SIP Intelligent Routing in the Contact Centre: Avaya Intelligent Customer Router (ICR)

Transcription

1 SIP Intelligent Routing in the Contact Centre: Avaya Intelligent Customer Router (ICR) Version 1.0 January 2008 Abstract: This White Paper explores the business benefits and enabling technologies of a SIP based multi-site contact center. Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) provides a new innovative methodology to deploy a more streamlined and effective Contact Centre architecture, lowering costs, removing unnecessary and outdated technology layers, and ultimately redefining the boundaries of where segmentation verses call distribution occur. This paper is intended for existing or new Avaya Contact Centre clients interested in the business benefits new technology enablers like SIP, VoiceXML, CCXML, SOA and Web Service can deliver in optimizing Customer Service architectural models. This document contains copyright information which is proprietary to Avaya. A non disclosure with Avaya is required prior to sharing this document with any party. No part of this document may be reproduced for or transmitted in any form by any means to a third party, without written permission. Date: Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 1 of 26

2 1 Executiive Summary This document lays out the unique opportunity emerging standards currently offer to rearchitect the technology layers in the Contact Centre, and thereby delivery a more simplified and adaptable methodology to segment, self-serve and distribute customers calls in a multisite Contact Centre. Applying and optimizing the relationship and linkage between SIP, VoiceXML, CCXML and Web Services technologies allows a more effective framework for delivering Customer Service, with more simplified integration between the various functions, layers and applications found in a contact centre operation. This vision leverages new open standards to better utilise the wide range of Avaya technology already deployed by your organisation, removing redundant hardware, software and integration methodologies that have been superseded by these new disruptive technologies and standards. Avaya s vision allows your business strategy to drive and be enabled by an enterprise communication strategy redefining how Customer Service is delivered, how new business models can be optimized, and competitive advantage and efficiencies derived. Figure 1: Aligning Technology & Operations with Business Startegy An IT owner has to meet three simultaneous challenges today, driving an adaptable businessfocused architecture; balancing technical and business needs; and delivering the future today through the support of innovation. Flexibility, speed, and innovation. All buzzwords that management use to describe goals that they envision around the kinds of differentiated services that business needs to deliver to grow and thrive. The task of providing a manageable and cost-effective way to deliver on those aspirations is expected even when business goals are not clear. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 2 of 26

3 While the benefits to the Business Strategy and Contact Centre Operation deliver to flexibility, lower TCO and a common platform for segmentation logic, the IT benefits specifically focus on a more effective use and integration between the various technology layers and functions found within the Contact Centre: Figure 2: IT Challenges This paper recommends the adoption of a unique set of standards based technologies and integration methodologies to fundamentally improve Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and enable the framework for a extendable and scalable solution for differentiated customer experience and service. This evolving communications architecture model lays the foundation for how your organisation can leverage SIP as a key enabler within your Contact Centre operation. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 3 of 26

4 2 Alliigniing Busiiness,, Process,, Peoplle and Technollogy The below table summarizes the linkage between Business Strategy, Process Drivers, and IT & Technology Drivers. Through the leverage of Standards Based emerging technology Building Blocks covered in section 3, all three aspects of Business, Process and Technology are aligned in the creation of an adaptable enterprise and business architecture. Each of these key drivers are expanded on below, substantiating the case for SIP Intelligent Routing in the Contact Centre: 1. Segmentation with the traditional Contact Centre model is performed in the Self Service Layer (IVR, and WEB) with identification and segmented Service, in the routing layer in distributing this interaction to a resource (ACD, Skills based Routing, Pre-route and post route load balancing), and finally at the agent desktop through intelligent productivity tolls and segmentation integration into the agent desktop business application. The Contact Centre Business Strategy desires a common environment for flexible and agile manipulation of the Segmentation Plan to delivery a Differentiated Service across the entire Contact Centre Solution. Greater application sophistication results as enterprise business applications become integrated more directly into the self-service environment. The Contact Centre Process and Operations Team desire to have control of this segmentation logic on a common platform, with open industry standards tools to easily modify and re-use segmentation logic built across the channels and customer segments. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 4 of 26

