Reduced costs, improved flexibility, dramatically increased scalability and enhanced security. These are just some of the benefits offered by cloud voice telephony services. “It’s a natural evolution of IP (internet protocol) telephony,” explains Three Ireland head of ICT and 3IOT Karl McDermott. “Both use IP networks to transmit voice but cloud takes the technology a step further by integrating it with modern cloud computing which allows a wider set of services and security.”
The technology effectively eliminates the need for hardware on the customer’s premises. This is a part of a process which has been continuing for a long time. “We have gone from old PBX systems which were very large pieces of hardware which sat in an organisation’s communications room and were managed and maintained by the IT department,” McDermott explains.
Those systems were augmented by voice over internet protocol (VOIP) technology which ran in conjunction with the PBX system to offer new services as well as eliminating long distance call costs.
“Even where PBX systems were replaced, organisations still had hardware to manage and software to update,” McDermott adds. “If they needed a service like interactive voice response (IVR) another piece of hardware was required. Cloud voice changes all of that. It enables organisations to get rid of outdated systems. It’s a natural element of digital transformation. Organisations are digitalising other applications and services, and they are now doing it with telephony and moving it completely to the cloud. They can even get rid of physical phones along with the other hardware if they want.”
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The technology shifts the responsibility for maintenance, scaling and updates to the cloud provider, he continues. “Cloud voice offers an ideal solution to keep teams connected and productive, without the limitations of older IP telephony systems.”
Scalability and flexibility are among the technology’s key benefits. “Because it’s in the cloud, you can scale up and down whenever you need to and as often as you like,” McDermott points out. “Some businesses are very seasonal, for example. They might take on 50 extra people in customer service for Christmas or during peak holiday periods and they all need phones. In the past, those businesses typically had to buy licences for a whole year to accommodate the seasonal staff. Now, with cloud voice they buy licences for just a single month if they want.”
And the additional staff don’t even need to be working in the same place. “It is particularly useful for organisations with a lot of people working remotely. New staff can be added very easily without the need for any new hardware – not even a telephone. Organisations can also add services like call queuing just for the period they are required.”
The technology also facilitates unified communications across web, voice, and videoconferencing channels and integrates with Microsoft Teams and other tools very easily – an important feature for contact centres.
“In our own contact centre in Limerick we are finding that a lot of younger people don’t want to talk on the phone, they want to self-serve instead,” McDermott notes. “But there are times when they might need to switch to have a conversation with an agent. Cloud voice enables that kind of seamless switching.”
The technology will become more powerful still with the addition of artificial intelligence (AI), he adds. AI is bringing lots of new features – call transcription, for instance; as well as transcribing a call, this facility can give a summary at the end. “Also, if want to bring a colleague on to a call to answer a question, the AI can send them a summary of the call up to that point before they join the call so that they know what has been discussed,” says McDermott.
He also points to its applications for contact centres. “AI can listen into call-agent conversations and build personas based on real-world conversations. New agents can be trained by spending a few hours on calls with an AI assistant. It can also detect the wellness and tiredness of a call centre agent just by listening to their voice and can indicate if they need a break ahead of schedule. It really is very powerful.”
Videoconferencing can be greatly enhanced. “It can do real-time translation for calls and display it in on-screen subtitles. Its noise cancellation capabilities are also very advanced. It can recognise who is meant to be speaking at any given time and cut out other background noises. Once you move to the cloud you open up a whole world of new services.”
And cloud voice brings enhanced security, says McDermott: “It will typically have the latest security features as standard, such as multi-factor authentication and encryption, and they are all looked after by the service provider.”