In the beginning of the year 2011, I had predicted about some IVR technologies as well as IVR applications which are likely to see high usage, on looking back, except speaker recognition, I can feel reasonably satisfied about the result of the predictions.

Among others, hosted IVR and bulk voice calling has almost gone mainstream now even in India. IVVR has been making steady progress with top VAS ( value added service) players in India creating application and content for it. Though 3G penetration has not made any spectacular progress!

As for usage of IVR in payment gateways, it is definitely getting wider acceptance as well as becoming more and more trusted method of charging one’s credit card!

I have not found any substantial acceptance of speech recognition in IVR applications in India, though in other countries speech recognition has become quite common.

Speaker Recognition is another technology which has failed to make much of a buzz in year 2011. But I am still hopeful of this technology.

So, for 2012, here are my predictions:-

1. RAD tools – IVR Toolkit
Rapid application development tools are gaining popularity as well as acceptance among many developers. Almost all serious IVR companies now a days have their own RAD tool for designing IVR call flow.

2. Web enabled IVR

Year 2012 should see many improvements on Web Enabled IVR designing tool. Hosted IVR provider would design and develop easy to use web based IVR call flow designer.

3. IVVR

I think, this year IVVR should find many deployments as well as usage. Hopefully, India would be able to provide low cost 3G connections which may propel consumption of video contents.

4. Wider acceptance of Open source IVR

I think, open source IVR would gain more popularity this year. With increasing acceptance of hosted IVR, the competition would be more intense and open source IVR would be advantageous.

These are all I can think of right now. Please share your predictions too!

We wish a very Happy New Year 2012 to all our readers, advertisers and well wishers! Hope this coming new year 2012 would be year of great achievements, prosperity and happiness! Also, let us hope year 2012 sees end of terrorism, domestic violence and child labour!

With 2012, this blog would complete eventful four years! Before the end of year 2011, IVR World blog, we would like to list few article of this year :

1. Smart use of IVR based Missed Call : Phone verification

2. Will Click to Call service replace Predictive Dialer ?

3. IVVR For tourism Industry

4. When a machine treats a person humanly: IVR for payment reminder

5. Interesting Hosted IVR: Virtual Receptionist

6. IVR Benefit: Updated information all the time

What is IVVR ?
IVVR ( Interactive Voice and Video Response) system can be thought of next generation of IVR system which includes ‘video’ apart from only voice in a typical IVR system. In an IVVR system, a caller will use a video call, will be able to choose options from his mobile phone screen, view information required by him in video format. Since now, in an IVR, caller could only listen his information in voice and select any option either by DTMF or speech recognition! With IVVR, caller would be able to give command to IVR system through user-friendly way by choosing menu options as if browsing a website!

How tourism industry can benefit from IVVR ?

Tourism industry majorly thrive on ‘showcasing’ their attraction to prospective visitors! So, IVVR could be cheap, highly interactive, accessible anywhere tool for any hotel or online travel companies! Till, now travel companies may have been promoting their hotel, destination through either costly TV advertisements, CD/DVD distribution, or plain old news paper/ magazine advertisements without any interaction at all. Website is a good medium, but then an web visitor needs a laptop or PC, internet connection etc. to check the hotel or the destination.

With introduction of 3G in many countries in the world, also availability of low cost 3G enabled mobile phones and falling bandwidth cost are likely to propel use of IVVR of hotels and other tourist attractions!

1. Providing video footage of hotel rooms

Hotel would be able to provide complete video presentation of their property, rooms, amenities, lobby etc. This will not only attract more and more travelers, but also increase confidence in the property.

2. Interactive booking

After reviewing a property, a traveler would be able to book by interacting directly with booking agent. Visual interaction gives more confidence for first time traveler than mere email exchange or telephonic conversation.

3. Live promotional video

Hotels or other travel marketing companies would be able to provide live promotional video to prospective traveler or clients. This would be really interesting for a traveler to check out the room he or she would be staying in near future!

So, most probably, IVVR offers some exciting application for hotel and traveling industry. Has any hotel or travel company implemented any IVVR for their properties ? I would be very interested to know and explore more about this.

