miSystem is an IVR Toolkit developed by Mokalmat is an LLC (Limited Liablity Company) from Cairo, Egypt. We have seen many Graphical IVR Toolkit for Dialogic CTI hardware, but miSystem is the first IVR toolkit I have come across which is built around Synway, a low cost CTI hardware.

miSystem : IVR Toolkit for Synway boards

Recently, I have been able to check out this miSystem IVR toolkit through Webiner by Amr Oreaba, who is co-founder of the Company, Mokalmat LLC providing efficient voice products and target-oriented solutions for your business while being distinguished from competition by our ease of setup and use, tailored to match your needs and low cost.

miSystem is an IVR system that is designed for rapid development of IVR call flows and Call center application over Synway Cards(SHT, SHN and SHD series).

miSystem miFlow Home Screen

It consists of a core server that runs the call flows and handles the CTI boards. It comes with embedded web server where you can monitor the channels status, upload call flows & voice prompts and Deploy the call flow through the administration web interface miAdmin.

miSystem - Multiple DTMF

A free developer GUI miFlow is supplied to draw your call flow via Drag-and-Drop technique where you can build a very complex call flow in minutes. This can be downloaded from here – Download miSystem miFow

miSystem - HTTP Integration

According to Amr Oreaba, miSystem current supports Synway cards only and will support other hardware vendors in future.

miSystem is complete IVR solutions actually which can be used off-the self, draw some call flow using its miFlow and it starts working! It has some features like call transfer, fetching data from Database as well as HTTP.

It also takes care of finer details about multiple DTMF digits detection, key press through etc.

This IVR Toolkit should fulfill many IVR systems requirement with simple call flow under a tight budget.

CTI (Computer Telephony Integration) Boards, Also known as CT Boards (Computer Telephony boards), is the interface between various IVR software running on the computer and the telephone network. It is normally a PC add-on boards which is installed inside PC/Server Chassis and which is connected to telecom network physically with through E1 or Analog FXO.

With introduction of VoIP communications, CTI is no longer just hardware based, it can also be software and using existing network interface cards in the server of PC. For example, Dialogic HMP 3.0 is software CTI like solution for VOIP or SIP phones. With 3G being introduced, we might see end of CTI boards!

Indian CTI market is getting crowded with new vendors now a days. Gone are the days when CTI boards mean Dialogic. We now have almost all vendors opening shop in India from all over the globe. Many Chinese companies have opened office in India and selling low cost CTI boards in price sensitive market like India.

Here are few new players which have become quite active lately in Indian market:-

1. Sangoma is a Canada based company which has 2 port analog USB based cards to 8 E1 PRI boards. They have also recently launched SS7 boards. They support Asterisk as well as has own API for developing voice applications. Alliance Infotech is their Indian distributor along with ForeMost Systems. All computations are done on the Host PC making their board sizes small. But it also increases CPU usage of the Host PC. Another disadvantage is, they do not provide Echo Cancellation and CPA ( Call Progress Analysis) as a default feature.

2. Synway is Chinese company which has large range of products beginning with 2 port analog USB boards to high density server based media gateways with 64 E1 connectivity! They have low cost, high performance and feature rich boards. They claim, they are now number one for voice logging products in India. They have products supporting both Asterisk as well as own API for developing IVR applications.

3. Donjin is another Chinese company which has analog CTI boards as well as high density KeyGoe Series of products which has 48 E1 connectivity per system! They support Dialogic APIs for their voice boards upto 8E1 which is a major advantage for them as there are many Dialogic based voice application developer in India. Their boards are feature rich as well as much cheaper than Dialogic.

4. Aculab is UK based company and they sell both CTI hardware as well as voice applications. They are not very cheap, but their boards are most suitable for voice portal applications. Recently, India has witnessed rapid growth of voice based value added service (VAS), and Aculab has potential to grow here. ForeMost Systems is their Indian distributor based in Mumbai.

