OTTAWA, ON, Feb. 2, 2012 – Pronexus, the developer of the leading Interactive Voice Response (IVR) toolkit Pronexus VBVoice™, announced today that they are compliant with telephony solutions from Avaya,  a global leader in business communications. With the Avaya certification, Pronexus customers can be sure their VBVoice applications that use HMP drivers and SIP protocol are going to work inside the Avaya environment.

Pronexus flagship product, VBVoice IVR software enables developing feature-rich inbound and outbound IVR solutions. Utilities OnCall, a VBVoice IVR application built by Vocantas, was successfully compliance tested with Avaya Aura® Communication Manager 6.0.1 and Avaya Aura® Session Manager 6.1 by Avaya’s DevConnect Technical Team and officially accepted as compliant.

The Avaya DevConnect program promotes the development, compliance-testing and co-marketing of innovative third-party products that are compatible with standards-based Avaya solutions.  Member organizations have expertise in a broad range of technologies – including IP telephony, contact centers and mobility applications – helping companies extend the value of multivendor networks and transform voice into an intelligent business application that delivers true value to the bottom line.

“We are very pleased to have our award-winning IVR software, VBVoice, compliance tested by Avaya and to announce that VBVoice now integrates seamlessly with all Avaya products,” said Valentin Doroga, Chief Architect of Pronexus. “As more developers turn to VBVoice to build their IVR applications, it has become more important than ever to integrate with large players like Avaya to ensure our users have access to the most cutting edge technologies.”

About Avaya

Avaya is a global provider of business collaboration and communications solutions, providing unified communications, contact centers, data solutions and related services to companies of all sizes around the world. For more information please visit www.avaya.com. For more information on the Avaya DevConnect program, visit www.avaya.com/devconnect.

About Pronexus

Since 1994, Pronexus has delivered proven voice applications and IVR development tools that developers rely on to help them integrate voice with business systems, including unified communications, customer relationship management and field service automation systems. http://www.pronexus.com.

When planning and ultimately deploying an IVR solution you will need to decide how the IVR will connect to the telephony infrastructure.  This means that you must decide  what  protocol to use and what hardware is needed for the server to support that protocol.  Often, customer sites may have stipulations on how your IVR can connect to the existing telephony infrastructure, since the IVR will be on their site after all.  Then there are the times when you get to decide.

So, where to begin?  Considerations are seemingly endless; protocol support, hardware requirements for the interface, server requirements, channel density and performance, life expectancy of the interface, cost, ease of integration, application performance on a given protocol.… just to name a few.

An IVR built with VBVoice can work with T1/E1 ISDN or CAS, analog, and VoIP through integration with Dialogic media.  In the case of T1/E1 and analog, a PCI or PCI-express board is installed on the server, and specific drivers are installed.  Some configuration on the board and on VBVoice is required, but the integration is relatively straightforward.  In the case of using media boards from the Dialogic JCT and DM3 family, all resources are hardware-based.  This means the DSP (to perform all voice processing like detecting DTMF, conferencing, fax, echo cancelling) is on the board and there are limited ways to configure resources.  Adding more resources might require adding new cards to the server.. Depending on what the production system will do, you must evaluate the different boards that are available to get the one you need in order to get the required density and allow for eventual expansion in the future .  When you consider that these boards are full length PCI format (12.5 inches long and 3.5 inches tall) it can become a problem to find a server chassis to accommodate the boards. In a scenario where the IVR must reside at the customer site, the footprint of the server can become a potential issue when having to ‘fit in’ to the existing server-room layout.

We are seeing an increase in the number of VoIP IVR deployments.  Given the versatility, lower cost, and excellent performance characteristics of VoIP, as such I will focus more on this protocol integration.

Dialogic Host Media Processing (named now DialogicPowerMedia HMP) performs media processing without requiring the use of specialized hardware, using the server’s CPU instead.

HMP, as it is more commonly referred to, is able to do call control and media processing for TDM cards like  Dialogic’s lineup of DNI boards for E1/T1 or could be used for a full VoIP solution. For VoIP it handles both the SIP/H.323  call stack and media processing.  Also, it is possible to run a T1/E1 solution with VoIP capabilities by using a DNI board; which offers capabilities for  creating media gateways with complex scenarios, interfacing TDM and VoIP with powerful media processing.

