NMS, Turner spent 13 years in engineering management at Digilab, a data systems developer.

The purpose of CTI is to allow end users to solve business problems and create new opportunities. With end users facing rising standards for customer service, shrinking budgets and "downsized" staffs, there is ample opportunity for end users to take advantage of the benefits of CTI.

From a manufacturer's standpoint, the evolution of platforms from proprietary to more "open" architectures provides a new level of flexibility to create CTI solutions that work in all organizations, with only software upgrades to customize various applications. NEC is working with independent software vendors (ISVs) to create these customized applications and distribute them to the marketplace.

Our biggest challenge with CTI is education and training. We currently have programs in place to educate and train our existing telecom dealers on the information systems (IS) channel. We also have programs to familiarize value-added resellers (VARs) from the IS side on traditional telecom equipment. There is also an educational process that needs to happen with the end users in various departments of an organization so that they are aware of the solutions that can be implemented to help them cut costs, increase revenues and improve service and support on a daily basis.

The sophistication of CTI technology has progressed over the last year, and 1996 will be the strongest year yet for CTI implementation. Indeed, estimates indicate that the CTI marketplace will be a billion-dollar industry by 1997. This converged market will provide opportunities for manufacturers, dealers/resellers, distributors and end users that recognize the potential of this new market.

Robert Talty is an influential part of the team responsible for the marketing and sales of NEC America's PBX, data communications and video equipment to businesses of all types and sizes. Prior to joining NEC America, Mr. Talty served as president of Telecom Resources of America, a telecommunications industry marketing, sales and sales management organization. During his tenure with Telecom, he consulted with some of the industry's leading manufacturers and trained hundreds of industry sales and management professionals.

The vision of CTI promises greater productivity and profitability through the merger of phones and computers. While this is unquestionably true, achieving these benefits is not yet as simple as the vision may imply. The value and the challenge of CTI lie in correctly defining the approach, expectations and implementation appropriate for each user and situation at hand.

Today's CTI offerings fall generally into two categories: those appropriate for individual and small office users, and those designed for enterprise situations that serve many users and departments. Applications may be as simple as providing phone functionality from the personal computer or as complex as enabling new strategic business processes such as virtual workgroups, work-at-home operations and 24-hour customer service. Yet even though the functions performed within each circumstance may be similar, the CTI infrastructure behind each can be radically different. CTI is not simply a technology decision. The planning, complexity, cost, implementation process and impact on general business practices of a complex CTI design must be developed in the context of a company's strategic objectives.

As a communications systems integrator, we see firsthand the issues and benefits associated with merging sophisticated telecommunications and information management systems into a single universe. Substantive change occurs in three main areas of a company's operations: systems management, business operations processes and the corporate culture. The success of change within each area depends in large part upon the quality and experience of the CTI team (company constituencies, vendors and integration management) and the planning, teamwork and communications that defines the implementation programs.

For call center customers and other enterprise-oriented complex solutions, the CTI payback is typically fast and dramatic, but the planning and implementation is a major undertaking. Companies need to understand what this effort entails. For example, CTI planning provides a unique opportunity to position the company for competitive advantage in light of business trends such as market globalization and corporate decentralization.

Astute CTI planning and implementation enables a company to be nimble, cost effective and informed as it communicates with its customers, employees and business partners. But the devil is in the details. The promise of enterprise-focused CTI is also its challenge--its rewards are born of the care and effort that go into its foundations.

Robert L. Griffin has 20 years of experience that includes building and leading businesses in systems integration, consulting, software sales and software client services. In addition, he has significant experience in process re-engineering and change management. In his current position, Griffin is chartered to build the Norstan Integration Services (NIS) business, a critical factor in successfully implementing Norstan's strategic direction. Prior to NIS, Griffin was vice president, CIO for the Accounts Business Unit at Digital Equipment Corporation. Prior to that he was vice president of Digital Consulting, Eastern Region.

Any discussion about CTI requires a definition. At Northern Telecom (Nortel), we define CTI as a set of tools and enabling technologies. These tools provide the architectural underpinnings to integrate voice, speech, messaging, call center agents, telecommuting and other functions that allow applications to seamlessly provide these services to end users. CTI opens the door to new markets and products, and it allows existing products to be used in new ways.

