CXTech Week 14, News and Analysis

The purpose of this CXTech Week 14 newsletter is to highlight, with commentary, some of the news stories in CXTech this week. What is CXTech?  The C stands for Connectivity, Communications, Collaboration, Conversation, Customer; X for Experience because that’s what matters; and Tech because the focus is enablers.

Examples of what falls into CXTech includes: Programable Telecoms / Communications, CPaaS, UCaaS, CCaaS, open source telecom software, CPaaS enablers, Multi-Factor Authentication / Instant Authentication, Telecom APIs, WebRTC, Cloud Communications, CPaaS enabled services, omni-channel, telecom infrastructure as code, telecom service dashboards, the myriad of UIs making APIs and enablers and services useable beyond coders.

You can read more about why we’re testing out this definition in the following weblogs: TADSummit State of the UnionWhat’s in a Name Part 1 and Part 2 discussions.

I wrap up the newsletter with a section covering, “People, Gossip, and Frivolous Stuff.”

You can sign up here to receive the CXTech News and Analysis by email. Please forward this on if you think someone should join the list, I also publish this on my weblog. And please let me know any CXTech news I should include.

 

Telecom API Market Findings Released by Mind Commerce, building on Research Since 2011

The latest Mind Commerce Telecom API report is out! Here’s a nice quote from the team: “Mind Commerce has talked to many of the leading providers in this space and also regularly supports the TADSummit, which has greatly informed our opinions and provided us with unique insights. The entire sub-segment of the industry has been impacted by M&A, with many smaller players acquired by larger players such as Cisco. Even medium-sized players, such as VoIP Innovations have acquired smaller companies such as Apidaze.”

I receive no compensation from the sale of this report, my relationship with Mind Commerce is co-marketing around CXTech / Programmable Telecoms.

CXTech week 14

 

 

UCaaS Revenue Will Reach $61.9 Billion by 2024, Growing at CAGR of 48%

The CXTech numbers are getting bigger fast! At least we’re not seeing hockey sticks anymore. Rather relabel an existing market (PBX, hosted PBX, UC) with the latest fashionable label, enter a large growth rate and see the numbers rise fast!

At TADSummit Asia, I’ll be giving a Programmable Telecoms Masterclass, where I review the different segments of CXTech and the range of predictions out there coupled with my guesstimates. As let’s face it, the one thing I can guarantee with any prediction is its most probably wrong.

 

Bandwidth Inc price target raised to $75.00 by Canaccord Genuity

Bandwidth’s Market cap is about $1.5B (current price $68) on revenues of $204M in 2018. Analysts are getting increasingly rosy on the shift in how enterprises buy telecoms.

Twilio is currently valued at $16B. Note a telco like Proxius group as a valuation of $9B on $3.5B revenue. Others: RingCentral is valued at $9B, Talkdesk has an estimated valuation > $1B, its a contact center service started from a Twilio hackathon. Enterprises refer to these companies as telcos / telecom service provider.

Twilio has risen rapidly in the North American SIP trunking market, remember those E1/T1 trunks for connecting an enterprise’s PBX to the PSTN, its now a SIP trunk over the internet from Twilio rather than Verizon or AT&T. RingCentral delivers enterprise telecoms, its wrapped up in the trendy phrase of UCaaS (Unified Communications as a Service), but its enterprise telecoms. The $1.2T telecom services market is shifting.

 

From APIs to UC: Rounding Up the News from EC19

A nice round-up of EC19 from Michelle Burbick. Quoting the article: “Startup Edify Labs chose EC19 for its reveal of Edify, a cloud-based, customer experience (CX)-focused business communications solution that combines the core functionality of CPaaS, CCaaS, and UCaaS/PBX platforms with customer success tools.” Another example of how CPaaS, UCaaS and CCaaS are converging as it’s all just services running on telecom app servers.

 

Webinar: Introduction to Apigate’s Keynote at TADSummit Asia with Richard Im

TADSummit Asia, 28-29 May in KL is ramping up!

On Wednesday 24th April 9AM KL time / Tuesday 23rd April 9PM ET we’re running a webinar with Richard Im of Apigate. The purpose of this webinar is to introduce the Apigate keynote at TADSummit Asia 28-29 May in KL. You can see the TADSummit Asia agenda here.

At TADSummit Asia, 28-29 May in Kuala Lumpur you’ll have a chance to meet everyone involved in the programmable telecoms ecosystem. Technology and service providers like hSenid Mobile and Apigate who are helping telcos and enterprises manage the shift to programmable telecoms and win in Asia and globally. Asian developers who have won at TADHack KL, will share their ideas, experiences, and needs. We’ll have leading analysts from Ovum share their analysis on RCS (Rich Communication Service) and UC. Enterprises will share their experiences in programmable telecoms across chat bots, conversational interfaces, and omni-channel communications.

 

Webinar: Introduction to Ovum (Pamela and Hwee Xian) at TADSummit Asia

On Friday 12th April 9AM KL time / 11AM Queensland / Thursday 11th April 9PM ET we’re running a webinar with Pamela Clark-Dixon and Hwee-Xian Tan of Ovum. The purpose of this webinar is to introduce two of the speakers of TADSummit Asia 28-29 May in KL. You can see the TADSummit Asia agenda here.

 

What is CPaaS? (Communication Platform as a Service)

I pick on this as article of the many attempts by marketing folk to explain CPaaS, UCaaS, and CCaaS. As mentioned by the Mind Commerce article above, TADSummit is the source for insight on these topics. All material presented at TADSummit is available on the TADSummit weblog. The State of the Union presentation has some diagrams that lay out how all the acronyms and market sizes fit together.  I’ll also be sharing the latest analysis at the Programmable Telecoms Masterclass at TADSummit Asia 28-29 May in KL.

 

Supercharge Your Enterprise Communications with CPaaS

I highlight another attempt at a CPaaS definition, while correct in the information presented, Bandwidth have an agenda in how they frame the market to aspects of their offer. Emphasizing their network and E911 support. Which depending on the use case may or may not be required.

In our first CXTech newsletter we highlighted the importance of urgent industry action the FCC’s on MLTS (Multi-Line Telephone Systems) NPRM (Notice of Proposed Rule Making) (FCC 18-132). because E911 does not apply to all many multi-line scenarios.

 

Robo-calling is a Political Hot Potato – first item on yesterday’s Senate Committee Meeting (Commerce, Science and Transportation)

We’ll see lots of noise on Robocalling this year. Effective action is another matter as this is a decades-old new issue. The FCC has fined Robocallers $208 Million, and collected only $6,790 🙁  I wonder if there are Robocaller lobbyists? Ribbon and Neustar have announced their offer to tackle Robocalling.

The trust rating players like Telesign and Payfone could also play in this space, as they can determine the trust associate with a number AND also if that number (if it’s being spoofed) is actually making a call right now. In the game of cat and mouse of robocalling which is broader than just the PSTN, I think we’ll see more web-centric solutions being applied.

 

People, Gossip, and Frivolous Stuff

DeveloperSteve from Telstra has moved onto IBM.  His predecessor, Frank Arrigo moved at the end of 2017 to Amazon Web Services. We can trace many such moves all the way back to James Parton joining Twilio from Telefonica in 2012. I’ll point again (sorry) to my weblog on the shift in telecoms and how telcos need to manage it. Evangelists struggle to operate in the telco.

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