HMP works like this: all call processing is handled by the local CPU.  The physical VoIP connection is the primary NIC card of the server. What determines the number of VoIP channels available is in the HMP licensing.  For each VoIP channel (SIP or H323) there must be 1 RTP, 1 IP Call Control, and 1 Voice resource, which is achieved by purchasing the corresponding HMP license.  If you must handle fax capabilities, then you will need to add to this a fax license.  If you need Conference, then you will need to add a Conference license for each Conference member that there will be. The licenses determine the resources or capabilities of the VoIP call stack.

Since there is no PCI or PCI-express board required in a VoIP scenario, the server chassis doesn’t need to be large in order to physically fit the board.  A 1U chassis could be used to run the IVR, for example.  With the latest version of VBVoice and Dialogic HMP, it is now possible to deploy the IVR solution on a Virtual Machine, greatly increasing the versatility of the solution.  System performance is very stable.  Modern server specs allow the IVR to handle 200 concurrent channels where an efficient application is using pre-recorded prompts, DTMF handling and database queries.  This number decreases with the addition of Text To Speech and Speech Recognition of course.

One of the great aspects of the HMP VoIP solution is that you only purchase the resources you need and when you need, allowing an easy extension of capabilities of your application without the need for hardware changes. This offers huge cost savings when compared to a PCI or PCI-express media board solution. With the boards, as mentioned, the resources are hardware-based.  So, you may be purchasing a board which has capabilities that your IVR won’t use, such as a DMV board with fax capabilities.  If your IVR will not perform fax, then why have fax resources available?  You have paid for this ability, but won’t use it, so this is money lost.

With HMP you purchase the licenses which equate to resources.  So, you have 4 RTP, 4 IP Call Control and 4 Voice licenses for HMP.  This means your IVR can handle 4 VoIP channels.  As production rolls along, you find it necessary to increase the number of channels which the IVR can handle.  It is just a matter of purchasing additional licenses to increase capacity.  If you need 4 additional channels, you would purchase another 4 RTP, 4 IP Call Control, and 4 Voice.  The new license is combined with the existing one to create a block of 8 RTP, 8 IP Call Control, 8 Conference.  These resources are pooled, and are available to any of the application’s channels.

If your existing infrastructure will allow for a VoIP connection, or you have the option to connect the IVR to a VoIP provider directly (maybe your ISP provides a VoIP connection), then implementing an HMP VoIP solution is a great option.

The Global Industry Analysts (GIA) recently released a report that said the global market for interactive voice response (IVR) systems is projected to reach $2.78 billion by 2017. This is great news for those of us whose entire business is focused on IVR.

As the IVR marketplace grows, we have also seen the landscape change. There is a shift from development of solutions “In House”, to outsourcing application development to IT Consultants and software developers who create and resell IVR applications to multiple end-users.  This presents a significant revenue generating opportunity for software development companies who are building IVR applications to repurpose turnkey solutions.   Many companies who have not previously considered this opportunity are beginning to realize it is a reality!

With the recent launch of VBVoice 7.1, we project more companies will benefit even further by using VBVoice to grow their customer communication business. This latest release of our already powerful SDK is our most enhanced version of VBVoice to date. Features of particular importance to value added resellers such as Virtual Machine hosting, and our 64-bit compatibility are at the leading edge of IVR technology. Using VBVoice 7.1 on a 64-bit machine enables the production of larger processing projects with improved performance.  The flexibility of hosting an effective IVR on Virtual Machine allows customers to take advantage of hosting services, the power of their IT infrastructure using a smaller footprint, added redundancy, and the best possible cost savings.  Be sure to check out all of the latest features available in VBVoice 7.1 .

You can download VBVoice 7.1 here. Please let us know what you think. We invite your feedback and insight.   We pride ourselves as a nimble company, effectively rolling suggestions and feature requirements into future releases.

New IVR Responds to Industry Need for 64 Bit Support and adds New Early Media Feature and Easy Installer

OTTAWA, ON, Oct. 13, 2011 – Pronexus, the developer of the leading Interactive Voice Response (IVR) toolkit Pronexus VBVoice™, announced today the launch of VBVoice 7.1, the newest release of their no charge, award-winning IVR software.

“We are fully committed to supporting the latest technology in the IVR and telephony industry,” said Gary Hannah, President and CEO of Pronexus. “We’re excited for new and current VBVoice developers to try all that VBVoice 7.1 has to offer. We truly appreciate our long term partners who provided us guidance in adding an express installer, 64-bit support and a new major capability, Early Media. This release is our most advanced yet.  It’s that great two-way feedback with our valued customers that has made Pronexus a leader in the IVR market for 17 plus years!”