Microsoft Corporation, the veteran company, leader ( almost monopoly) in PC operating system has bought Skype, the voice call provider on internet ( peer to peer Skype account as well as any telephone to Skype account and vice versa ).

Microsoft Acquires Skype : New Voice Apps

If it does so, than we may experience many interesting changes the way we have been creating call flow of IVR, IVVR etc.

CTI manufacturers have been making CTI boards supporting Asterisk, the open source Telephony Software so far, but now, they may start manufacturing CTI boards in future directly supporting MSXML for building rich voice and video application eying the 170million Skype users ( growing at 40% Year over Year).

So, we hope the acquisition of Skype by Microsoft seems exciting for IVR World!

Mobile Content Summit second edition was held today at Shangri-La Hotel in New Delhi, India. This summit was a day long event where IVRS World was a partner. This mobile content was organised by Virtue Insight and attended by more than 100 delegates from Mobile Content, Telecom industry.

Mobile Content Summit 2011

The first session was chaired by Mr. N K Goel who is president of CMAI ( Communication and Manufacturing Association of India an industrial organisation with more than 5500 member companies). During his opening remark, he had informed the captive audience that India has the lowest voice call rate in the world , still its profitability is in the range of 20-25 range which is again highest profitability in telecom industry int he world!

Mobile Content Summit

In the morning keynote was delivered by Mr. Suresh Jayaraju, vice president, Head – new age VAS ( Value Added Service), 3G service from Reliance infocomm. In his speech, he opined that India has many innovative low cost VAS ideas where “missed call” can be used to exchange many information. For example, he said that if I give a “missed call” to a person with one ring, h/she would understand that I would come after one hour, if I give missed with with two rings, it means I would be late by 2 hours!

Mobile Content Conference

Vamshi Reddy from Yahoo had explained about mind boggling amount of content being stored, processed ready to be delivered to consumers. He had also informed that, now a days there are many user generated content and this is likely to increase manifold once 3G is rolled out in India.

Mr. Keith Curran, CEO of Steadings Group, United KIngdom had talked about UK experience about Mobile VAS industry and how India will have to gear up for changes in its content development. He explained about “PUSH” and “PULL” method of product development and how “PULL” method had been phenomenal success ( obviously referring to Apple’s IPad). He had also declared that Mobile Phone is now dead and we should gear up for new gadget which will do much more and voice call would become a mere feature in it!

It was successful summit attended by top executives who are stake holders in the Mobile Content Industry in a telecom market which has more than 770 million users and increasing by 20million every month!

What IVR technologies or IVR applications would be hit in the year 2011 ? Here is a list of few IVR applications or IVR technologies that might see high usage as well wide acceptance among people!-

What IVR technology or Application will rule in year 2011 ?

1. IVVR ( Interactive Voice And Video Response)

With introduction of 3G technology in worlds most populous countries, India and China, IVVR should see wide application and deployment. I think, IVVR would be used in VAS ( Value Added Service) industry, customer care, virtual tour in hotel industry.

IVVR would also be used Tele-medicine in India as well as e-governance.

2. IVR in Payment

IVR would be increasingly used in phone banking as well as payment using phones. Recently, RBI ( Reserve Bank of India has introduced OTP ( one time password) valid for just one transaction for 30 minutes to 24 hours. So, the public confidence in payment using IVR might will increase. Many payment gateway providers are now trying to provide payment option using IVR with just a telephone call on the move.

3. Speaker Recognition

With increasing payment using IVR, speaker recognition technology will be used more and more. Most probably, this technology would be further developed.

4. Speech Recognition

With increasing usage of IVR in customer care as well as ‘self-help’ complaint management system, speech recognition usage as well as accuracy may increase in 2011!

5. IVR Hosting

Since many visual as well as online web-based tools are now available for IVR call flow designing, I think, IVR hosting will see increase in 2011. Presently, Click To Call is one service which is a hosted IVR service used by many people. Many people are also opting for hosted IVR solution in order to reduce initial capital investment as well as support.

6. Bulk Voice Call

Bulk Voice Call should see increase as well as competition in terms of per call pricing in 2011, specially in India. Reminder Service using voice call will also be used more and more.

These are the IVR applications which I think will be deployed and used by many people in the year 2011! I would like to hear from you too, so kindly leave a comment with your opinion!

