Alcatel's Genesys named top vendor in worldwide voice portal shipments

(2005-03-21)

Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc., an Alcatel company (Paris: CGEP.PA and NYSE: ALA), announced today that market research firm Gartner, Inc. has named Genesys the 2003 worldwide leader for voice portal port shipments in its report entitled "Market Share: Voice Response Systems, Worldwide, 2003." * According to the report, Genesys has a worldwide market share of 13.0 percent.

Genesys also achieved the highest port shipment figures in the 2003 EMEA market, securing 15.7 percent market share in the region. In the "Rest of World" (APAC and Latin America) category, Genesys also placed first with 26.7 percent market share. Genesys is ranked second in the North American market with 10.1 percent market share.

The Gartner report states that voice response systems based on voice portal architecture currently account for more than 20 percent of the total market, and that in 2003, voice response port shipments increased for the first time in several years, showing a 6.5 percent year-over-year gain. Genesys is a leading vendor in the combined market of IVR and voice portal platforms and is a provider of next-generation voice portal platforms.

"To help improve service and reduce costs, enterprises are increasingly looking to implement speech technologies and Web-centric voice portal solutions that leverage speech recognition and advanced voice applications," said Elliot Danziger, chief technology officer at Genesys. "Genesys is leading this growing market with an open standards approach to voice portals that integrates customer self-service with advanced routing and 'live' agent assistance."

This announcement follows Genesys being named in the leaders quadrant in the Gartner 2004 IVR and Voice Portal magic quadrant report. **

Key capabilities of the Genesys Voice Platform include:


Pure software solution - VoiceXML and open standards software enables companies to make Web-based information available to customers over any telephone.
Complete speech processing capabilities - provides speech-processing capabilities through a VoiceXML browser, SIP interface, speech and text-to-speech integrations.
Advanced call control functionality - empowers companies to manage the set-up, monitoring and transfer or tear-down of calls using Web standards instead of proprietary technologies, thereby enabling enterprises to more freely integrate across disparate applications and infrastructure.
Seamless Genesys suite integration - seamless self- and assisted service integration leveraging the full suite of Genesys call center solutions, so companies can easily extend their customer service capabilities from automated to agent-supported transactions.
Unparalleled application support - platform supports the broadest range of applications, both custom-designed and packaged third-party solutions, so companies gain faster time-to-benefit and reduced IT costs.
Flexibility of deployment - deployable in front of or behind a PBX; over IP or traditional TDM lines; and on-premise or as a managed service by telecommunications companies and service providers.

Additionally, Genesys has a robust ecosystem of application developers using Genesys Voice Platform to build speech self-service applications for improved customer service, as well as to meet the specific needs of vertical markets.

*See Gartner report: "Market Share: Voice Response Systems, Worldwide, 2003," authored by S. Cramoysan and D. Kraus (January 2005)
**See Gartner Report: "IVR and Enterprise Voice Portal Magic Quadrant 2004," authored by B. Elliot and D. Kraus (April 2004).

About The Magic Quadrant
The Magic Quadrant is copyrighted September, 2004 by Gartner, Inc. and is reused with permission, which permission should not be deemed to be an endorsement of any company or product depicted in the quadrant. The Magic Quadrant is Gartner, Inc.'s opinion and is an analytical representation of a marketplace at and for a specific time period. It measures vendors against Gartner defined criteria for a marketplace. The positioning of vendors within a Magic Quadrant is based on the complex interplay of many factors. Gartner does not advise enterprises to select only those firms in the "Leaders" quadrant. In some situations, firms in the Visionary, Challenger, or Niche Player quadrants may be the right matches for an enterprise's requirements. Well-informed vendor selection decisions should rely on more than a Magic Quadrant. Gartner research is intended to be one of many information sources including other published information and direct analyst interaction. Gartner, Inc. expressly disclaims all warranties, express or implied, of fitness of this research for a particular purpose.

About Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc.
Genesys, an Alcatel company, is 100 percent focused on software for contact centers. Leading companies in the Global 2000 and Fortune 1000 use Genesys to deliver interactions that drive better business. With 3000 customers in 80 countries, Genesys directs more than 100 million customer interactions every day. Genesys allows enterprises to achieve key business objectives by tying together customer interactions, people, and customer information in both traditional telephony and IP environments. Sophisticated routing and reporting across voice, e-mail, documents and Web interactions, coupled with integrated self service, ensure that customers are quickly connected to the right resource - the first time. Genesys solutions stop customer frustration and allow enterprises to deliver superior customer satisfaction and improved business results. For more information visit us at www.genesyslab.com.


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