VBVoice now allows you to harness the power of 64-bit systems for your Interactive Voices Response applications and take advantage of the latest Windows operating platform. VBVoice 7.1 creates a stable environment for developers who want to run  complex  and demanding VBVoice applications. 64-bit operating systems enable production of larger processing projects with improved performance.

“We develop IVR applications for many different companies, so being able to have multiple VBVoice applications on one computer simultaneously is essential. With VBVoice’s new 64-bit system support I am able to run numerous IVR applications on one machine with zero slowdown,” said Kurosh Sahraie of Central Touch.

VBVoice 7.1 includes a new express installer that allows VBVoice users to set up the software faster and easier.  It has never been this simple to setup a new VBVoice development or production system.  Our new silent installer option is great for those required to deploy on IVR servers hosted at customer sites.  The ability to hide VBVoice Start Menu options means your IVR application stands out as the final product.

“The express installer adds a new level of simplicity to getting your voice applications up and running. It took only a couple of minutes to install and setup the software, then I was able to start developing our voice messaging application,” said John Pope, President of CenturiSoft.”

Also new in the release is an enhanced VBVoice feature called SIP Early Media, which allows the caller to hear the IVR before the voice call is actually connected. Early Media allows you to provide interaction between your IVR and an inbound caller before actually connecting the call.  Now, the caller will not be charged until the call is accepted and connected.   This feature proves useful in scenarios where callers are billed for connected calls to your IVR, for example, you require a message be delivered to the caller prior to the connection for information, legal and billing purposes.

“Early Media is a great new VBVoice feature that is perfect for my IVR applications that require per-call billing. With Early Media, I can tell a caller that reaches my IVR that they will be charged before the charges begin.  This gives my clients ample time to have payment out, and eliminates the potential for misunderstandings,” said Stefano Favaro, Application Developer at Edistar, a long-standing Pronexus customer.

VBVoice integrates with Microsoft® Visual Studio leveraging familiar programming skills and industry-standard programming languages. It combines an easy-to-use visual call flow environment with fully programmable controls and options like speech recognition and text-to-speech.

VBVoice comes with everything a developer needs to kick start their IVR project, including the award-winning VBVoice IVR toolkit, 2 free VBVoice runtimes for testing, 10 days of free technical support from Pronexus’ IVR experts and a free online training demo. VBVoice is available to download at no charge at www.pronexus.com.

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About Pronexus:

Since 1994, Pronexus has delivered proven voice applications and IVR development tools that developers rely on to help them integrate voice with business systems, including unified communications, customer relationship management and field service automation systems. http://www.pronexus.com.

Videos:

• Pronexus Vice President of Sales announcing the release of VBVoice 7.1
• Chief Architect, Valentin Doroga, talking about the latest release of IVR toolkit, VBVoice 7.1
• Pronexus Support Manager, Sean White, discussing the latest release of the award winning IVR toolkit VBVoice

Pronexus sat down with Mida Solutions to talk about their large-scale retail IVR application built with VBVoice.

Pronexus: How would you describe your IVR solution?

Pronexus: What business problems does your IVR application solve?

Pronexus: What technologies does your solution use?

Pronexus: How did you get started developing with VBVoice?

Pronexus: How was your experience using VBVoice to develop your application?

Next Generation IVR Development Solution Accelerates Functional Testing of Systems

Ottawa, Ontario.  August 15, 2011.  Pronexus, the developer of the leading Interactive Voice Response (IVR) toolkit Pronexus VBVoice™, announced a partnership with RealityCorp that will enable VBVoice developers, testers, and quality assurance analysts to easily automate the functional testing of their IVR systems using ClinTest^TM Voice.

ClinTest^TM Voice, RealityCorp’s automated testing platform has been utilized in a variety of IVR applications.  The state-of-the-art, user friendly ClinTest^TM Voice platform combines test script creation, execution, and output reporting into one application.  Once IVR test scripts have been created, users ‘press play’ to run the automation and generate output documentation and testing objective evidence. ClinTest^TM Voice utilizes sophisticated voice to text capabilities determining prompt accuracy up to 100%, while having configurable thresholds for both conditional pass and failure cases.

“This partnership will present clients of Pronexus an opportunity to benefit from a union that provides the full suite of IVR development and testing software; allowing one to go-live with their IVR faster,” remarked Carlton Schowe, President and CEO of RealityCorp.  “Our automatically generated QA/Output documentation allows for one to listen to the exact prompt requiring review, which is recorded in real-time.  The embedded .mp3 file completely eliminates the physical need to use the phone during the development, testing or QA review process.  Designed with the eClinical industry in mind, ClinTest^TM Voice has been tested following a comprehensive validation process to ensure quality and reliability for the high risk, regulatory environment.”

