VeCommerce inks $2.5 million telco deal

Voice and data services provider VeCommerce has signed a $2.5 million deal with Alcatel to supply an IP-based voice platform to AAPT call centres.

Paul Magee, MD at VeCommerce, said the contract was phase one of a deployment under discussion with Alcatel, which was rolling out a three-phase telecommunications package to AAPT in Australia, a Telecom New Zealand subsidiary.

VeCommerce would deploy a voice application platform from Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, a wholly-owned Alcatel subsidiary, internally in two Australian call centres, with 380 seats spread between Robina in Queensland and Bendigo in Victoria, he said.

'This will automate transactions completely and reduce the requirements for staff to cope with growth,' Magee said. 'Customers will be able to ring up and say what they want [and] get through to the right person with minimal effort.'

The rollout would finish mid-year, he added, and would include VeCommerce's own VePay payment software and some customer identification elements from its VeSecure software.

Magee said VeCommerce had done similar call routing and voice application platform integration work for companies such as SunCorp but hoped this Alcatel deal would open doors for the company, particularly across the Tasman.

'We are hoping to get Telecom NZ quickly after this as well [as] this has a very good pay-back and business case in cost reduction,' he said. 'But the sales process is always [unpredictable].'

He said the Alcatel-AAPT deal was the first major VeCommerce rollout of such services to a telecommunications company.

'We will [be able to] use Alcatel's global network of telecommunications customers to market our services to other telcos,' Magee said.

Stages two and three of the AAPT deal with Alcatel -- which would include an external rollout of the technology -- were under discussion and it was probable that VeCommerce would continue its involvement.

However, further details, including time-frame, were yet to be decided, Magee said.

Rhoda Holmes, GM of customer and network services at AAPT, said the rollout was a 'milestone' in AAPT's customer service capability. 'We will be able to ... resolve more customer questions when they first call us,' she said.