5 The IT group wish to leverage VoiceXML, ccxml and Web Services open standards development tools to develop and support the objectives of the Contact Centre business with lower cost and high availability Web and Java development tools and resources. Vendor lock is also minimized. 2. Avaya has formulated a significant methodology to deliver a new Multi-site Contact Centre model using IP Telephony, breaking the boundaries of distance and geography. Called Flatten, Consolidate and Extend, this new paradigm delivers Centralized Business Control and Logic, with decentralized Service Delivery, centralizing the processing and application layer, yet understanding the need for a distributed agent workforce. This methodology follows the Consolidate where you can, distribute where you must mantra, and delivers a significant TCO in removing application silo s, and ROI in Agent Utilization through virtualization. Through this initiative the Contact Centre Business Strategy gains control of a common processing and application layer in a distributed resource model, the Contact Centre Process and Operations team gain centralized control of applications, logic, segmentation and new functionality to be extended, and the IT team optimizes project cost, development, deployment and support through a build once, and extend everywhere methodology. 3. FCE has allowed many businesses a Communications model in globalizing, and extending reach and operations across the business. This flexibility provides Process and Operational returns with resource utilization and productivity, and extends IT a lower cost TCO in delivering to their objectives of simplifying support and resiliency at the edge of the business, where your customer facing resources reside. 4. Cost and TCO remain significant Business Drivers for every organisation. Process and Operations with this solution will have more flexible budget control and impact through this consolidated vision, and provide significant cost benefits to future application and functionality deployment. IT derive costs savings from a number of solution areas, removing hardware and licensing of duplicated trunking real estate, SIP Call Delivery direct from the carrier and most significantly the removal of costly CTI interfaces and middleware applications, improving risk on points of failure, ongoing support costs, and the removal of a technology layer through the innovative use of SIP Headers for CTI data transport to SIP aware intelligent desktop applications. This solution further leverages and utilizes existing Avaya investments and feature rich Contact Centre assets, improving investment protections and ongoing TCO. 5. The Avaya SIP Intelligent Routing in the Contact Centre, coupled with FCE, folds new capabilities such as Presence, Collaboration and resource virtualization into the Contact Centre, and extends to parts of the enterprise where back office, branch or partner resource reside and impact business process latency in Customer Sales and Service. The notion of Resident-Expert therefore allows the business to better integrate the rest of the enterprise into the Contact Centre, institute collaboration and business process teaming across the enterprise, and provide IT a mechanism for technology to deliver significant business value and process integration. Although there are approximately 9 millions Contact Centre agents worldwide, a further 100 million workers are servicing Customer and 400 enterprise workers are yet to be more tightly integrated into Contact Centre business process collaboration. 6. While risk mitigation and continuity of business in the event of disasters, network outages and geographic impacts to resource is a top level priority for the business, process and operations require this resiliency to be inherent to the network and systems IT deploy. The Avaya solution embeds these mechanisms into the fabric of the solution, to provide automation, failover and continuity of Business though distributed SIP and IP based mechanisms. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 5 of 26

6 3 New Technollogy Buiilldiing Bllocks A number of emerging standards and technologies provide a new framework of Building Blocks to re-think and optimize the architecture model to deliver to the above Business, Process and People drivers. Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) SIP is an Internet protocol for establishing, manipulating, and managing communication sessions. One element in delivering an Adaptable Business Architecture is the requirement to deliver services through generic infrastructure (for lower operation requirements and ubiquity of support) while providing a platform for innovation. These requirements match perfectly with SIP as a protocol. SIP support within an Adaptable Business Architecture can be broken down into three primary areas of support: support for ubiquitous networks (SIP trunks and IP trunks), convergence of data within the communication channel (CTI replacement) and support for new classes of applications (presence and video). SIP was created during the Internet revolution to do for telecommunications what TCP/IP did for networking. SIP inherently broke down the barriers of distance and vendor interoperability by tackling not only the Enterprise communication space, but also the Service Provider space. Within a SIP-aware network, every device, every service, and every resource is accessible and usable within a solution. As more Enterprise Vendors and Service Providers have driven solutions into a SIP solution set, procurement, access and operational costs have dropped. Within the Avaya Voice Portal architecture, native support for SIP has delivered the following benefits: Support for Service Provider SIP Trunks: The Voice Portal architecture integrates to Service Provider SIP Trunks without the need for traditional switched circuit resources. This allows Service Providers to pass on the lower cost of management within their infrastructures to Enterprises. More importantly, the requirement for local switched circuit resources can be consolidated into a broad IP management and procurement initiative. Interoperability with multiple Vendors. As all major vendors have adopted interoperability standards, integration with multiple SIP endpoints and SIP communication solutions is delivered. The often-requested ability to pass data from one endpoint to another in a communication application, whether from IVR to agent ( Please enter your account number What is your account number? ), or agent to agent, has been hampered by complexity and cost despite the business need. SIP inherently supports convergence between voice and data channels as the SIP data and voice channels are one and the same. This delivers the following features: Availability: Data that needs to be passed from the self-service solution (account number, account balance, and other arbitrary data) to another SIP-aware element (Agent Desktop or other application) is always available. Avaya s architecture supports inserting arbitrary data in the SIP session so other SIP endpoints can access and use this data. Ease of deployment: Traditionally CTI deployments have demanded a separate data network (and integration points between computers and telephony) for operation. This has meant additional planning and costs. With SIP, the telephony network is the Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 6 of 26

