In an exclusive conversation with CXO News and APAC News Network, Angira Agrawal, Business Head, Exotel India & SAARC outlines Exotel’s technology and business strategy in India and how it is leveraging AI to transform customer experience.
What are the solutions and services currently in the Exotel portfolio that are available in India?
At Exotel, we deliver technologies that transform communication between humans and companies. Exotel, a leading AI transformation partner for customer engagement and experience, offers a diverse range of solutions tailored for businesses in India. Exotel empowers businesses to craft exceptional customer journeys across all touch points, driving measurable growth. Our solutions, including CPaaS, CCaaS, and Conversational AI, unify customer experiences, boost conversions with personalized outreach, reduce costs through automation, and elevate agent efficiency.
We partner with businesses across various departments, from customer support and sales to collections and marketing, to unlock the potential of every interaction. We leverage AI to create co-pilots. These intelligent assistants seamlessly integrate across all communication channels (omnichannel), enabling personalized interactions with every customer. Imagine empowered agents receiving real-time guidance, leading to faster conversions and improved lead nurturing.
Exotel’s impact extends beyond the agent experience. AI co-pilots automate repetitive tasks, freeing up valuable resources and reducing operating costs. Additionally, AI-powered self-serve options empower customers to find answers independently, boosting overall CX.
Which are the verticals where Exotel is witnessing maximum traction in India and what are their use cases?
Today, there is an increased focus on consumer privacy (DPDP legislation is around the corner), coupled with various organizations’ need to reach out to their consumers / customers even more effectively. Exotel is seeing significant traction in verticals where there is a need for businesses to frequently engage with their consumers or distribution networks, or vice versa.
Use cases start from customer acquisition (Marketing and Sales), Onboarding / Activation, and Customer Life Cycle Management (including Collections for BFSI and Utilities). BFSI uses Exotel to drive customer acquisition, life cycle management and collections, across all channels. Recently, we have seen an increased use of CQA to improve the quality of interactions, and more so, because of the focus on consumer privacy and fraud.
Retail, ecommerce, Logistics and Transportation see an increased benefit by driving better governance of end consumer interactions, orchestrating targeted promotional campaigns, engagement at stores, during the delivery process, and also consumer feedback. There is an increased use of integrated CCaaS solutions to increase customer interactions, and also protect consumer privacy. Healthcare providers are regulated, and also want to ensure that the health service recipient and the healthcare giver are connected seamlessly, as needed.
How does Exotel’s business strategy revolve around CPaaS, contact centers and AI?
Exotel’s business strategy is built around the seamless integration of CPaaS, contact centers, and AI technologies, creating a holistic approach to customer communication and engagement. By acquiring Ameyo, a leading contact center software provider, and Cogno, a top conversational AI company, Exotel can now be a single provider for end to end customer communications and engagement technologies. This strategic integration combines CCaaS (Contact Center as a Service), Conversational AI, and CPaaS into a cohesive system that offers superior customer interactions.
With GenAI now making an impact in mainstream business use cases, Exotel’s “House of AI” brings even higher insights and efficiencies to customer engagement. Overall, Exotel’s strategy revolves around creating a comprehensive, integrated solution that leverages the strengths of CPaaS, contact centers, and AI to drive superior customer engagement and operational efficiency.
What are the dynamics of Exotel’s House of AI and what has been the traction till date?
‘The House of AI’ integrates Generation AI and Natural Language Processing (NLP) technologies into a unified platform for AI-driven communication solutions. It supports various Large Language Models (LLMs) and is crafted to enhance efficiency, accuracy, and user experience in customer interactions. This innovative approach includes several key components:
Dynamics of Exotel’s House of AI
- AI-Driven Product Development:
○ Exotel’s House of AI revolves around embedding AI capabilities into its existing products and services. The focus is on developing AI-driven tools and features that enhance customer engagement, automate routine tasks, and improve decision-making processes. This includes innovations like:
■ Contextual Question Answering (CQA): AI-powered systems that provide real-time, context-aware responses to customer queries, improving the accuracy and relevance of interactions.
■ Agenoids: Virtual agents designed to handle routine customer interactions autonomously, reducing the workload on human agents and lowering operational costs.
■ Autonomous Contact Centers: Steps towards creating fully autonomous contact centers by integrating advanced AI capabilities, such as natural language processing (NLP), machine learning, predictive analytics, and sentiment analysis.
- Unified Communication Strategy:
○ The House of AI initiative aims to bring together various communication channels — voice, SMS, email, chat, and video — under a unified AI-powered platform. This convergence ensures seamless and consistent customer experiences across multiple touchpoints, allowing businesses to manage all communications efficiently and intelligently from a single interface.
- AI Orchestrator (Exomind): Exomind manages and optimizes interactions between different AI models, balancing factors such as cost, accuracy, and response speed. This tool ensures that the AI-driven solutions are efficient and effective in meeting customer needs.
- ExoInsights: This feature aggregates knowledge from various sources, providing valuable insights to support decision-making and strategic planning.
What are the challenges for enterprises in managing LLMs and how does Exomind help in this respect?
Enterprises face challenges with Large Language Models (LLMs), such as choosing the right model, balancing cost with performance, and scaling efficiently. Managing these models involves continuous monitoring, fine-tuning, and integrating with existing systems.