Dialogic Corporation (“Dialogic”), a global provider of world-class products and technologies for multimedia and signal processing, today launched its inCloud9™ network, a free, cloud-based developer network designed to make it easier and more efficient for developers to test Dialogic products while building new

Dialogic Launched InCloud9

Developers can securely develop applications using inCloud9 resources that are functionally partitioned and assigned to them. They are initially provided login credentials that enable them to access the site via a VPN connection. Development tools can then be accessed to create prototype applications that can be functionally tested with dedicated server resources running both Dialogic and third party products. inCloud9 also serves as a community for developers, and allows them to communicate and interact with others that have similar interests.

The first products available for use in the inCloud9 network include Dialogic® PowerMedia™ products — Dialogic® PowerMedia™ IP Media Server (IPMS), a powerful and flexible server-based software product that supports open protocols and APIs to unleash media processing capabilities for mobile value-added services; and Dialogic® PowerMedia™ Web Media Server (WMS), software that enables the rapid development and deployment of voice and video-enabled Web 2.0 social networking and other applications using an HTTP RESTful-based interface popular with web developers.

Additional third party products are also accessible, including the Sailfin J2EE application server, OpenMethods OpenVXML service creation environment, Vicorp xMP service creation environment, NetBeans IDE and the Tomcat server for XML script and prompt storage. Dialogic is planning to make additional Dialogic products and third party products available through inCloud9 later in 2010.

In addition to providing product access and support, inCloud9 will feature video training demos and sample code for applications such as:

* IVVR
* Video Mail
* RTSP
* Text Overlay
* MSCML-based IVR and Advanced Conferencing
* Dynamic VXML
* “Click to Call” Applications
* Video Ring Back Tone
* OpenVXML

“We designed the inCloud9 network to be a stimulating, resource-rich environment for developers in which they have access to the tools and support for expressing their creativity and developing new applications,” said Jim Machi, senior vice president of marketing at Dialogic. “We are excited to see what innovations will emerge from the inCloud9 initiative.”

Dialogic is currently accepting mobile video applications for its second annual Dialogic Innovator Challenge. The company is offering access to inCloud9 for selected developers to create applications for submission to the Innovator Challenge. The grand prize winner will receive a cash prize of US$10,000, with additional cash prizes awarded to two runners up.

About Dialogic Corporation

Dialogic Corporation is a leading provider of world-class, innovative technologies based on open standards that enable innovative mobile, video, IP, and TDM solutions for Network Service Providers and Enterprise Communication Networks. Dialogic’s customers and partners rely on its leading-edge, flexible components to rapidly deploy value-added solutions around the world.

Information about Dialogic is available at http://www.dialogic.com/. Also, join our social networking community, the Dialogic Exchange Network (DEN), at www.dialogic.com/den or visit our Facebook, Twitter and YouTube pages for additional Dialogic news and updates.

Dialogic is a registered trademark, and PowerMedia and inCloud9 trademarks, of Dialogic Corporation. Other trademarks mentioned and/or marked herein belong to their respective owners. Dialogic and its subsidiaries encourage all users of their products to procure all necessary intellectual property licenses required to implement their concepts or applications, which licenses may vary from country to country.

Contact:

Kristen Perry
Dialogic
+1-973-967-6665
Kristen.perry@dialogic.com

Dialogic, the name that goes almost synonymous with IVR, has announced availability of the DiaStar™ Server, Release 2.0, as per their press release, Parsippany, NJ , USA.

Dialogic Diastar Release 2.0 Available now

• Call Progress Analysis (CPA) Enhancements -User-Defined Tone Detection with detection results available in both Asterisk Dialplan and the Asterisk Manager Interface (AMI)
• Robust support of SIP Video from the Asterisk Dialplan, including:
o Play and Record Audio and Video
o H.263 Support
o MPEG4 Support
• Video Transcoding between H.263 and MPEG-4
• Video Transrating
• Video scaling to enable playback of video on different sized video screens
• SIGTRAN signaling support
• Native media bridging

These new features and enhancements continue to expand Asterisk developers’ ability to utilize the DiaStar Server to create applications such as IVVR systems, Video Surveillance Systems, Video Gateways, Mobile Advertising and Banking, Multimedia Social Networking and basic Video Call Completion.