7 data network. Once the telephony aspects of the network are cared for, data paths come for free across vendors and service providers. Reliability and cost: SIP promises to eliminate the expensive service provider premium services for multi Call Center data infrastructures and the associated unreliability and ongoing costs. The elements of SIP described above deliver on the promise of lower total cost of ownership and simplicity in management. However, the promise of SIP extends beyond this with support for new classes of applications through new primary capabilities: new media types and presence. SIP is inherently media agnostic. Following the internet model that transport is agnostic to content, SIP provides for not only the easily understood value of real-time voice (telephony) conversations, but also for data which can be text, images, video and complex location based data. A prime example is the ability to deliver a multimedia experience to the user of a SIP aware device (such as a 3G Mobile Telephone). Now, streaming video content and presence-aware content can be delivered to a user conversing through a Spoken interface. (For example, allowing a user to be able to see rich video content driven by a speech interface.) Presence is an exciting new capability supported by the SIP model. Now each user or application can express his, her (or its) availability to meet an end goal. Traditionally provided by the detailed understanding of telephony states within a call center function, presence and availability can be combined to create new ways of servicing end users and applications. Through SIP, end customers, will spend less time waiting to get the right answer for their question. VoiceXML, ccxml, SOA and Web Services Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems and speech-enabled IVRs are established technologies that have an easy to articulate value proposition. In order to become a part of the Adaptable Business Architecture these technologies must evolve from proprietary technologies and programming models with limited application reuse. In recent years a set of standards have emerged for IVR and speech environments that address the use and reuse of IVR and speech services in a web-based IT infrastructure. VoiceXML and related standards describe a way for systems to interact with end users, while Java technologies have been adopted to speed integration and support of business logic. Increasingly, IT owners have settled on these standards in a voice portal ecosystem which include not just the technologies, but a set of best practices and expertise from integration experts that can be applied to create solutions. Some of the most obvious advantages to these solution sets are: Consistently managed and administered application environments Common skill sets and tools for developing and maintaining applications Less expensive application environments as vendor lock is removed Common business logic and integration environments Greater application sophistication as enterprise business applications become integrated more directly into the self-service environment Businesses today are required to provide a rich, valuable customer experience that translates into high automation rates and lowers the overall costs associated with call and Contact Centres. Delivering an Adaptable Business Architecture dictates requirements to have Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 7 of 26

8 maintainable, extensible, and manageable applications that can quickly be modified to meet business requirements. This, in turn, requires use of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) best practices. Increasingly, services that may include IVR functionality (for example, a Service which interacts with an end user to collect identifying information like an account number) may integrate to services that include people (for example a subject matter expert who will be researching issues related to the provided account). Adaptable means that new business objectives may arise where customer service may become subservient to cost savings or vice-versa. Reuse of existing Web Application infrastructure, software and development expertise has moved from nice to haves to requirements for all deployments. Additionally, the need to deliver high-quality metrics around business effectiveness and business intelligence now stretch to multiple constituents including departmental businesses, internal customers, and management. This requires a highly consistent approach to managing the infrastructure. The Avaya Voice Portal Solution brings a unique value proposition to dealing with an Adaptable Business Architecture, by adopting key IT principles in defining its systems, including: Support for Web Standards, separating Access (via software-based media processing) from Presentation (through optional Java-based software frameworks), from Business Integration and Data Access. This promotes reuse and agility. Support for SNMP-based network management and operational standards, including roles-based access control and thin client access. Support for SOA design for data integration, exposure of reusable services, and management capabilities. Standards-based design and development practices by supporting an Eclipse-based Integrated Development Environment (IDE) ECLIPS based development tools for Self Service, segmentation, routing logic For enterprises and integration partners seeking rapid and easy speech and touch-tone self service creation, Avaya Dialog Designer is a complete Integrated Development Environment offering support for both design and management of voice and speech self service applications. Dialog Designer simplifies lifecycle activities associated with development of VoiceXML and ccxml applications including design, simulation, and integration. Support for Web Services (SOAP/XML/WSDL), Databases (JDBC), CTI, and Java (Servlet, EJB, JMS, etc.) and legacy integrations (3270/5250/MQ) are all facilitated within the Dialog Designer environment. Dialog Designer was designed to conform to common IT application development practices by integrating into your existing Java, Web Services, and Eclipse-based development systems and allowing you to more easily leverage their investment in Avaya Self Service solutions. Integrating Segmentation and Routing logic into this framework provides a common application environment for development and support of your business logic. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 8 of 26

9 4 SIP Intelllliigent Routiing iin the Contact Centre A SIP Contact Centre today is both a reality and a vision Reality because all the foundation mechanisms are already in place, and Vision because the each building block is still likely to be considerably enhanced over the next months. For example, the availability of feature rich SIP services from Inter Exchange Carriers is in its infancy, and the exact form in which it will take place is still being discussed. At the same time, customers still have a lot of legacy products that will not be replaced in wholesale. Prior to covering in more detail the various items within this architecture, it is important to elaborate on the transformation underway from traditional to SIP based architectures. Typical Traditional Architecture Traditional voice protocols (H.323 included) have limited ability to carry relevant nontelephonic data. This restriction fostered the development of CTI middleware applications which could communicate at the same time with enterprise databases and telephony systems. Examples of these suites are Avaya Interaction Center, Cisco Intelligent Call Manager and Genesys. All these products had to develop proprietary integrations to the different ACD and IVR vendors, and try to reverse-engineer ACD behaviour within their software to keep call and data synchronized. Needless to say, these CTI products have achieved some success, albeit at significant cost and complexity. The flaws of such systems are not the purpose of this document, but lack of real time synchronism with ACDs and multiple release management are examples. Figure 3: Traditional TDM/ H.323 High Level Architecture Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 9 of 26