CTI History

Those in call centers recognize CTI from its early days. CTI actually got its start in the mid-1980s. Communications vendors (primarily PBX manufacturers) and mini/mainframe computing vendors advanced the productivity of call centers by delivering coordinated voice and data to the agents. The goal was to empower agents with personalized, immediate information.

Although CTI has been around for a while, it has been limited in its ability to address call centers because of high costs. So why is CTI beginning to attract so much attention? Personal computer vendors and communications vendors are working to bring these technologies to the general business user, not just the mission-critical customer service operation. With the advent of application programming interfaces (APIs) for telephony in the personal computer industry, virtually any desktop in the world can be "telephony enabled."

CTI Changes Communications

CTI, by combining the unique characteristics of the communications and computing industries, promotes a new class of applications. Many of these applications can improve productivity. In addition, by combining the real-time capabilities of telephony with the powerful store and retrieval capabilities of the PC, CTI leads to applications such as screen-based telephony, integrated messaging, personal conferencing and intelligent call routing.

CTI also enables existing applications to be used in new ways. Telephony-enabling databases and personal information managers allow those applications to dial telephones and present information as the call arrives. CTI also brings the communications and computing infrastructures closer together. PBXs are equipped with intelligent interfaces to communicate with LAN servers and operating systems, essentially making them peers on a heterogeneous network.

What Does the Future Hold?

In terms of architecture, PBXs will continue to export greater functionality both to the server and individual desktop. Native TCP/IP interfaces and operating system drivers will allow virtually any application to run in a multivendor computing and communications environment. Personal computers will be equipped with the necessary hardware and software to answer calls, store messages, process speech and intelligently act on telephony-generated events.

New classes of applications to support the mobile worker and telecommuter should begin to appear in 1996. And this evolution will not stop at the personal computer. Mobile devices--such as pagers, personal document assistants (PDAs), laptop computers and cellular telephones--will begin to take on the characteristics of CTI as well.

J. Michael Camp's group, Multimedia Business Applications, serves enterprise and public markets by delivering solutions for voice processing, multimedia messaging and high-performance call centers. These solutions reside on a family of scaleable multimedia platforms that support PBX, wireless and central office switches from multiple vendors. Previously, Camp was assistant vice president, MCS Multimedia Business Products, Enhanced Services. Since joining Northern Telecom 1989, Camp has held several key management positions including vice president, Data Networks Division.

The biggest challenge that CTI will face in the next few years is the industry's ability to adopt and consolidate standards that support heterogeneous environments in a global network. The industry today has many standards--some competing, but many complementary. Many of these standards revolve around a specific hardware environment. All provide robust services within the scope of their specific environment, and all are capable of delivering CTI solutions today. Few are poised to expand into the global communications community. Standards designed with heterogeneous environments in mind are best poised to deliver the promise of the future.

In the future, CTI will extend far beyond a telemarketing agent's phone and computer. The call center of tomorrow will include multimedia kiosks that allow customers to view catalogs on-line while ordering merchandise. CTI will help customers manage their telephone services from all types of locations: in satellite offices serving telecommuters; across wide area networks for the large enterprise; and from changing remote locations for the business traveler. Future CTI applications will include all manner of devices from personal document assistants (PDAs) that provide call center reports to supervisors half way around the world to computers in cars that automatically call 911 with location and damage assessments in the case of an accident.

Continued product evolution toward standards that support all types of data devices and all types of communications networks will make this future possible. Customers can choose solutions that satisfy their business requirements today, but standards are a big part of their analysis. When standards are consolidated to include all types of devices within a global network, customers and vendors alike can focus their energy expanding CTI beyond a core group of people huddled around their telephones to the global communications community.

The benefits of CTI, which were once limited to the rich and famous, are now available to everyone with a phone and a data network. As the industry adopts standards that support heterogeneous environments in a global area network, CTI capabilities will be accessible by everyone, anytime, anyplace.

Michael Durant is responsible for NetWare Telephony Services and the telephony services application programming interface (TSAPI) specification. The Telephony Services Division works with customers, international standards bodies and switching partners to deploy NetWare Telephony Services worldwide. Mr. Durant joins Novell from the telecommunications industry, where he has over 12 years of experience, 8 of which were devoted to CTI.

CTI must "cross the chasm," to paraphrase high-tech marketing guru Geoff Moore. To date, CTI and applications using CTI are only being used by early adopters and visionaries in niche markets. Only by demonstrating cost-effective productivity to a pragmatic, mainstream market, will CTI cross the chasm and move to fuller market acceptance.

