Bharti Airtel rides on Avaya to enhance 5-year customer capabilities

Bharti Airtel Limited and Avaya have signed a five-year partnership to enhance Airtel’s customer capabilities across its operations.

The partnership signed under the aegis of Avaya Communications Outsourcing Solutions would provide contact center technology and managed services designed to increase the performance, reduce the costs and accelerate the transformation of Airtel’s customer service experience.

Airtel in a press statement made available to ITRealms Online showed that Avaya partner, Mara Ison stands in the midele of the deal, reassuring that they would provide services and application cum infrastructure support to Airtel in Africa.

It was also gathered that the new agreement demonstrates the breadth and scope of the long-standing relationship between the two companies.

“It encompasses a broad suite of Avaya technology and expertise, enabling Avaya to implement, source, manage and enhance contact center technology operations throughout Africa. By using Avaya for this complete end-to-end solution, Airtel can move from a capital-intensive model to a utility-based model across its network with ‘a pay per usage’ agreement,” says Bill Crawley, the Managing Director, Mara-Ison.

Airtel’s contact centers will initiative a more agile customer service strategy through deployment of Avaya’s proactive outreach manager (POM) and proactive Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems, in addition to communicating with customers through voice, email, and Short Messaging Service (SMS) notifications.

With these solutions, Airtel officials said, it would enable customers with the latest in contact services, by not only allowing for a higher number of incoming calls but also actively reaching out to their customers with outgoing service and campaigns.

Speaking on the project, Jayant Khosla – CEO, Anglophone at Bharti Airtel, said that at Bharti Airtel, the customer is at the core of everything.

“We constantly innovate and partner with the best to offer our customers a world-class service experience at every touch point. Our partnership with Avaya is in line with the rapid evolution into the data world, and will provide superior customer service experience and extends from traditional voice based to video and social media interactions. Additionally, Avaya Communications Outsourcing Solutions will enhance our service capabilities, and help us deliver superior customer experiences across our operations," he said.

For Nidal Abou-Ltaif, Vice President of Emerging Regions, Avaya, Africa represents one of the world’s fastest-growing and most innovative telecoms markets, and Bharti Airtel has created a forward-thinking strategy to provide superior service to existing customers while anticipating future opportunities.

“This partnership ensures that Bharti Airtel and Avaya can continue to collaborate effectively together for the benefit of the company’s customers across multiple geographies. With a custom-built solution for each client, Avaya Communications Outsourcing Solutions can help innovative companies like Airtel to get the most out of their communications infrastructure investments for the benefit of current and future customers,” he said.

Further, Mr. Crawley, pointed out that they have invested heavily in both people and presence in order to establish a strong Pan African operation capable of supporting leading African and multinational companies as they deploy leading-edge technologies and global best practices for their operations. 

“This agreement with Bharti Airtel and Avaya is a significant affirmation of this strategy.  We will continue to invest in Africa where we believe we can add significant value to our customers, our partners and our own organization,” he said.

Remmy Nweke
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