Avaya and RingCentral Expand Strategic Partnership with AI-Powered Communications and Collaboration Experiences
New Hybrid Solution Empowers Customers to Combine Existing Avaya Investments with Enhanced Collaboration Capabilities from RingCentral
RingCentral Enhances Avaya Cloud Office with RingSense AI and Microsoft Teams Integration
Avaya ENGAGE, RingCentral, Inc., a leading provider of AI-driven cloud business communications, contact center, video and hybrid event solutions, and Avaya, a global leader in customer experience and communications solutions, announced an expansion of offerings for Avaya customers, including a new hybrid solution of RingCentral’s AI-powered cloud business communications solution with Avaya Aura telephony, providing enhanced collaboration capabilities.
“Our expanded partnership with RingCentral enhances communications and collaboration experiences for our global customers. This integration further demonstrates our commitment to innovation without disruption. We are empowering our customers to operate where and how they want – on-prem, private cloud or public cloud – without missing a beat.”
This new hybrid offering allows users within the same organization to seamlessly collaborate with each other, whether individuals are using Avaya Aura or Avaya Cloud Office telephony solutions. Customers gain additional value from their existing investments in Avaya’s solutions by combining them with RingCentral’s video calling and messaging features, including RingSense™ AI — RingCentral’s core AI platform. This hybrid solution, which is exclusively available through this partnership, also provides Avaya’s enterprise customers with the choice to utilize their existing Avaya Aura Platform or cloud-based Avaya Cloud Office by RingCentral (ACO) for call control functionality, enabling a seamless user experience across messaging, video and phone.
Alan Masarek, Avaya CEO, said, “Our expanded partnership with RingCentral enhances communications and collaboration experiences for our global customers. This integration further demonstrates our commitment to innovation without disruption. We are empowering our customers to operate where and how they want – on-prem, private cloud or public cloud – without missing a beat.”
“Our objective is to simplify business communications while offering robust, enterprise-grade multi-modal cloud communications capabilities with 99.999% reliability and security,” said Vlad Shmunis, Founder, Chairman and CEO of RingCentral. “We’re excited to build on our partnership with Avaya through a solution that flexibly serves Avaya’s UC customer needs. Together, we are proud to offer Avaya customers a new, hybrid option for leveraging their existing investment in Avaya Aura while providing a seamless path to a cloud communications experience.”
Intelligent Communications with RingSense AI
RingSense AI, which is currently available for ACO customers, will also be included with the Avaya Aura integration, which will be available in the coming months. RingSense AI’s core capabilities include live transcriptions, closed captioning, video summaries, and video highlights.
RingSense AI, which is broadly infused across RingCentral’s suite, is purpose-built to enhance personal productivity and business collaboration. It transforms everyday conversations into actionable insights, saving employees time on manual tasks, enabling them to optimize workflows and empowering them to focus on more value-added aspects of their interactions.
“Dauphin County is looking forward to exploring the new features of RingSense for our publicly held meetings. Features like Closed Captioning and Video highlights will enhance the meeting experience for our constituents and provide better clarity on agenda topics,” said ACO customer Elizabeth Perry, Director & CIO, Dauphin County.
“In the digital age, embracing technology isn’t just about convenience; it’s about unlocking new possibilities and empowering businesses to thrive. With RingSense, Seneca Foods can connect seamlessly, access support, and elevate their communication game,” said Tim Eddinger, Enterprise Networks Manager, Seneca Foods.
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New Microsoft Teams Integration
As part of RingCentral and Avaya’s strategic partnership, customers will have the opportunity to benefit from a new integration of ACO phone capabilities with Microsoft Teams, which will leverage direct routing and the RingCentral for Microsoft Teams embedded app. This will enable Microsoft 365 customers to add 99.999% uptime reliability and a robust set of cloud PBX capabilities from RingCentral into their Microsoft Teams environment. The integration is expected to be available by the end of June 2024.
Updated Avaya Experience Platform Public Cloud Integration
In addition, the integration of the Avaya Experience Platform (AXP) public cloud contact center with ACO provides customers with a unified communications and contact center integrated experience. Bringing these solutions together into a single environment can create a unified digital workplace that enables contact center agents to stay connected with the rest of an organization. This integration is currently available.
“The expanded partnership with RingCentral enables Avaya to continue to deliver on its promises of ‘innovation without disruption’ and ‘choose your journey,’” said Zeus Kerravala, Founder and Principal Analyst at ZK Research. “RingCentral customers are using RingSense AI to transform customer interactions, and soon, Avaya’s massive Aura customer base can enjoy the benefits of RingSense AI as well while continuing to take advantage of the bulletproof reliability of Avaya’s private cloud solution. Also, the ACO – AXP integration delivers a unified UC – CC experience to create a single workspace for seamless front-office and back-office interactions. No two customers will have the same journey to CX modernization, and Avaya is delivering what’s most important to customers – choice of deployment to ensure the business is never put at risk.”
