A recent report by COMMfusion, "Market Update: Evaluating Unified Messaging Solutions," has placed Applied Voice and Speech Technologies (AVST (News - Alert)) at the top of the list of providers of unified messaging (UM). The company gains this rank in terms of “completeness of solution.”

 

When COMMfusion evaluated UM offerings from 16 vendors, AVST's CallXpress was identified as having the most complete UM solution. As defined by COMMfusion, UM is the integration of voice, fax, and e-mail messages and message notification allowing users to access any of these messages, anywhere, anytime and from any terminal.

 

Applied Voice & Speech Technologies is a developer of communications solutions for businesses of all sizes. Through its unified communications platform, CallXpress, AVST offers a suite of second generation communications solutions including advanced call processing, voice messaging, unified messaging, fax, notification, and speech-enabled personal assistant (including automated attendant and hands-free mobile worker access).

 

COMMfusion claims to be an independent industry analyst and consulting firm, providing market research analysis and consulting services on Unified Communications (News - Alert) and communication convergence markets and technologies, aimed at helping end-user, vendor and reseller clients both strategically and tactically.

 

According to Blair Pleasant (News - Alert), COMMfusion's president and principal analyst and author of the study, "When it comes to UM, flexibility is key. As companies evolve, and as rules, regulations and business environments change, administrators need to have the flexibility to adapt to those changes. AVST's four UM architectures (Server-based, Client-based, Secure, and Simplified) enable companies to manage the transition to UM, deploying any mix of UM that they wish in order to best fit their needs and unique environments."

 

According to COMMfusion, the yardsticks they maintained for marking a solution complete are the solution’s features, capabilities, its ability to go beyond the usual addition of voicemail, e-mail, and fax and allow features such as find me/follow me and live reply.

 

Personal assistant or speech capabilities; automated attendant; integration with a groupware calendar; Web clients; the ability to work with several groupware products; the ability to support both IP and TDM switch environments; the ability to integrate with multiple vendors' switches and in a mixed-switch environment; networking capabilities; notification options and TUI emulations are the other features considered by the evaluators.

 

CallXpress promotes enterprise mobility and efficiency by allowing workers to stay connected to the office 24x7. It helps organizations in being more successful and resourceful other than just serving as a flexible solution.