During August's Google Next event, Google released its second CCaaS platform – CCAIP: Intelligent Virtual Agent-Only.
The announcement came less than a year after its first - The Google Contact Center AI Platform – became generally available.
That solution presents a fully-fledged contact center ecosystem with an embedded voice platform, mobile-first architecture, and much more.
Yet, in the months since its release, Google has recognized a desire from many of its enterprise customers for a slow, cautious transformation process.
To better enable this, it has put forward a hybrid CCaaS solution: The CCAIP: Intelligent Virtual Agent-Only offering.
The new platform enables businesses to keep their current contact center infrastructure (CCI) but leverage elements of its Contact Center AI Platform à la carte.
Such elements include the contact center tools for which Google is well-known – i.e., its DialogFlow conversational AI offering, CCAI Insights conversational intelligence tool, and agent-assist solutions.
Moreover, contact centers can leverage the tech giant’s new generative AI services – including its auto-summarization, knowledge assist, and intent analysis tools.
The following slide from Google Next better showcases the CCAIP: Intelligent Virtual Agent-Only concept.
In leveraging the solution, Google also hopes to minimize disruptions for contact centers as they take their first steps into a cloud environment.
Finally, as Shantanu Misra, Group Product Manager at Google Cloud, concluded when first unveiling the platform:
We can work with whatever infrastructure you have and give you access to GenAI services as soon as possible.
In releasing such a solution, some may draw parallels with Avaya’s "innovation without disruption" mantra – which promises contact centers "evolution, not revolution" when moving to the cloud.
What’s Next for Google In the Contact Center and Beyond?
Many of the capabilities that Google put forward during Google Next demonstrated the vendor’s deep innovation in the contact center and its adjacent areas.
Indeed, the vendor also released cutting-edge innovations across its Dialogflow, Vertex AI, and Workspace solutions.
But, these didn't come together as part of one coherent strategy. Instead, Google unveiled them in different presentations across various locations without much of a link between them.