10 SIP Future Vision Architecture SIP adds intelligence to the communication protocol itself, and eliminates the need for middlemen (CTI). This should not be mistaken with empty statements of CTI being dead. The role of CTI providing events and triggers to other applications is not being replaced (e.g., to initiate call recording). Nonetheless, the capability of adding additional intelligence to route calls sometimes referred to as third party call control becomes totally redundant. The following table summarizes some of the main transformations: Characteristic Information-rich protocol Powerful peer-to-peer communication Intelligent endpoints Simple and flexible interoperability Impact Important information moves with the call Eliminates the need for CTI middleware parallel network All components access and can execute on call information in real time Seamless handoffs between architecture components From an architecture perspective, the elements that touch the call become intelligent endpoints that can now make informed routing decisions in real time. As they move the call around, the new recipients receive the call and its context. The different boxes depicted in the below figure can have call inflows or outflows, using SIP as the mechanism for a seamless handoff. Figure 4: SIP Intelligent Routing in the Contact Center The SIP Contact Center is a simpler yet more efficient architecture. The different components become more software processes that resemble more enterprise business applications than the traditional architecture. The below concepts are fundamental to the Avaya Solution: The Voice Portal, the ACD and the agents leverage Web Services to access any additional enterprise data. This speeds the deployment and facilitates maintenance as it eliminates proprietary integration. A Customer Interaction Repository, also accessible via Web Services, provides a database where the interaction data can be stored and later used for customer experience reporting and routing. The Customer Interaction Repository provides cradle-to-grave data-rich reporting without requiring complex key index matching. Unlike other contact management solutions, the Avaya approach not only tracks the interaction through the IVR and routing, but also through agent interaction. A single development environment can be used to configure the call flow end-to-end. The output of this Eclipse-based tool is standards-based CCXML, VXML, and BPEL documents. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 10 of 26

11 4.1 The Avaya SIP Intelligent Customer Routing (ICR) Solution Components. This section highlights the various solution components using SIP Intelligent Routing in the Contact Centre: Figure 5: Component Based View Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 11 of 26

12 Avaya Communications Manager 5.0 The Avaya Communication Manager PBX and ACD system continue to play a key role in this SIP based solution, one key function providing the queuing and Expert agent Selection in distributing the call to the most appropriate agent. Your investment in these systems is therefore protected, with a solution that leverages assets and system capabilities already in place. This solution does however require Communications Manager 5.0 and SIP Enablement Services 5.0 (SES), as key enhancements in R5 enable core functions of the below callflow. The first enhancement is support for User-to-User Information (UUI) in Communication Manager SIP trunks. UUI is a field that is used to encode customer identifier information and is often used by Contact Center applications to route incoming calls or trigger screen pops. UUI has been supported in traditional ISDN trunks, but no equivalent encoding was defined in the original SIP standards. Avaya recognized this outage and authored an IETF Internet Draft (draft-johnston-sippingcc-uui) that defines how UUI could be transmitted in SIP signaling. This capability is implemented in Communication Manager 5.0. (and the Avaya Voice Portal 4.1) The second SIP contact center enhancement is support for Network Call Redirection with Communication Manager SIP trunks. Network Call Redirection is also referred to as Take Back and Transfer and allows incoming contact center calls to be redirected by Communication Manager to a different IVR or agent queue on a different switch. Further elaboration on the use of this function is covered below as an alternate architecture and callflow in the additional Solution considerations sections. The final SIP contact center enhancement in this release is the Avaya Agent Deskphone 16CC, which is a cost-effective SIP-based contact center agent desk phone. The Avaya Agent Deskphone 16CC supports the most popular Expert Agent Selection (EAS) features, including Agent Log-In / Log-Out, Auto-In, Manual-In, AUX Work, After Call Work, and Release. Note that the S8500A and S8700 cannot be upgraded to Communication Manager 5.0. Communications Manager 5.0 will also be the last supported release for the S8300B. Both the S8720 and S8710 require the DAL2 duplication boards when upgrading to Communication Manager 5.0. The S8720 and S8730 (S8730 new with Communications Manager 5.0) Servers with software duplication do not require any DAL boards. Communications Manager serves as the SIP-based ACD, with the scalability and robustness that has characterized Avaya ACDs over the years. In an all-ip environment, its look and feel changes a bit. First, since the system doesn t terminate traditional TDM interfaces, the footprint is dramatically condensed. With SIP, the hardware requirements are restricted to queuing and media services needs (e.g., for conference calls, monitoring calls, remaining analogue or digital terminations, etc). For all typical calls, the RTP media does not pass through the ACDs, going directly from the SIP Gateway to the agents. The infrastructure consolidation in these cases can be above 80%. The remaining gateways supply an extremely efficient DSP bank. They scale to hundreds or even thousands of resources in the system with very simple operational needs. The gateways don t have operating systems and therefore need little Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 12 of 26

