Cross Channel Conversations initiative gains momentum as European customer service providers move to improve the customer experience across a wide range of devices

Genesys-led initiative gains momentum as partners and customers begin enabling multimedia chat, video self-service, customer text messaging centres, and other next generation customer service capabilities

CAMBERLEY, June 15th, 2009 – An industry initiative designed to improve customer service by delivering a consistent customer experience across the phone, web, branch and mobile channels, called Cross Channel Coversations, has gained significant momentum with a recent wave of enterprises and technology vendors implementing these next-generation capabilities. Last week at the Genesys GForce Event, one of Europe's largest meetings of customer service professionals, the move toward Cross Channel Conversations reached several key milestones as technology providers showed improved integration and some of the world's most innovative enterprises demonstrated their results.

Cross Channel Conversations is an initiative led by Genesys, an Alcatel-Lucent company (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU), that brings together key enterprises and technology providers to eliminate the breakdowns that customers often experience when they move from one communication channel to another. The Genesys Cross Channel Conversations initiative includes identifying the gaps in customer interactions today and providing an integrated platform to serve as the hub of these interactions.

In support of Cross Channel Conversations, LivePerson announced it has joined with Genesys to improve the web experience by integrating online customer service with assisted service via both chat and voice capabilities. The two companies are addressing the challenges consumers face when they begin an online transaction but need additional assistance and want to use more than one channel of communication, moving to either a call centre or online chat without losing the context of their interaction.

The newly unveiled integration between LivePerson and Genesys gives customer service agents the ability to engage with customers in real-time by proactively inviting online consumers to 'click-to-chat' and 'click-to-call', and directing them to the right resource, with the most suitable expertise and availability for meeting the needs of the customer.

Genesys and InQuira also announced they have teamed to improve web-based interactions by integrating their respective software suites - combining Genesys customer interaction software with InQuira’s knowledge applications to enhance self-service interactions by presenting the right information and resources customers need.

The joint solution between Genesys and InQuira makes it easier for eServices customers to get the right answer with InQuira's intent-based retrieval capabilities. Using multi-lingual natural language processing (NLP), InQuira discovers the "true intent" of each question to find the most relevant answer as quickly as possible. InQuira leverages profile data, customer searches and other information maintained in Genesys to deliver even more targeted and personalised answers.

In addition to partner integrations, several innovative enterprises also demonstrated at GForce that they have made an impact on consumers by delivering improved customer service that supports multiple communications channels.

For example, in the Egyptian branch of the Middle East & Africa telecom provider Etisalat, new video call centre IVR technology by Genesys has enabled this fast growing telco provider to serve its seven million Egyptian customers via their video enabled mobile phones and 3G networks. In less than two years Etisalat Egypt's client went from startup to reach nearly seven million clients and, to date, covers 96 per cent of the inhabited areas in Egypt. Etisalat Egypt has created one of the world’s most advanced multimedia contact centres, combining video, voice and SMS, with voice recognition, avatars, and other advanced self-service choices.

Etisalat is the first telecom provider in Egypt offering video customer care services, and will be recognised as one of the world's most innovative customer service providers. Clients can now see their customer care representative live on their mobile phones as well as choose tariffs and other service via video calls. Video self-service dramatically improves customer satisfaction as it reduces frustration caused by the traditional touchtone audio menus.

Other cross channel successes will come from customer examples that will be shared exclusively with attendees. For example, one of the largest financial service providers in Northern Europe has leveraged SMS text messaging to provide new communications channels that are integrated with traditional ones. In addition, one of Europe's largest telecom providers has incorporated eServices via its web site, to include chat, and voice in order to improve satisfaction and continuity as consumers jump from self-service on the web to assisted service through its contact centre.

GForce is an annual event that brings together high ranking executives from throughout the world. This year's European event was held in Barcelona, Spain.

About Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Inc.
Genesys, an Alcatel-Lucent company, is the only company that focuses 100 per cent on software to manage customer interactions over the phone, web and in e-mail. The Genesys software suite dynamically connects customers with the right resources - self-service or assisted-service - to fulfill customer requests, optimise customer care goals and efficiently use resources. Genesys software directs more than 100 million customer interactions every day for 4,000 companies and government agencies in 80 countries. These companies and agencies can leverage their entire organisation, from the contact centre to the back office, to improve the overall customer experience. As a result, Genesys helps stop customer frustration, drive efficiency, and accelerate business innovation. For more information, go to www.genesyslab.com.

About Alcatel-Lucent
Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) is the trusted partner of service providers, enterprises and governments worldwide, providing solutions to deliver voice, data and video communication services to end-users. A leader in fixed, mobile and converged broadband networking, IP technologies, applications and services, Alcatel-Lucent leverages the unrivalled technical and scientific expertise of Bell Labs, one of the largest innovation powerhouses in the communications industry. With operations in more than 130 countries and the most experienced global services organisation in the industry, Alcatel-Lucent is a local partner with a global reach. Alcatel-Lucent achieved revenues of Euro 16.98 billion in 2008 and is incorporated in France, with executive offices located in Paris. For more information, visit Alcatel-Lucent on the Internet: www.alcatel-lucent.com.

Media Contact:
Duncan Burford, UK PR for Genesys, 01780 721 433, dburford@iba-europe.com

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