Having said that, the personal computer will increasingly include CTI features and functions as extensions to the operating system, in much the same way that modems in personal computers connect us to the network today. CTI suppliers must recognize that the competition is not the replacement of the telephone, but rather using CTI productively as a robust enabler of network and electronic links to every employee, customer, prospect and supplier. Then, the applications and markets for CTI will expand exponentially.

Ronald R. Charnock has more than 20 years of experience in information management. In early 1981, Charnock formed NPRI, which developed one of the first minicomputer-based turnkey telephone call center support systems. That system is currently installed in over 5000 telephone transaction processing workstations throughout the world. Charnock is the founder and initial chairman of the Alliance of Computer-Based Telephony Application Suppliers (ACTAS), as well as the vice chairman of the Multimedia Telecommunications Association (MMTA).

Trends indicate phenomenal growth in the number of companies requiring CTI implementations in their mission-critical call centers. As callers become more sophisticated in their service expectations, businesses are turning to CTI implementations to provide efficient collection of customer information and enhanced customer service in a more expedient manner.

CTI suppliers are facing three primary challenges:

1. Which of the emerging standards will be viable for end-user applications?

2. How to implement CTI in the end-user's environment without requiring the user to completely replace or revamp systems and applications?

3. How to make CTI accessible for the smaller user?

Standards have received attention in the media as various factions offer their answers to the question, "How do I make my systems work together seamlessly and take advantage of new applications without replacing what I already have in place?" Unfortunately, standards have not been able to completely provide the ubiquitous access and interoperability that many people have hoped for. At best, they can only offer a guide post for applications development so that in the end, applications will operate similarly.

The other primary challenges pertain to costs. One of the strategies that Rockwell has embraced is developing products that can be implemented into the user's environment with minimal disruption to the existing operations. Products with flexible interface options and user-definable scripting will permit the cost-effective introduction of CTI. Users do not want to have to revamp applications running on their mainframe computers.

Rockwell also recognizes that another cost-related challenge--that is, the challenge of making CTI accessible to the smaller user--is key to opening up the market. In the past, CTI was only available to large users with large budgets. Now, however, the needs of smaller users (fewer than 50 positions) are being met with cost-effective systems that are based on standard operating applications programs; that utilize standard interfaces; and that permit connectivity to off-the-shelf components.

To stay competitive, businesses will implement CTI as a tool to enhance customer satisfaction and increase profitability. The main challenge will be to provide users with cost-effective integrations that allow users to stay within their current operating environment. And, in the future, as applications become more sophisticated, businesses will implement video and multimedia platforms to satisfy market demands.

Robert (Bob) Buffington directs Rockwell's efforts in the development, design and implementation of both inbound and outbound CTI solutions for call center applications. A 17-year veteran of the call center industry, Buffington was involved in the very first CTI application, which entailed developing a data link between an automatic call distributor (ACD) and a general purpose computer in 1983 for an automated tax collection system for the U.S. government. Buffington possesses management expertise in strategic planning, program management, product management, marketing, sales and business development. In addition, his international background includes the development of the CTI business and organization for Rockwell Switching Systems, Ltd. in the United Kingdom.

Customers who contact our business by telephone are finding the and experience far more satisfying personalized than just a few years ago. The reason for their increased satisfaction can be found in the emphasis of our call centers and help desks on "high touch" customer service areas. The change was made possible largely because CTI technology allows the timely delivery of the precise service or information the customer needs.

Call center managers know that customers are strategic assets. As these banks, brokerage firms, catalog houses and help desks interact with customers through their call centers, they are gathering a database "diary" of customer interactions. This stored information about customer preferences is being used to make each contact more productive and leave the customer happy. Happy customers are repeat customers who share the good news with their friends.

The potential of these new CTI software applications for creative solutions to business problems has only just started to be tapped. Virtually anything managers can dream up for serving customers faster and better is getting implemented in CTI. In the process, we are giving employees the tools and information they need to make better decisions faster and with less strain than ever before. For example, skills-based call routing software empowers call center agents to do the work they most enjoy while providing much higher levels of customer service. It also allows agents to override system routing decisions if so empowered by their supervisor.

Thanks to standards committees like Versit and the Enterprise Computer Telephony Forum (ECTF), I anticipate we will soon see universal interoperability for software applications. Application programming interfaces (APIs) will become universal to the point that CTI software will run on any computer and PBX combination. That will be a major breakthrough for the proliferation of CTI technology.