13 maintenance especially when compared to some alternatives where several servers are needed to accomplish the same thing. Important to note that even though the media is not passing through the system, the call control signalling still is. This allows calls to be rerouted and controlled while they are in progress. For example, if a supervisor decides to service-observe a call, the media automatically gets re-routed through the system so that the supervisor can hear it creating something similar to a conference call. This happens regardless of where the supervisor is he could even be calling from a cell phone. Once the call stops being supervised, the media once again bypasses the ACD. SIP Gateway: The SIP Gateway performs nothing more than TDM-to-IP/SIP conversion. It typically has high density TDM interfaces (DS3 or OC3), and it bridges the gap until a Session Border Controller will rather be deployed once Service Providers are able to deliver the call traffic via SIP. Interim gateway solutions could be provided by any vendor that supports the main SIP RFCs, or using the Avaya High Density SIP Gateway. Avaya G860 High Density Trunk Gateway (HDTG): Avaya is currently launching the G860 High Density Trunk gateway (AudioCodes). This carrier grade small footprint (5U) Gateway offers DS3. OC3, STM-1 interfaces, for SIP connectivity to Avaya Communication Manager. Using the G860 will significantly reduce Carrier access charges, costs associated with acquiring and maintaining data centre floor space, and cost savings by reducing hardware footprint. The G860 works in conjunction with G650 gateways and is ideal for large IP based Contact Centres. With the G860 R2, it will also be possible to pass UUI with the call when it is redirected. SIP Services: SIP Services include Proxy, Registrar, Redirect and Presence Servers. In the solution, the main function of this component is to resolve the SIP Invite messages and route calls to the appropriate destination. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 13 of 26

14 Avaya SIP Enablement Services (SES) 5.0 creates a communication services layer within the Avaya Communications Architecture that mediates between Avaya MultiVantage applications and a wide range of standards-based user agents, webbased applications, and communications devices. These services combine the standard functions of a SIP proxy/registrar server with SIP trunking support and duplicated server features to create a highly scalable, highly reliable SIP communications network. This resulting network supports telephony, instant messaging, conferencing, and collaboration solutions. For enterprises that have already deployed H.323 IP Telephony, the migration process can be initiated immediately and transitioned at whatever pace is desired. Once registered and licensed on SIP Enablement Services, existing Avaya 4602SW, 4610SW, and 4620SW IP phones can convert their operation from H.323 to SIP through a simple and free firmware upgrade. Through Communication Manager Extended Access, SIP endpoints have access to additional telephony features. IP Softphone users have a similar migration path to SIP telephony through the Avaya SIP Softphone, which supports SIP for both IM and telephony. A key feature of SIP is its support of Uniform Resource Indicators (URI) for user addressing, in the same basic form as addresses (i.e. [email protected]). Because this addressing is based on the user, not a device, it can be mapped to whatever device the user desires. Ultimately, this will allow people to communicate with each other using a single handle-based address vs. the hard-to-remember multiple phone numbers of their desk phone, cell phone, pager, etc. Through SIP Enablement Services, communication over even existing telephony networks become simpler, more intuitive, and focused on the user vs. a device. Through SIP Enablement Services, a number of Avaya Business Communication Applications, including Communication Manager telephony, and Meeting Exchange web/audio conferencing, become available to a wide range of standards-based user agents, web-based applications, and communication devices to create a new paradigm of Converged Communications that leads to increased flexibility and cost efficiency. SIP Services are the key component to future enhancements around Resident Expert, in which knowledge workers throughout the enterprise could be contacted to provide their specific expertise based on their presence availability. Also part of the roadmap is the integration with third-party presence services such as Microsoft Office Communications Server. CCXML/VXML Voice Browser: One of the two components of a Voice Portal, it is a software based product that terminates SIP signalling and VoIP media. It replaces traditional IVRs, providing speech and touch-tone applications to callers. The browser itself does not contain business rules it reads and interprets the instructions provided by the application server through standards-based CCXML and VXML documents. CCXML/VXML Application Server: It hosts the CCXML and VXML documents that are accessed by the voice browser. Besides the traditional self-service role, the Voice Portal is also responsible for call routing in the SIP environment. Using non-proprietary CCXML scripts, the application can look at the call and segmentation information in order to define where to route it which could be a specific ACD node, a VXML application or an outsourcer. The routing databases could be stored in a local database or be accessed through Web Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 14 of 26

15 Services calls. Similarly, load balance instructions, if applicable, can be obtained through Web Services. This is a key component in the SIP architecture. For the first time routing scripts can be written in a non-proprietary language using standard CCXML development environments (for Avaya Voice Portal, this is done via the ECLPISE-based Dialog Designer application included at no charge). By using Web Services to obtain external information, the CCXML application is shielded from proprietary access methods and becomes neutral in relation to how these external systems are configured. Voice Portal SIP based Intelligent Customer Routing (ICR) Application ( Route to Best ) This Web Service will be invoked by the Voice Portal Application, once the customer decides to opt out of the IVR looking for an agent. The VoiceXML script calls a Route to Best web service which using SIP polls multiple Avaya Communication Manager ACD systems to determine the best route destination based agent skill/queue expected wait time. XML Application Server: This server hosts the agent desktop application. In addition to ACD controls, the application presents the call information from the SIP header to the agent. The application server will host the IP Agent thin client process, reducing cost of ownership and desktop support issues. Intelligent Endpoint: An agent desktop application has a multitude of functions: ACD controls Displaying SIP Header information Web Services access to read/write to enterprise data repositories (e.g., to store SIP header information for later reporting) SIP presence status and external SIP service integration Optional media termination (in case no phone is used) All these controls (with the exception of media termination) can be provided in a thinclient environment. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 15 of 26