5. OpenVox is another Chinese CTI board manufacturer which are Asterisk based. They have both analog and Digital voice boards. They are also very competitive. ForeMost Systems is their Indian distributor based in Mumbai.

6. AudioCodes is Israel based company which provides TDM and IP based telephony servers for value added services.

Apart from these foreign companies, there are few home grown CTI board manufacturer who provide complete solutions from CTI boards to Voice Applications. Few Indian companies who provide CTI boards are:

1. ExtendIVR : ExtendIVR is majorly known for their IVR platform ExtendIVR, but they also have CTI boards.

2. OZONTEL : Ozontel Systems, based out of Hyderabad has come out with a dual port E1 PRI CARD. It was integrated with Asterisk and comes atleast at half the price of cards which are being imported. Its manufactured within India and hence support is available for both s/w and h/w out of India.

3. Punjab Communications Limited is one of the oldest IVR companies in India which has their own CTI boards.

Though Dialogic is still the biggest CTI vendor in India, but with these new CTI companies, we can expect dominance of Dialogic will reduce and IVR users will have more choice. As per Dialogic, they will soon come out with voice products specific to India which will be aggressively priced keeping mind of these competitions.

While outbound IVR systems are being widely used now a days for many promotional activities, but outbound IVR potential as smart predictive dialer is still to be tapped.

While many acknowledge that, outbound IVR has many advantages over predictive dialer, call centers still deploy predictive dialer for making outbound calls and then transferring the calls to human agents.

History of predictive dialer shows, it came to be used in call centers for increase efficiency of human agents, as well as effective monitoring by supervises. Predictive dialer increase productivity by automating the dialing, then detecting answering machine, FAX tone or human answering and then connecting to human agent. Any outbound IVR with small computation power using CPA ( Call Progress Analysis) can achieve these and much more!

Another major advantage of outbound IVR ( or any IVR for that matter) is its availability in both on-premise and hosted environment. Hosted environment provides many advantages like low initial cost as well as sudden spike in call volume! Predictive dialer are normally on premise and sudden spike of calls can only be served by increasing number of ports in it.

So, why call center owners are still having separate predictive dialer and not using their inbound IVR as predictive dialer in outbound IVR configuration ?

As I had interacted some call center owners as well as few vendors for call center industry, I think, in India, only two reasons for not using outbound IVR as predictive dialer :-

1. Lack of information
Not many people are aware that IVR can be used for making outbound calls and then transferring it to human agent along with call whispering or agent pop up with the connected call. Many call center owners include inbound IVR, but they are not aware or made aware that the same IVR could be used for making outbound calls as well as it can eliminate predictive dialer all together.
IVR being based on a PC, it has many options for monitoring, accessing data from various sources as well as present status of calls and activity of human agents.

2. Lack of confidence in IVR applications
While predictive dialer is a proven product, but many consider IVR applications to be just add-on and stand-by arrangement in India. Most probably, this has to do with technology adoption problem! Also, many people cite example of ‘hard coded’ IVR applications and lack of support and maintenance by IVR companies. Most of the IVR companies in India uses CTI boards APIs to develop IVR applications instead of open standards or tools. It may create problem in upgrading the application as well as maintenance.

So, it looks like outbound IVR will not be able to replace predictive dialer as preferred ‘smart dialer’ in call center in near future in India.

Dialogic D/300 JCT-E1 is the entry level board for anyone who needs digital network interface with PSTN network as well as voice resources in the single board. I feel, D/300 board is most used entry

Dialogic D/300 JCT-E1 board

Features of Dialogic D/300 JCT-E1 board

1. Digital Network Interface

It has both E1(2.048MBPS) and T1(1.544 Mbps) support. It supports digital interface network protocols like ISDN PRI, R2MF. ISDN PRI is widely used protocol for connecting CTI board with PBX systems. With D/300 board, it is quite easy to configure it to work with many ISDN variants as per PBX from one country to another or manufacturer.

