The Speech Attendant - A Next-Generation solution for Today's world Ben Lixandru, Product Manager Active Voice LLC

About us… Active Voice, LLC is a global provider of unified messaging, computer telephony, and voice messaging solutions Headquartered in Seattle, Washington, Active Voice, LLC was established in 2001 and is a subsidiary of NEC Unified Solutions, Inc. Corporate headquarters in Seattle, WA 120+ employees, including offices abroad Largest switch-independent messaging provider * Over 170,000 systems installed in over 60 countries 20+ years of messaging product development experience Development centers in Seattle and Romania *Source: InfoTech Global distribution channel of 400+ resellers Active Voice products are also sold through: –Key OEM partners: NEC, Tadiran, Philips, Crane, Aspire, NECii

Our products Mainly voice messaging and IVR Windows and Linux based, TDM and IP Plain voic or Unified messaging Automated attendant, Information delivery, Self- service, IVR Business oriented applications (custom design) Speech attendant (Nuance OEM partner)

Our typical customers: Hotels Hospitals Government Universities School districts Small and Medium Size Companies

Voic based speech attendant Quick, cost-effective solution Standard solution, well documented and supported Rigid conversation (press 1 for …, etc) Completely under customer’s control Sequential by nature, slow transfer if multiple levels are required

Speech enabled voic ? Pros 2/3 of the customers prefer a company that has a better call center Speech recognition has become affordable Voice messaging is a necessary presence in any business environment Voic covers most of the requirements Cons What is the business case? Avoid “all the eggs in one basket” Performance issues, heavy usage for the speech processing software Training, support and maintenance issues

Just one number to dial anywhere Company Directory Internal calls Call anywhere… External calls Personal Contacts Just say the name!

Seven answers the call Caller states the request “Can I speak to Laura Jones please?” Thank You. Transferring your call to... Laura Jones Seven transfers the call Who may I say is calling? Voic performs Call Screening/Call Holding VM transfers the call Speech attendant with Call Screening and Hold Queues

Best of both worlds Complementary solutions Directory integration possible Flexibility (call screening, call hold) The voic offers a reasonable backup solution

Facts Speech Attendant vs. traditional DTMF solution “Say the name and get transferred” – natural and fast Over 95% recognition out of the box, no tuning needed Install and forget – very little management required Automatic speech directory update (LDAP or.csv file) Advanced performance evaluation tools – built-in Nice business features, multilingual Stable and very reliable, very good documentation Anybody can learn to use it in 2 hours No development costs Total control on the customer side

Statistics (6 months) No tuning, no updates

Things to consider… Customers are trying to keep their investments Lots of our voic systems in the field get updated once in 5+ years (OS/2-based systems still in service) Adding incrementally pieces of infrastructure works better for SMB

Facts 18 months statistic, 100% acceptance, no major issues Very reliable and mature solution (1 support call per year per site!) All customers kept their voic -based IVR in parallel as an alternate solution Business features and basic features are ignored or misused in 60% of the situations The customer wants just a simple voice dialing directory in over 90 % of the situations 4 hours of training for the technician and end-user are a must Good planning makes good implementations

Lessons… Hospitals: Multiple sites having same services everywhere (ex. Radiology, or Emergency) A single directory to cover all the locations worked best, with clustering option for failover Lots of foreign names, large fluctuation in the personnel, large diversity of callers, bi-lingual sometimes Over 70% less calls to operators, much better customer service overall Having a voic -based IVR as a backup solution is important to not disrupt the services

Banks and Financial institutions Reliability is very important (clustering suggested) A well designed interface is very important Automated routing features are very important (a bank can have 40+ locations, each with different locations, and different operators with different schedules) Some business users need personal directories High satisfaction once implemented Lessons…

Education: Large diversity in names Limited resources (personnel and time) on the customer’s side, busy tech people Over 70% less calls to operators, very low maintenance Gradual approach worked best Integrating the Speech attendant and the voic proved to be a better solution Lessons…

City services: Large diversity in names, bi-lingual sometimes needed No operators! Limited resources (personnel and time) on the customer’s side Gradual approach worked best Great customer satisfaction Lessons…

Production environments: Large diversity in names, multi-lingual Untrained users, calling from noisy places Limited resources (personnel and time) on the customer’s side, little room to customize Using multiple schedules, multiple operators, multiple points of entry Other languages (Dutch, German, French, UK English) Gradual approach worked best Good communication and a hands-on demo of the capabilities before closing the sale is very important Lessons…

Conclusions for customers: Properly used, an automated speech attendant can give lots of benefits to a company Customer’s focus, education and cooperation are essential Ask for training first, make a proof of concept, then plan a gradual deployment The technology quality + vendor’s experience are very important