16 Figure 6: Intelligent Endpoint Although numerous Intelligent Endpoint softphones are available, Avaya CSI will also be offering a web browser based JAVA Softphone. This softphone will offer: General Telephony controls (answer call, transfer, conf, hold, etc) Call Centre controls (ACD login, logout, AUX, avail, etc) Integration with a Desktop Wallboard to deliver real-time Contact Centre statistics directly to the agent desktop Platform independent, being Java based and could run stand-alone (thick client) or in a Remote distribution mode (Applet in a Web Browser). Codec s supported will be G711U (Windows, MAC, Linux, Solaris), G729A only on Windows. This softphone will operate in Telecommuter, shared or road-warrior modes, along the lines of other Avaya softphones. Basic Screenpop Most importantly this softphone will provide basic screenpop functionality (open a web page when receiving a call), and leverage and apply the CTI data related to the caller passed from Voice Portal through the SIP Header and UUI fields. Optional Data Directed Routing Web Services: A Web Service access enabling: Central storage of relevant information from the SIP headers Reporting on Customer Interaction Repository data Optional centralized tables for any relevant information, such as routing definitions accessed by CCXML applications Optional brokerage for enterprise systems access, in case direct access by the SIP Contact Center is neither possible or desirable Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 16 of 26

17 4.2 Call flow overview. The following points step through at a high level the calls flow between the various components of this solution. Incoming call flow 1. Customer call is routed to one of (N) Data Centres done with network % allocation. 2. Call is delivered over DS1, DS3 to SIP Gateway (PSTN case), or alternatively delivered over SIP directly from the carrier to Session Border Controller (SBC). Either or both of these call delivery options may be used, and will primarily depend on whether SIP from the carrier is available 3. SIP Session Director load balances calls across the Media Processing Platforms (MPP) servers of the local Voice Portal system 4. The call is delivered to a voice portal MPP platform (shown as RTP1). Note that VP, and the caller at this stage are in front of the ACD, and call has not yet reached the ACD at this stage, or used up any ACD resources (trunks, licenses). The Voice Portal platform creates a Universal Call ID (UCID) for this call, to be used for integrated reporting. The Voice Portal MPP invokes a VoiceXML IVR/self-service application residing on the Web Application Server, specified by ANI, DNIS, customer knowledge, etc. This application also stores customer context info for downstream agent screen pop. Of importance to note that for customers not opting out to an agent (~60%), the calls are serviced at the MPP and Voice Application Server level, and use up no resource on the Avaya CM ACD systems. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 17 of 26

18 5. When customer Opts to talk to an agent, the VoiceXML application invokes a Voice Portal Intelligent Customer Routing (ICR) Web Service Application, which initiates an Avaya BSR (Best Service Routing) poll to multiple Avaya communication Manager 5.0 ACD systems, to determine best ACD to route caller to. This determination is based on one of the following agent availability criteria: i. Shortest EWT ii. Most expert agent iii. Most Idle agent iv. Least occupied agent v. Best local available agent This ICR Routing Application returns the best ACD route back to the VoiceXML application. 6. The VoiceXML/ccXML application uses the MPP to place a second call leg to the best Avaya CM ACD destination identified by the Voice Portal Routing Application. - UCID goes with the call in user-to-user SIP header - Context info for agent screen pop goes with the call in user-to-user SIP header - User-to-user info goes with the call, even if answering agent transfers call - Media connection remains between caller and VP MPP (shown as RTP1) - VP application provides queue treatment while caller waits for an agent - No media connection at this stage between VP and CM, optimizing WAN bandwidth 7. Avaya CM ACD queues the call. 8. When an agent becomes available, Avaya CM delivers the call to the available agent. An Alerting notification is sent to Avaya Application Enablement Services (AES) for Screen Pop of SIP UUI data to agent desktop 9. VP receives 180 Ringing SIP message - VP terminates queue treatment - VP merges two legs of call - VP sends REFER/Replaces SIP message to SIP Gateway 10. SIP Gateway sends INVITE/Replaces SIP message to CM 11. Agent answers call - Media (RTP2) connected between SIP Gateway and agent station - RTP2A if local ACD was best route, RTP2B if remote ACD was best route - Call shuffled off of Voice Portal MPP, freeing up Voice Portal MPP ports Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 18 of 26

19 4.3 Sip Callflow ladder The following two SIP Callflow ladders, depict firstly the end to end callflow ladder, and secondly an expansion view of the specific BSR Request SIP callflow ladder. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 19 of 26

20 4.4 Additional Solution Considerations A number of peripheral considerations are important to note, in context of the total solution. Location Preference Logic to minimize bandwidth utilization: The SIP Intelligent Router Application (BSR Web Service) will have locationpreference capabilities that allow for adjustments on location routing decisions, similarly to the offset vector command in a traditional BSR Response vector on Communications Manager. This will adjust the Expected Wait Times (EWT) and can be optionally administered to adjust available agent metrics also. In addition, there will also be an administrable "local preference" option for available agents in which a local available agent will be preferred over a remote available agent. The combination of these features can ensure that only a small subset of calls need to be redirected across the WAN to a distant Communications Manager system Service Provider Network Call Redirection: The routing event could leverage the service provider network, by invoking a Network Call Redirection of the caller back through the network to the distant selected CM system. All Call Treatment with this callflow will reside at the terminating CM ACD Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 20 of 26