2. FAX support

Dialogic D/300 board supports both FAX and host based speech recognition. In certain cases, FAX and speech recognition may not work together. It also supports CSP ( Continuous Speech Processing) which offers IVR developers a powerful feature to develop many interesting IVR applications and features depending on the call progress. Speech recognition feature provides IVR developers to develop Speech-Enabled menu for any IVR application.

3. Scalability

Dialogic D/300 supports H.100 connector and it allows it to connect to other Dialogic boards. Inexpensive normal PC can be used to install this board and one PC may install upto 16 boards per machine if PCI slots are available.
With its support for GSM and G.726 bit exact voice coders ( standard for Voice Profile for Internet Messaging (VPIM) , one may develop unified messaging solutions based on D/300 board.

4. Programming

Dialogic D/300 board is supported by many RAD Tools for IVR development. It also supports widely popular GC ( Global Call Protocol) for making many high end, mission critical IVR applications.

Applications

D/300 board can be used to develop any kind of IVR applications. It offers many call related information available with digital network interface protocols. Call bridging available in ISDN PRI is one of the feature which is used to make Click To Call application can be developed.

D/300 board is also ideal choice for starting a voice portal service to start with 30 lines and then increase the lines.

DIalogic has some other models with higher capacity with same features. D/600 and DMV1200 have 60 voice and 120 resources respectively. One may move from D/300 to DMV/1200 without having to make any changes in the application.

Other CTI vendors like Donjin, Synway, Digium too have D/300 equivalent boards. For example, Digium TE122P/TE122B, Synway TEJ Series and Donjin DN300 are Dialogic D/300 equivalent boards with similar features.

What is “on premise IVRS (Interactive Voice Response System)”?
On premise IVR system can be defined as Interactive Voice response System (IVRS) which is installed in the premise of the company who is using IVRS for providing various services to its customers. On Premise IVR systems are also known as “Legacy IVRS” which are normally developed specifically for the company, using native API functions of CTI boards. It is tightly integrated with CTI board used, PBX or telephone operator, Operating System of the machine and normally written in a well defined languages like C++, .NET C# etc.

While, hosted IVR may provide many advantages, mainly outsourcing of maintenance and low initial investment, but on premise or legacy IVR systems are going to stay, in my opinion.

1. Recurring Cost
Hosted IVR services are normally rented. So, it is a recurring cost for a company. Hosting service provider may restrict services when some call spikes take place. Unlimited calls and one time cost is more beneficial in terms of ROI for many large corporates than paying for every calls handled by hosted IVR. Many companies already maintains various computer servers and PBX systems and putting one more server ( the IVR System) is not another heavy investment.

2. Long term Operation
Can a large enterprise afford to change their customer care number overnight ? What happens when hosted IVR service provider company stops its services as it closes down? With experience of recent recession in the world where many large companies went out of business, this is a real danger now where a Hosted IVR service providers close their shop, leaving their customers high and dry. Even the companies using their IVR services may close down, but they wont be needing IVR services too, right ?

3. Control and Integration
Some facility or control may not be available on hosted IVR. For example, transferring IVR call to some person in office. It can be done free of cost with in house PBX. While it may not be at all possible in case of hosted IVR or would cost money for making the outbound IVR call. Integration with PBX gives many features to IVR application, which otherwise will not be available in a hosted IVR. Another advantage would be to access IVR generated voice recordings/complaints on local LAN quickly by many people.
On premise IVR provides complete data security, protection along with customer caller IDs!

4. IVR development Tools
Now a days, there are many IVR development tools which can be easily learned and used for creating IVR applications. So, it is not difficult to manage IVR application any more. These tools can be used to develop any IVR applications in matter of days, if not hours! So, the advantage of hosted IVR for “going live quicker” can be matched with on premise IVR systems too.

5. Initial Investment
With easy availability of low cost CTI boards like Donjin, Synway etc., the initial investment for putting up a on premise IVR is no longer a deterrent. Many Telephone companies provide ISDN leased lines for voice at low rental, making it affordable to many medium sized companies too.

Many will still prefer hosted IVR over on-premise IVR systems and choice between them would largely depend on the IVR application and usage. When number of calls remains more or less constant and data security is required, than on premise IVR systems seems a better choice.