“Using ClinTest, Pronexus customers can now get their solution up and running faster with objective evidence that the VBVoice solution will work optimally from the first day it is deployed,” said Gary T. Hannah, President and CEO of Pronexus. “VBVoice developers can now quickly and easily perform load testing and functionality testing on their IVR; thereby providing quality assurance prior to deployment.”

VBVoice is a rapid application development (RAD) toolkit which enables the creation of powerful, speech-enabled solutions including voice self-service, unified communications and IVR systems. VBVoice allows developers to leverage their programming skills in industry-standard languages such as VB.NET and C#, thus ensuring compatibility with Microsoft’s development and deployment systems.

About Pronexus:
Since 1993, Pronexus has delivered proven voice applications and IVR development tools that developers rely on to help them integrate voice with business systems, including unified communications, customer relationship management and field service automation systems. We are aligned with market-leading technology partners such as Microsoft® and have Silver Certified Partner status in the Microsoft Partner Program. Let us show you how we can help you reduce the time, cost and complexity of deploying speech and telephony technology by visiting our web site: http://www.pronexus.com.

About RealityCorp:
RealityCorp focuses on eClinical validation services using our proprietary automation platform, ClinTest^TM.  By adopting ClinTest^TM as a business solution, our clients expedite the task of software validation, thereby shortening the software development life cycle and achieving go-live faster.  ClinTest^TM has been utilized for a wide variety of eClinical software including EDC, IWR, IVR, and CTM systems; in addition to applications from the insurance, government, and financial industries.  In conjunction with RealityCorp’s experience in services, ClinTest^TM provides a targeted, next-generation solution for all testing, validation, reporting, and quality assurance.  For more information, please visit us at http://www.realitycorp.com.

Pronexus Contact:

Nicole Reid

Marketing Communications

613-271-8989, ext. 527

nicole.reid@pronexus.com

RealityCorp Contact:

Marketing and Social Media Department

302-995-2770, ext. 111

martketing@realitycorp.com

Pronexus recently spoke with the developer of WatchOverU™ about their personal safety service built with VBVoice and the technology behind it.

Pronexus: How would you describe your IVR solution?

WatchOverU: We created an IVR application as the operational component in a personal safety service for business and consumer use. This service provides a backup for people of all ages involved in many different work, sport or leisure activities when they are on their own or, for whatever reason, they are subject to greater risk. The service helps by automatically notifying friends, family or colleagues to raise the alarm if things do not go to plan. The service also includes a web application component, particularly useful for business users, to manage groups of users (employees), monitor activities and provide a full audit trail. You can find more information, and a comprehensive list of activities where this service is useful, at www.watchoveru.com

Pronexus: What business problems does your IVR application solve?

WatchOverU: The WatchOverU™ service helps a company provide ‘duty of care’, particularly in a ‘lone working’ situation. The monitoring and notification processes are fully automatic and, because the person in trouble may be out of cell phone range or incapacitated, it does not rely on their intervention in any way. Also, there are no special devices required other than a telephone for the initial setup.

In many cases involving accidents of people taking part in activities in remote areas, or working on their own, a major problem is that when nobody is aware of what they are doing, there can be a long delay before they are missed and the alarm is raised. The WatchOverU™ service solves this problem by automatically raising the alarm as soon as the plan goes adrift. In some situations you may not be able to, or want to,  tell anyone what your plans are so the WatchOverU™ service can be used to only notify people when absolutely necessary.

Pronexus: What technologies does your solution use? (i.e. speech recognition, text-to-speech, etc.)

WatchOverU: The service and all its components run as a multi-tenanted SaaS platform. The IVR application (VB.NET) uses keypad entry and speech recognition (NuanceASR) for data input and in circumstances where the ASR is having problems recognising the input, the ASR automatically falls back to keypad entry. Dialogic HMP is used with VOIP SIP. The IVR application interfaces with an SQL Server database making use of the VBVoice WorkerThread control for database functions. The service can be operated and administered using only the IVR application but a web application, written in Java, is provided to manage and administer the service and provide the advanced features required for business use.

Pronexus: How did you get started developing with VBVoice?