21 system. Depending on the method used to deliver the call to the enterprise (direct SIP from the Service Provider, or TDM through a SIP gateway), various Network Call Redirection standards, protocols and options are available, depending on the specific capabilities of the relevant Service Provider. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 21 of 26

22 5 Sollutiion Evollutiion With the solution framework defined, Avaya continues to evolve and explore new potential ways of leveraging SIP, Web Services, CCXML and VXML. Evolving architecture with layer separation With the emergence of SIP and SOA, Avaya recognise the Access, Session and Application layers making up the architecture of a PBX or ACD system have fundamentally begun to separate, with the each functional layers signalling to each other via Session Initiation Protocol. The Access functional layer contains the physical devices that connect a user to the network including, but not limited to, phones, PBXs, gateways, wiring, switches, and routers. The Session Layer includes the function that sets up and tears down connections between endpoints on the network; including numbering plans, least cost routing, call admission control, and call accounting functions. Finally, the Application Layer provides the business logic for business communications processes such as Call Center, Conferencing, Mobility, and Messaging. In the recent past of circuit switching, all of these functions were integrated into a single device, the PBX. This implementation required a system at every location. When systems evolved to H.323, the Access layer was separated from the combined Session and Application Layer, giving businesses chance to centralize the Application and Session functions while distributing the Access function (i.e. gateways, softphones, and hardphones) across IP based networks. The introduction of the SIP signalling protocol has now caused a third evolution of the three tier functional model. The Access, Session, and Application functions are now fully abstracted from one another - and the functions signal to each other with SIP. This paradigm allows for massive scalability, simplified system management, and improved system interoperability. This architecture breaks the rigid hierarchical models of the past it is highly distributed, provides loose coupling between components, incorporates any media, and includes mobility as a core capability instead of as an afterthought. This Avaya architectural recommendation is validated by principles in the 3rd Generation Partnership Project ( IP Multimedia Sub-System (IMS) standard, now in its 6th iteration. Although IMS was originally conceived for Service Providers, large scale enterprises are using the same principles to build highly scalable, adaptable, and richly functional systems. The architectural evolution of this three layer model is depicted in the following diagram: Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 22 of 26

23 Adherence to this reference model approach will help ensure high scale, vendor interoperability, and system adaptability. Access Layer In the Access Layer, all PBXs and Key Systems communicate with the Session layer via SIP trunking. SIP trunking can be provided via an add-on gateway or by native SIP trunking. While the SIP based trunk signalling is interpreted by the Avaya SIP Session Manager, the RTP based media streams are sent directly to the other PBX location. The SIP based signalling and the RTP media streams are transported on the IP based WAN backbone. Session Layer For the purposes of the solution proposed in this paper, the Session layer handles session establishment, covering calls from the SIP Service Provider, Call Admission Control, Call Re-direction, Digit Analysis, Dial Plan Management etc. It also routes SIP signalling into the Application layer, and routes SIP requests between the Application layer services. A Session Border Controller (SBC) is normally placed between the SIP Service Provider network and the internal private network of the enterprise. The SBC provides security, NAT traversal, signalling conversion, media forking, and media conversion between the public and private networks. All SIP signalling and media streams from the Service Provider and the enterprise SIP network pass through the Session Border Controller. Avaya partners for SBC functionality with companies like Acme Packet, NexTone, Convergent, Ingate, and Sipera. Application Layer For the purposes of the solution proposed in this paper, the Voice Portal and SIP Intelligent Routing applications provide the Self Service, Segmentation and Routing Services, and are effectively brokered by the Avaya SIP Session Manager. Avaya Communication Manager (ACM) provides the Call Centre queuing and call distribution service. Evolving to the Solution Delivery Platform The ability to rapidly create and deploy features and applications that add value to the business is a core requirement in today s marketplace. Traditionally, however, creating applications and integrating them into the communications infrastructure is a laborious process that differs from vendor to vendor and product to product. The solution to this problem is to provide a Solution Delivery Platform (SDP) for building applications. The value of the SDP is that applications can reuse components and modules and recombine them to create new services which provide value to the business. In 2006, Avaya acquired Ubiquity, maker of the Sip Application Server (SIP A/S). Sip A/S is the leading SIP-based application platform in the marketplace today. Service Providers and enterprises use the SIP A/S and its SIP/SOA based application environment for rapid application creation and deployment. In the future, the SIP A/S will serve as the platform for application integration and deployment across Avaya products. The Solution Delivery Platform provides the framework for creating applications using common pre-defined services. The SDP also provides a bus for application to application communication flows, providing distributed Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 23 of 26