I think, on premise IVR systems are going to stay.

There are many disadvantages of using analog CTI ( Computer Telephony Integration) cards. Apart from that, digital CTI boards offer many advantages over analog CTI boards and I would like to list three main reasons why one should upgrade to digital CTI boards from analog ones.

Even in India, E1 connectivity or PRI lines are easily available from any telecom service provider and it is much cheaper. And with, many new CTI manufacturers are offering high quality digital CTI boards which are easily available.

Here are three reasons :-

1. Dialed Number Identification ( DNI Facility)
Digital boards provide DNI ( dialed Number Identification) which is not available in analog CTI boards. DNI can be very useful. It provides options for separate CTI applications depending on the DNI detected. The same interactive voice response application could play different welcome prompts as per DNI. For example:- A digital interface with Telephone exchange may offer 30 different numbers, and one common number for all 30 lines. Now depending on caller dialing one or groups of numbers, a separate greetings, separate call flow can be implemented in the same CTI application. There would be flexibility to change, modify these numbers without having to change any physical lines.
DNI can also be used for shortcut in menu options. For example, there are 4 kinds of complaints in a company. Four separate numbers could be used for each of the complaints saving callers time to choose a complaint through menu. This can greatly increase usability of any interactive voice response system application.

2. Quick connections
Digital CTI boards uses digital protocol for quick call setup and quick information exchanges. So, any call can be connected quickly. But n analog, it order to CTI boards, one has to wait two rings before the call can be connected. Many of the times, analog CTI boards may not detect CLI at all. Any irate customer gets more irritated when her call is connected after 2/3 rings. It also saves time and handle more calls. So the throughput of digital boards is more than analog CTI boards.

3. Disconnect Problems
Analog CTI boards need to train on varius disconnect tones which may vary from one PABX to another. It takes time to setup detection of these various tones like Busy Tone, Engage Tone, Disconnect Tone, Dial Tone. Also, it takes some minimum time to detect any of these tones. So, analog CTI boards take time to dial out, disconnect.
During outbound calls, it is not easy to detect if called number has picked the call or not. Many people use here voice activity detection as ring back tone does not work with accuracy. With digital CTI boards, all these problems are removed. This not only saves time, but it increases efficiency, result in more number calls.

There is one benefit of having analog lines. out of many analog lines, if one cable is cut, remaining lines will work, in digital, it is only one wire, so one cable is cut, whole of your lines or at least minimum 30 ports would go down.

So, if you are still using analog CTI board, consider upgrading to digital CTI boards now!

An interesting IVRS Application for Voice Portal is Voice Chat Application! It can be a real revenue spinner for a voice portal if it is properly moderated, if it has feature like outbound call, background music etc.!

This chat application has two modes:
1. One To One chat
Here two users chat one through voice portal. The connection can happen both ways. User calls to voice portal number and can browse profiles of IVR Chat users and then send request for chat. If the other user is not connected to Voice Portal, voice portal makes and outgoing call to the other user and initiates the chat!

2. Group Chat/Conference ( Moderated or Operator based)
Here many people join a chat room just like in normal chat room in a website. Here a moderator approves any joining to chat room request. Moderator can block any un-parliamentarian chatter. Telephonic talk-show as well as public opinion could be generated and sampled using this kind of chat.

All calls should be recorded through a dedicated voice logger. There should be dedicated moderators. In fact, customer care of a telecom service provider could be modeled around this IVR Chat and Conferencing for better service to customer.

IVR Chat Application in a Voice Portal

Suggested Technical Arrangements :
For better operation, we recommend using a private exchange (EPABX ) for chat application. IRIS IVDX with 512 lines is good option.

