There is poetic justice for Vonage, the creator of commercially successful Voice over IP (VoIP) services, to acquire Over.ai, the company that coined the term “Voice over AI” (VoIA®). It marks a competitive milestone for Vonage as it assembles the requisite features, functions and software components that comprise the complete solution stack for Conversational Commerce, Intelligent Assistance and omnichannel bots.

Vonage’s message to competitors, customers and prospects is simple. Voice matters! Over.ai has personnel and IP to speed up the time it takes for an enterprise to launch sophisticated, voice-based virtual agents to handle high-impact use cases. That includes automated handling of frequently invoked inbound queries, as well as outbound voice alerts which, with the help of VoAI, can be used to start conversations that culminate in the purchase of a pay-per-view offering or resolution of a disputed credit card transaction.

IVA is the New IVR

… and vice versa. Ideally, enterprises introduce elements of Conversational AI into their digital customer care and marketing fabric with a single goal in mind: to provide correct responses, recommendations and actions, consistently, across all channels and devices and at the required scale. The VoAI® approach means that Vonage will offer its business clients a set of pre-built skills that, initially cover a broad spectrum of horizontal requirements, like routing the conversation to the proper live agent, but can also be linked to desired outcomes, such as registering a complaint, paying a bill or, ideally, making a purchase.

The “AI” that informs the voice response system will be leveraged across every communications medium that the Vonage Business Cloud supports. Its a list that includes chat and SMS (through Nexmo and Vonage Flow) and video streams through WebRTC (via TokBox), as well as contact centers, based on NewVoiceMedia’s platform, and APIs and microservices available through the Nexmo marketplace. This packaging is inspired by successful implementations of Over.ai’s services with existing customers. They successfully reduced the cost associated with taking payments, making appointments and routing calls to the correct resources.

Testimony to Voice’s Staying Power

In the era of Conversational Commerce SMS, chat, video and collaboration, rightfully, receive growing attention. Yet the voice channel remains important for those moments when an individual initiates a phone call or kicks off a voice conversation through a mobile app. Vonage recognizes voice’s staying power and, with the acquisition of Over.ai will have an elegant way for companies to offer similar, if not identical answers regardless of the medium or device that an individual might employ.

To further accelerate adoption and successful deployments of Natural Language-based solutions, Vonage offers an “visual” application development platform designed to appeal to subject matter experts within the company rather than expensive professional services. Any resemblance between the IVR and IVA is purely intentional.

Categories: Intelligent Assistants