For complete Press Release : Diastar 2.0

There has been lot of talk about video IVR or IVVR ( Interactive Voice and Video response System) recently. Dialogic also has announced recently of their availability of Beta DiaStar™ Server, Version 1.1, “Allowing developers to create video applications for fixed and mobile phones. this brings into variety of existing video features into open source marketplace.” (Dialogic Press release) Indeed a good news for large open source Asterisk IVR/IVVR developers.

Dialogic Releases Beta DiaStar

Dialogic is no doubt the leader in the field of CTI boards, Telephony Signaling products in the world and this initiative by Dialogic to make their existing Video enabled products accessible by open source developer community will boost the development of video IVR applications.

Now, can Video IVR or IVVR can be the next big VAS for Telecom operators ?

I think so and here are my reasons:-

1. 3G is available
3G has been introduced almost everywhere in the world including big Telecom market India by state run mobile service providers BSNL ( Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited) and MTNL ( Mahanagar Telecom Nigam Limited). MTNL operates in two big Indian metros New Delhi and Mumbai while BSNL operates all circles in India other than New Delhi and Mumbai. 3G is the requirement for video call in the mobile network and 3G enabled phone is the requirement at the user end. 3G enabled mobile phone with twin camera for video calls have been in the market for long time now. Also entry level 3G enabled with camera is now available at less than $100, even in India. So using video applications or services by large number of users is a reality in India.

2. Innovative Video Application
Think about getting an SMS alert about Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s huge six with a link to make video call to watch it! Or an SMS alert informing about Irphan Pathan getting out Ricky Ponting out by a yorker ? Who in India or in Indian subcontinent want to miss it ? Video IVR creates possibility of many innovative video application which will entice user to avail video value added services! If YouTube could be such a hit, video IVR with large contents and innovation would also be hit!

3. Concept of citizen journalism or citizen activism
People are getting used to the idea citizen journalism now. With video IVR, there will be people who would be uploading video footage about events immediately for large audience which will be available simultaneously on internet, TV or mobiles of any 3G users!

4. Customer care
Video IVR may revolutionize customer care and call center industry! With video call, many problems by customers could be solved remotely as proper instruction could be provided to the customer for self-help. Frustration with traditional voice based IVR where they are made to speak to machine, by customers would also reduce as through video IVR, they can discuss with customer care executives face to face!

5. Video Advertising, blogging, cinema etc.
Video blogging can be expected to increase by many fold! Video portal would have much larger audience with 3G users. People would be able to watch trailer on movies before they buy a ticket for it over video IVR! SMS advertising would give away to video advertising now! Watch TV advertising on your mobile!

6. Utility Services
A user will be able to video weather conditions live at any place! Phone banking will be replaced by video banking which will make it more secure as well as personal! It will be very useful in healthcare industry where specialist would be able to instruct many locations simultaneously from a remote location!

So, innovation and ideas are many for video IVR applications! So, if video IVR is introduced after 3G, it may be the next big VAS ( Value added service) for mobile operators!

What is a Video IVR or IVVR ( Interactive Voice and Video Response System) ?

This is nothing but IVRS ( Interactive Voice Response System), but it also has video. So essentially the calling terminal has to have video screen as well as video playing capability! It also requires high bandwidth, so existing POTS (Plain Old Telephone System) or 2G mobile phones can not be used to make a call to IVVR Server.  IVVR is essentially for 3G or 4G Mobile Phones.

So IVVR seems to be quite new concept! But with its description in WikiPedia, seems it may have major application in the field of Tele-Medicine or Telehealth!

It can take inputs or commands from users either in the form of DTMF or Voice Recognition.

It can also be used in Voice Portal to deliver users many exciting services like instant cricket video update, live sports update, watch few interesting TV programs, catch up with TV Live Breaking news! It will also be used in live interactive multi-player games!

Overall IVVR seems an quite interesting development, enhancement in IVR Applications. Since Video will be delivered to user handset as Video Call, it eliminates requirement of processing the video feed for different 3G phones!

APEX Voice Communications, Inc. is one such company which has Video IVR Solutions.