This means that the call center of the near future will be a multimedia environment, where video and Internet communications are routed to well-equipped and -skilled knowledge workers. Call centers with these capabilities are feasible today, but not yet widely available. Provided the international community is willing, we expect a globalization of access and services for customers worldwide from regional service centers. In this scenario, agents are assigned to virtual groups on a call-by-call basis. Selection would be based on country code, language, product knowledge, etc., to facilitate customer service of a quality that is today unheard of. CTI may truly stand for Call Centers Tied Internationally.

Max M. Fiszer joined Siemens Rolm in 1988 as the Call Center Application Manager. In 1990, he became director of planning for all Siemens Rolm products. In his current position, Fiszer is responsible for call center products, workstation applications, video conferencing and wireless. Prior to joining Siemens Rolm, Mr. Fiszer held various software development and product planning management positions with IBM in the San Jose and Santa Teresa laboratories.

The future challenge for CTI is to maintain a philosophy of technical openness and interoperability among vendors, while continuing to produce cost-effective products, suitable for customer applications, in a timely manner. CTI products and customer applications can be found anywhere along the following continuum: shrink-wrapped applications

* third-party multiapplications

* custom designs

* toolkits

The viability of any one of these CTI applications depends on the following factors:

* Does the customer have applications and databases in place? Many customers do, making use of shrink-wrapped products for third-party applications difficult.

* What is the customer's level of technical expertise? Many customers do not and will not have the expertise to use CTI toolkits.

* Does the customer have the available expertise to develop custom CTI applications?

* What is the trade-off that the customer is willing to make between functionality and ease of implementation? In other words, would a customer be willing to forego ease of implementing a shrink-wrapped CTI product in order to install a custom system with a higher level of functionality?

Regardless of the customer environment, CTI will be less costly to implement and support with a high level of interoperability. To achieve a high level of interoperability, disparate resource suppliers will have to form working partnerships and embrace open architectures that accommodate products from multiple vendors. The challenge then becomes the identification of the smallest set of standards that can make interoperability happen.

Industry forums like the Enterprise Computer Telephony Forum (ECTF) assist in this assimilation process. This process is difficult, at best, since technological advances that affect CTI are moving at such a rapid pace. There are many questions to be answered. How will standards be affected by developments such as the Internet, switched video and wireless technologies?

As CTI implementations are adopted by smaller, less technically sophisticated organizations, the real opportunity may lie in the customer support of these complex, multivendor environments.

Greg Smith leads SRX's OmniWorks integrated call center system division. Smith has more than 15 years of experience in telecommunications sales, marketing and management. Most recently, he was region manager far Rockwell International's Southern Region, where he was responsible for automatic call distributor sales to accounts such as Florida Power and Light, American Airlines and Federal Express. In addition, Smith has sewed as vice president and area manager for Rolm, and has held a variety of sales, marketing and management positions with IBM/Rolm.

As standards emerge and the cost of CTI deployment drops, CTI is finally beginning to evolve from the early, very complex projects of the 1980s that focused primarily on cost savings and efficiency, to high-value implementations of the 1990s that focus more and more on ways to increase revenues and improve customer service. The nexus of this shift is the intelligent agent desktop, where all voice and data applications can be fully integrated to empower the call center agent. Software technology anticipates both the caller's and the agent's next need automatically, then recommends and performs routine actions, shortening the call and giving the customer better service. At the same time, technology is automatically prompting the caller for upsell opportunities, making possible dramatically growing revenues.

The effect of these trends is the "disappearance of technology and the reappearance of the customer" as a business driver, ironically even as the technology itself becomes more sophisticated. This is the primary challenge and opportunity for CTI over the next few years: to continue to enable business providers to offer an even wider range of products and services through technology and automation, while at the same time enabling that trend at ever lower costs and complexity. Through wider deployment of the Internet, CTI will have a powerful effect on all business transactions, and callers will become used to conducting electronic commerce through any medium, not just voice telephone calls. The term CTI will come to stand for the convergence of the computing and telecommunications industries into a single multitrillion-dollar, global enterprise.

Tom McCalmont is instrumental in shaping the open systems computer-telephony strategy and client/server product development for Teknekron Infoswitch, a worldwide supplier of integrated voice and data solutions for customer call centers. A 20-year veteran in the industry, McCalmont previously held management positions at Cray Research, Lachman Technologies and Cromemco.