Exomind addresses these issues by providing a streamlined platform for LLM management. It simplifies model selection and deployment while balancing cost, accuracy, and speed. Exomind ensures real-time monitoring, seamless integration, and optimal performance.
How Exomind Simplifies LLM Management
○ AI Optimization: Exomind customizes LLMs with proprietary data for improved relevance and accuracy, continuously learning from feedback.
○ Data Security: It protects sensitive data with encryption and compliance features, including data anonymization and secure access controls.
○ Resource Efficiency: Exomind optimizes computational resources, reducing costs and allowing flexible scaling.
○ Real-Time Processing: The platform supports low-latency AI processing for prompt responses and high customer engagement.
○ Seamless Integration: Exomind integrates effortlessly with existing systems through APIs and connectors.
○ Continuous Improvement: It provides tools for monitoring performance, detecting biases, and refining models to ensure ongoing accuracy.
What has been the response for Ameyo XTRM Contact Center Solution in India?
The market response to our key product, Ameyo XTRM Contact Center Solution, has been overwhelmingly positive in India. As one of the most advanced and scalable contact center solutions available, Ameyo XTRM is specifically designed to meet the needs of large enterprises with extensive customer service operations. Ameyo XTRM is probably the only true Omni-Channel Contact Centre that integrates various channels to give a single view of the consumer. Our customers are liking the Scalability it brings (can go up to 20,000+ agents on a single deployment), the Flexibility of API led customizations and integrations (coupled with our in-house Professional Services team).
Capabilities that enhance agent productivity, in addition to the supervisor and admin controls, are so enhanced, and are a given. Customers are able to realize significantly higher value, and faster, with the Ameyo XTRM contact centre offering. Overall, the response to Ameyo XTRM Contact Center Solution in India has been very encouraging, with numerous large enterprises choosing it as their preferred contact center platform to enhance customer service, improve efficiency, and scale their operations effectively.
How does Exotel today differentiate itself in the highly competitive solution provider landscape?
Exotel differentiates itself by providing a comprehensive, unified communication platform that integrates CPaaS, CCaaS, and AI capabilities. Its focus on innovation, flexibility, security, and customer success, combined with a strong market presence and competitive pricing, makes it a preferred choice for businesses looking to transform their communication strategies and drive growth in a highly competitive environment.
What are the key pillars on which Exotel’s GTM strategy rests in India? What are some of the key initiatives under this strategy?
Exotel’s Go-to-Market (GTM) strategy is centered around our customers, ensuring that we address their needs with best-in-class products and dedicated teams. Our GTM approach is structured by industry, use cases, business segments (Enterprise, Mid-Market, and Scale-ups), and geographies. A key initiative in our strategy has been unifying organizational goals across product, growth, customer experience, and delivery teams, all focused on driving customer success. For specific large complex managed services requirements, Exotel is now also working closely through strategic partnerships with Cloud Hyperscalers, ISVs and Global SIs.
What is the overall channel structure that Exotel currently follows in India? How are these differentiated between distributors, ISVs and SIs?
Exotel is committed to delivering exceptional service to our customers through key partnerships with major cloud hyperscalers, ISVs, and Global SIs. We are focused on strengthening these alliances as we refine our channel sales strategy in the near term.
What are the dynamics of Exotel’s partnership with Microsoft?
Exotel has entered a Managed GTM partnership with Microsoft, making our product offerings co-sell ready on the Microsoft marketplace, specifically addressing customer experience (CX) and contact center (CC) challenges for Microsoft customers.
- Microsoft Teams Integration: We have integrated Exotel’s solutions with Microsoft Teams to enable seamless PSTN calling. This allows businesses to use Teams as their main communication platform while benefiting from Exotel’s advanced communication features.
- Enhanced Flexibility: The partnership facilitates integration with various CRM systems, offering businesses greater flexibility and improved management of customer interactions. This streamlines communication workflows, enhancing overall efficiency.
- Privacy and Efficiency: Our integration ensures secure communication without exposing personal contact details, a crucial feature for sectors like banking and financial services where privacy and confidentiality are critical.
Overall, the partnership with Microsoft enhances Exotel’s offerings, providing businesses with a robust and integrated communication solution that meets their diverse needs.
How do you predict the transforming landscape of customer service unfolding in the next few months?
In the coming months, the customer experience landscape will be shaped by technology-driven innovation, a strong emphasis on personalization, and a move towards more proactive and omnichannel strategies. Companies that invest in AI, automation, and unified communication platforms, while focusing on customer empowerment, data security, and experience enhancement, will be best positioned to succeed in this evolving environment. The ability to adapt quickly and embrace these trends will be crucial in maintaining a competitive edge and delivering exceptional customer service.
What are going to be Exotel’s key focus areas in the next 12-18 months?
Over the next 12-18 months, Exotel will focus on advancing its AI capabilities to continue transforming communication between humans and companies. The focus is on striking a balance between humans and digital, and how the best CSAT/NPS can be achieved by the customers we serve.
Converging the gap of communication technologies in CPaaS, CCaaS and Conversational AI into a truly unified interaction application, deepening its presence in key industries, and geographies. By prioritizing innovation, security, and customer experience, Exotel aims to solidify its position as a leading AI customer communication solutions provider globally.
Rajneesh De, APAC News Network
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