I’ve been in telecoms for over 26 years. My journey began with a small company focused on the travel industry, which eventually led me to more technical roles and product development. I spent some time at Telewest, NTL and Virgin Media Business where I designed and implemented MPLS networks, Inbound and Voice services in a Presales role. After that, I moved into the Voice sector with Gamma as a Presales Consultant for eight years. Since joining Redcentric two months ago, I’ve been working as Head of Communications – Presales.
I lead the Presales team for Communications, specifically focusing on Voice and Contact Centre products. My team and I work closely with clients to understand their technical and business challenges, designing solutions to address these issues. For example, if a customer is experiencing call quality problems on their contact centre solution, we might look at improving their connectivity, or exploring alternative solutions.
We’re in the process of talking to customers about migrating away from legacy solutions and helping them find the right route for their Voice roadmap following the PSTN and ISDN switch off. We’re transitioning these customers to IP-based solutions. This is critical because many customers still rely on these older systems, and they need to plan and prepare for the switch off.
We’re also enhancing existing IP solutions to meet more demanding requirements, providing value-added services like PCI compliance and advanced call analytics. We’re seeing lots of interest in Akixi Analytics for Microsoft Teams Calling which provides great insight into call flows and customer service using call metrics visible from the Teams interface.
Additionally, we’re helping public sector clients migrate from on-premises PBX and ISDN circuits to more cost-effective solutions like Microsoft Teams.
We start by understanding where the customer is in their Voice journey, what their immediate challenges are and what their longer-term aims are. For instance, they may be using a cloud PBX or struggling with an outdated contact centre solution. We can offer a comprehensive product suite to address immediate issues and help plan for future improvements. Currently, there’s a lot of interest in Microsoft Teams Calling. We enable seamless integration of telephony into the Teams platform, allowing businesses to consolidate their communication tools. We can also offer hybrid solutions that integrate existing telephony with Teams through SIP trunking, making the migration smoother and providing additional features like analytics and call recording.
My team is focused on addressing the evolving needs of our clients, providing practical advice and solutions in the field of voice and contact centre communications. A few recent examples include the following:
A leading law firm wanted to enhance its existing Teams calling service with a contact centre service, which includes call recording, an attendant console, queuing, auto attendant, and call analytics.
We provided a Microsoft Teams based solution including Reception function, call recording and contact centre functionality. We will provide our Teams Calling Direct Routing solution to over 400 users and provide a host of innovative communication features through our UCX suite such as a feature rich attendant console and conversational AI.
The solution will be delivered in two phases; to deploy to approximately 70 users in the first phase and the second phase for a further 300 users to be delivered by the end of September.
The key benefits of the solution are:
Microsoft Teams based calling solution, allowing users to make and receive calls directly from the Teams app on any device, providing a more connected experience.
It provides a fully hosted and managed solution with suitable business continuity providing peace of mind should the worst happen.
Introduction of an innovative application suite including fully featured attendant console, call recording, call analytics and call routing all in one place, providing a single view of interactions helping to drive business outcomes more efficiently.
We helped another customer in the legal sector by improving its Teams service, adding PCI payments, call recording, and analytics.
A City Council, for which we secured a public sector tender, adopted Teams voice and a Contact Centre solution.
We aim to provide robust and integrated communication solutions tailored to each client’s needs. Whether through UCaaS (Unified Communications as a Service) or CCaaS (Contact Centre as a Service), we offer comprehensive solutions. Tools like Akixi analytics, call recording, PCI compliance, and omnichannel contact centre solutions help ensure our clients have the necessary functionality to manage their communications effectively and achieve their goals.