Chat Server is connected to this EPABX through ISDN PRI. (easy to integrate)
Here is the tentative option technical process:
1. All calls to voice portal lands on EPABX. EPBX routes the call to Chat Server.
2. Chat Server handles the call, does the patching, OBD calls, conference calls using EPABX conference facility. Normally, this is used for one to one chat.
3. Chat Server also uses Conferencing CTI hardware to conduct its own conference as per requirement. Normally this is used to Group Chat. CTI hardware should be Dialogic or Donjin. Actually it could be any other CTI hardware, but our software supports both Dialogic and Donjin CTI hardware.
4. Moderators or Operators are connected to EPABX locally and brought to conference as per call flow.

I hope this kind of application can increase revenue of a voice portal if it is properly marketed.

Almost one year back on 28th August 2008, I started a poll in this site to try to know how many people use Dialogic CTI boards as well as other CTI boards. I have concluded the poll today, 5th September 2009. The question of the poll was :

Which CTI card you use for your IVR Applications ?

And the options were :
1. Dialogic
2. Synway
3. Pika
4. AudioCodes
5. TelcoBridge

I forgot to include two more important CTI manufacturer Digium and Donjin. I future, I think I would conduct another poll about these two CTI boards. Digium is wide famous for Asterix.
Not many people voted in the poll! Only 28 people voted. 3 registered users and 25 guests. Total number of vote was 40 as one voter could select more than option.

A good percentage of 18 votes went for Dialogic(64%). I was expecting it to be more than 80% though! Second position was occupied by Synway with 14 votes(50%). Pika technologies came 3rd with 6 votes(21%) and other two got 1 vote (4%) each.

I think low voter turn out must be due to poor visibility of the poll. Last one year has been quite a learning experience, this year I hope to organise more meaningful polls as well as better voter turnout.

I think, analog CTI boards most problematic to configure other than simple incoming or inbound IVR Software. They are dependent on switch or PBX connected to them for many basic IVR functions, call operations. I am trying to list here the problems I had been facing while using analog CTI boards:-

1. Disconnect
2. Dial Tone
3. Dial out
4. Caller Id

1. Disconnect
You need to ‘define’ the disconnect tone to your IVR application so that it can detect disconnect. This disconnect tone may vary from PBX to PBX. Dialogic has a tool PBXpert to detect various analog tones like dial tone, disconnect tone, busy tone, ring back tone etc. With CRBT ( Caller Ring Back Tone) being popular now a days, detection of ring back tone has just become more difficult.

2. Dial Tone
Dial tone also varies from one PBX manufacturer to another. This dial tone becomes very important when you make an outgoing call. IVR application may be unable to make outgoing call if it fails to detect dial tone. Though there are ways to dial out without detecting dial tone or learn dial tone and feed in IVR application, it is still not easy.

3. Dial out
Once successfully dial out, it may not be easy to detect if dialled party has picked up the call. Many people use Call Progress Analysis to detect, if person has picked up the call. But I always think, it is not easy or it does not work accurately all the time.

4. Caller ID
Unlike in digital CTI boards or Digital Telephony interface, caller ID detection is almost a pain and it may not work accurately all the time. Normally, in analog interface with PBX, the caller id is sent by PBX in DTMF form after first or second ring. So, it is really cumbersome to detect Caller ID.

Digital CTI boards with digital interface does not have the above problems. So it would be nice if one can avoid using analog CT boards and use digital boards. Though digital boards are costlier, but now a days there are many CTI vendors which have digital CTI boards which are priced very competitive.

I have thought of an arrangement to avoid using analog CTI cards. Though it may make the IVR system costlier, but most probably, it will be good arrangement in terms of future enhancements, more features. My thinking is to use use a EPABX with PRI card. the CTI board will be connected to EPABX through E1 connectivity and use ISDN PRI protocol. Commonly used and widely available. In turn EPABX may have CO lines from telephone service provider ( analog lines which other wise you wold have connected to CTI board directly). This kind of EPABX may cost less than Rs. 150,000/-

Now, when price of 4 port CTI boards starts with Rs. 10,000/-, investing another Rs. 150,000 on a EPABX and another Rs. 30,000 for a digital CTI board, may not make sense, honestly! But there are some benefit of using this kind of arrangement for for specific IVR application and outbound IVRS is one of them, considering the cost of hiring a E1 link from telephone service provider.