Initially, CTI applications will continue to grow in functionality beyond screen pops. In fact, CTI has already moved beyond screen pops to accomplish call routing based upon both agent skill levels and customer database characteristics. CTI will be used to enable Alfred Toffler's "mass individuality"; that is, calls will be handled distinctly based upon caller information from the moment the call is answered to the follow-up after the call.

CTI is here to stay. Its implementation is a fact of life in the most obvious places, the largest call centers. CTI will become just an additional feature tied in with users' software applications and less of a "product" sold separately. With this packaging, CTI will spread throughout the enterprise. This will decrease its cost over time as CTI becomes "commoditized." It will also make implementation easier. CTI will become as ubiquitous as the spreadsheet.

This means CTI will be sold by more nontraditional vendors, that is, software companies. These companies will have telephone/CTI specialists on staff. The traditional telephone hardware vendors who don't change will be left out in the cold as time goes by.

This does not spell the end of the telephone as we know it. In fact, many people still have rotary phones even today. What the telephone will become is a simple, standard interface for collecting information. Voice response via touch tones will be replaced by voice recognition. Callers will be able to directly interface with any corporation via the phone, and all transactions will be automatically captured to a database.

As co-founder, Cate Brady's experience in telecommunications includes a patent pending product that provides CTI to users regardless of their current telecommunications or computer environments. As vice president, she oversees company business functions including product development and establishment of distribution channels. Brady's experience prior to the founding of Teledata Solutions includes being an industry consultant for Dearborn Publishing. She was also a faculty member at Keller and Elmhurst College.

Because of its enterprise-wide implications, CTI poses several new challenges to corporations. Two areas stand out: interoperability issues, and CTI application issues.

Currently, CTI implementations involve multiple hardware, software and network components, all with different interfaces, protocols, languages, and degrees of openness. This overall complexity is something we've begun to see addressed through the following developments:

* The appearance of interoperability groups such as Versit and the Enterprise Computer Telephony Forum (ECTF).

* The adoption of standards such as computer supported telephony applications (CSTA), telephony application programming interface (TAPI), and telephony services programming interface (TSAPI).

* The migration of the computer and telephony industries toward open architectures.

In addition, the use of "middleware" and applications packages is helping to speed basic CTI implementations. For most major applications, however, we're still a long way from "off the shelf" CTI solutions. In these situations, CTI will continue to be a custom development effort.

The need to put together custom systems has important implications for how supplier companies work together to provide solutions for customers. The traditional model for customer-supplier relationships has been for the supplier to work directly with the customer. In cases where multiple suppliers work together, the customer is expected to provide the coordination between different supplier's efforts, which is usually inefficient and costly in terms of dollars and time.

With CTI, we are increasingly seeing the need for suppliers to cooperate with each other to provide an effective and efficient total solution. This is unfamiliar territory for suppliers who may view each other as competitors. The key is to determine roles and responsibilities early in the process, ideally before contract signing.

Another challenge is in defining how users think about CTI. Rather than concentrating on CTI technology, users must focus on applications, which are the measures of success for most organizations. For example, rather than concentrate on "screen pops," evaluate the overall benefits of the availability of integrated information to customer service representatives, or the value of more intelligent routing of calls to the correct representative in the first place.

Although we've seen the majority of CTI implementations in large call centers, we see the market migrating to the desktop in "informal call center" or "workgroup" applications that integrate multiple forms of communication for increased efficiency. Increasingly, we'll see applications that go beyond integrated messaging, functionally integrating all forms of telephony and computing.

All of this is good news for vendors who develop and support CTI; systems integrators; and (most of all) users, who will realize the benefits of this transformation unifying the worlds of computers and telephony.

Donald Van Doren founded Vanguard Communications in 1980. Since that time, Vanguard has helped companies effectively implement and use voice processing systems and other innovative communications products and services. Assisting companies to implement leading-edge technologies, such as CTI, is a major focus for Vanguard. Mr. Van Doren works actively on client assignments in the areas of voice processing, strategic introduction of new technologies into organizations, and strategic management issues. In addition to his work in the United States, he works extensively on international assignments. Mr. Van Doren has been a computer and communications consultant for twenty years.

Copyright Technology Marketing Corporation Nov 1995
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