WatchOverU: About 10 years ago we needed to provide an IVR interface for workforce management application so, rather than re-invent the wheel, we used the VBVoice platform. Since then we have used VBVoice for a number of different applications and seen it develop and improve along the way. This made it the obvious choice for the WatchOverU™ IVR component and our introduction to speech recognition functionality.

Pronexus: How was your experience using VBVoice to develop your application?

WatchOverU: Why re-invent the wheel? VBVoice is easy to install and use. It integrates well with the Visual Studio environment and provides a comprehensive set of controls to service your application needs and provide the IVR functionality you require. The Pronexus support team was a great help with VBVoice’s related components (Nuance ASR, Dialogic HMP, etc.) The end result is an application that is reliable and easily scalable so what more could anyone ask for?

For more information go to – www.watchoveru.com

Download VBVoice today and start building your own IVR application.

Emergency notification interactive voice response solutions (IVRS) are becoming more commonplace as communities realize the difference it can make when it comes to keeping their residents safe.

An emergency notification IVR can be utilized during urgent situations, such as a natural disaster, to deliver phone alert messages to the end users. With some emergency notification systems, the end user has the option of acknowledging the call and providing a status update. Simultaneously, dispatch operators can be notified of the event and alerted to the location.

Communities can utilize this type of IVR application to alert the general public about disasters or events occurring in their neighbourhood, as well as relay any information on evacuation or escape measures. Likewise, if the resident requires special assistance, the call can be routed by the IVR to an emergency line.

An emergency notification IVR can also be used by organizations and schools. For example an emergency notification system could be deployed in a school board to notify parents if a school has been placed in a lock down due to an emergency or for an organization with many field staff such as an airline, utility or factory – that needs to notify many people quickly of an emergency.

Some benefits of an emergency notification IVR include:

• Speed the communication process significantly
• Speed the response
• Focus operators on the next task
• Reduce accidental errors at critical times
• Ensure that everyone gets a consistent, timely message

Search our Global Solutions Locator to see some of our customers who have already used VBVoice to develop emergency notification IVR applications.

Pronexus, a company specializing in telephony, speech and database integration technologies, has announced that IKON Software’s IVR application is best suited students. Company has created this IVR solution for the Training and Apprentice Fund that allows students to call in, confirm, cancel and reschedule classes by phone.

This latest application even allows users to hear the details of their upcoming classes including instructor, time and date. Previously, students had to call in and confirm classes by talking to office staff, but with the increasing number of classes at the center, the office staff became overwhelmed with calls from students confirming, cancelling and rescheduling classes.

The latest introduction of the IVR solution offers 24/7 automated class confirmation by the students while automating the updating of student data directly into their class scheduling software. This alleviates the heavy call volume on the office staff and increases productivity in other key areas, according to Ikon software officials.

The IVR application uses text-to-speech, a software component that integrates with the IVR solution. TTS is a technology that allows users to create a real-time link between text-based content in their database and a customer awaiting an immediate reply and can read any text out loud without knowing the vocabulary, the names, the numbers or codes contained in the text.

This technology is mature; it has been validated by market deployments and is already largely used in telephony services provided by carriers and enterprises alike, says the company officials.

TTS IVR applications have grown past the “robotic” sounding voice from the 90’s. It’s now so close to the human voice that it’s difficult to tell the difference between them.

Full article: http://education.tmcnet.com/topics/education/articles/193667-ikon-software-intros-ivr-application-schools-students.htm

How would you describe your IVR solution?

We created an IVR application for the Training and Apprentice Fund that allows students to call in, confirm, cancel and reschedule classes by phone. The application also allowed for users to hear the details of their upcoming classes including instructor, time and date.

What business problems does your IVR application solve?

Before the application was deployed, students had to call in and confirm classes by talking to office staff. As the number of classes at the center increased, the office staff became overwhelmed with calls from students confirming, cancelling and rescheduling classes. The IVR solution allows 24/7 automated class confirmation by the students while automating the updating of student data directly into their class scheduling software. This alleviates the heavy call volume on the office staff and increases productivity in other key areas.

What technologies does your solution use? (ie speech recognition, text-to-speech, etc.)

The IVR application uses text-to-speech.

How did you get started developing with VBVoice?

We sought a solution to this customer’s requirement.

How was your experience using VBVoice to develop your application?

VBVoice is a great tool. The visual front-end design environment and .NET back end make it ideal for custom application development. If you know .NET, you will have no problems working in VBVoice. It is easily scalable and reliable. It beats anything I’ve found on the market. Their support is top notch as well.