But, the problems I have listed above can be solved by smartly writing your IVR software. In fact, they must be routine problems for many IVR developer, unfortunately no document is available on net, at least I could not Google it. And I am yet to write a smart IVR application for analog CTI board as I started my IVR software development with Dialogic D300 board and R2MF protocol!

I have been thinking to prepare a list of RAD(Rapid Application Development) tools for developing IVR software or voice applications for long time. I have found 8 RAD tools ( including one free tool) for developing IVR Application so far and I think there may be more as I am quite sure, many IVR RAD Tool companies do not use SEO techniques to rank high in search engines! Or may be, Google does not know everything on net, after all.

I have tested only one among this list of 8 tools, VBVoice 5.6.1 of PRONEXUS, and I must admit, I am impressed with how they have made developing IVR software easy and quick! And I am sure pride of many people will be dented as who were member of exclusive and minority group of IVR developer using native API of CTI boards, including myself. I hope to download evaluation version of all the tools one day and compare all of them.

I would say, not all in this list of eight RAD Tools for developing IVR software may qualify to be called complete rapid application development tools, and here is the list:-

1. VBVoice 5.6.1 from PRONEXUS INC:-
I think this is the biggest RAD tool for IVR Software development. Very powerful, easy to use tool that uses industry standard programming environment like .NET technology. It has support for large speech and telephony technologies like ACD, SIP, HMP, MRCP, ASR, TTS and VoIP. If anyone knows VB.NET, C# then with this VBVoice 5.6.1, he can become an IVR Application developer overnight. They support high end CTI boards of Dialogic as well as other CTI boards from vendors like Donjin.

2. VoiceGuide by Katalina Technologies
Another powerful RAD tool for developing IVR. It has its own script and visual editor to write IVR Call flow. It has support for Microsoft SAPI. I feel this is a good tool to start with IVR application. They claim to have more than 5000 clients in their website.

3. Envox 7 from Envox Group
This is another big RAD tools for not only IVR Application, but for many more! It supports IP Telephony, Video Messaging and SMS! One of the key feature of this tool is support for VoiceXML, CCXML and Web Services. It has its own graphical programming environment Envox Studio. It gives good flexibility for developers to develop wide range of voice and IVR applications, most probably ideal for call center solutions. Supports wide range of CTI hardware.

4. Velocity 2.0 by Glorsoft Limited
New kid on the block! “Velocity™ is a completely new technology created by .NET developers for .NET developers.”, It is a new tool, but looks very promising. They support wide range of Dialogic CTI Boards. They have already got prestigious client like London Underground.

5. Xtend IVR 3.0 by Xtend Technologies (P) Ltd
Indian competitor in the field of IVR RAD development tool. This toolkit can be used in various programming languages like VB,VC++, C# etc. They also support speech technologies as well as CTI boards from multiple vendors. They also have a large clientele in India. Free tool for one channel IVR can be downloaded from their website.

6. CT Developer Studio 2 by Pingram Software
CT Developer Studio 2 is a Windows software that helps you quickly implement a professional voice response system into your business. Developing IVR solutions is easy with Visual IVR Script Designer and the many ready-to-use samples supplied with the product. They have their own script, visual script programming environment and simulator. They support Ai-LOgix, NMS and Dialogic boards.

7. Eurovoice objects version 2.0 by Eurovoice Ltd.
They provide COM interface to VB6, VB.net and C# programs for voice or IVR functionality. They mainly support PIKA CTI boards. But they also support PCI express boards from Dalogic. They have speech recognition through MRCP.

8. AGE (Application Generation Environment) version 2.1. by CompTek Internations
AGE is the fastest and easiest way to build voice applications. Best part is, it is completely free, but they charge you for runtime components. It supports Dialogic Voice boards. I think it may not be suitable for large IVR Applications.

I think I would give my top two ranks to VBVoice, Envox 7. Velocity 2.0 is the product to watch out for.