24 data services for the serving applications, and the support infrastructure to manage the applications. Avaya Solution Delivery Platform *It is important to note that many of the applications in the diagram above can/will be instantiated on the SDP itself. In the Intelligent Communications Architecture, existing Avaya Communication Manager and other servers used for such applications as messaging, conferencing, IVR and call recording become known as Communication Feature Servers. These servers are known to and communicate with the Solution Delivery Platform and are used to deliver the features and applications that are needed by a user or a caller in real time, regardless of location or device. This allows for a high degree of investment protection, as much of your existing software can be re-used as a Feature Server. From the infrastructure point of view, once all circuit switch dependencies migrate to SIP the Contact Center will truly become a software-only application running on industry standard servers. It should be noted that even today the so called soft-acd products require hard-acd components to control calls (like media gateways or routers). In a pure software solution, the media services for queuing and conference will be provided by software-based media processing platforms (MPPs) which will communicate directly to a SIP facility. These MPPs can be part of the Voice Portal solution that is tightly integrated with the agent state control mechanism. Thus this type of approach provides for true interoperability and openness in a true software based model. The solution outlined in this paper is a clear step in the direction towards this new architectural model, and establishes the framework to migrate more seamlessly into the future Avaya SDP architecture. The Voice Portal platform has already made this transition, with Access, Session and Application layers all separated. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 24 of 26

25 6 Concllusiion The solution outlined in this paper will provide a significantly improved technology Total Cost of Contact Centre Ownership, will transform the effectiveness of traditional multi-site Contact Centre solutions to an optimizing standards based framework for a scalable solution for differentiated customer experience and service. In conclusion, the below highlights some of the key value propositions this unique Contact Centre architecture model offers: Strong investment protection of existing Avaya assets, all agent licensing & features, including EAS and Advocate, remain unchanged, most of the gateways and servers are retained, and no agent retraining is required. This solution therefore extends the benefits of SIP, with minimal disruption, to the existing feature rich Avaya IP Contact Centre Dramatic reduction in trunking real estate and licensing, levering the HDTG SIP gateway, and an IVR First architecture Leveraging the SIP protocol and header to pass caller-context-information downstream to ACD s and endpoints, negating the duplication and overhead of costly third party CTI Server solutions. SIP enables a contact center system to deliver, in one payload, the call and the data that defines its context. With the Sip Contact Centre, calls and context need only to be passed to the contact center when the best agent or resource is available. Open standards based minimizing vendor lock-in, re-use of Web Application infrastructure, and common skill sets and tools for developing and maintaining applications. Centralized logic and control, with decentralized Service Delivery, i.e. minimized technology footprint at the edge of the business. Consolidated and standards based environment for segmentation logic, with Self Service logic, Opt-Out segmentation logic, and segmentation routing logic all on a common platform and application environment. Service-oriented architecture and session initiation protocol are revolutionary technologies that promise to transform communications, and will enable the development of business applications that leverage the contact center s sophisticated communications services. The need for responsiveness to change, and lower costs for computer-telephony integrations, will drive this transformation. It would be an oversimplification to think of SOA and SIP simply as replacements for routing or CTI. Their value comes not from what existing telephony or contact center functionality they can replace, but from the unique capabilities they can add and make available on the enterprise communications network. The ultimate vision of SOA and SIP is one of decentralized communications, an infrastructure leap of faith, a complete and irreversible switch away from today s technologies. Seldom in the history of technology has change happened in this way. Revolutionary change can lead to quantum leaps in productivity and service. SIP is a communications technology. Avaya takes seriously its role as a communications industry leader. Avaya sits on the major SIP standards boards, and is actively participating in shaping a realistic, lasting place for SIP in contact centers. Contact centers have long trusted Avaya to lead their evolution. Avaya has a long-term vision for SIP, and is guiding Avaya contact centers toward it, with an identified migration path and business benefits at every step. Above all, the Avaya vision involves protecting the significant infrastructure investments already made by Avaya contact centers. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 25 of 26

26 The below before-and-after table further highlights the factors this new world brings to the deployment of a SIP based Contact Centre: CONSIDERATION BEFORE AFTER WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT Signalling Protocol H.323 SIP Peer Capability, extensibility Trunking PSTN based ISDN SIP Service Provider Cost, scale Physical Queue Point ACM Gateway VP Media Server Queue Treatment Vectoring VXML Application ACM use Queuing, queue treatment, virtualization. Work assignment, agent states Work assignment and agent states Virtualization Vectoring (BSR) ccxml based Web Service More efficient resource, licensing and bandwidth usgae Standards based, integrated with Self Service Callflow Common segmentation and routing platform Minimized resource, licensing and bandwidth Data Directed Routing CTI workflow ccxml and SIP SDP CTI Elimination Voice and Data synchronization CTI Native to SIP CTI Elimination Integration Stiff SIP & Web Services Flexibility, simplification Scripting Languages Proprietary Standards (VoiceXML, ccxml, Java, BPEL) Easier to find skill sets, no vendor lock Extend Operations Silo d applications Orchestration Easy implementation of new features The Contact Center is where business applications intersects communications infrastructure, and few other areas in the enterprise will more deeply feel the revolutionary impact that SIP, VoiceXML and Web Services bring. These technologies and standards will forever change how Contact Centres are architected, and provide unprecedented business value in very simple ways. Jan 2008 Avaya Proprietary Page 26 of 26