Semafone and Avaya bring leading payment security capabilities to contact center customers
Reseller agreement builds customer loyalty and trust in digital commerce and strengthens PCI DSS compliance & privacy capabilities for contact centers
BOSTON, MA and GUILDFORD, UK – April 13, 2021 – Semafone®, the leading provider of data security and compliance solutions for call and contact centers, today announced a global reseller partnership with Avaya (NYSE:AVYA), the leader in cloud-based solutions designed to enhance and simplify communications and collaboration.
This agreement brings Semafone into the Avaya ecosystem of alliances, with the goal of helping contact center customers solve the complex security and compliance challenges faced as they embrace a work from anywhere model.
As multi-experience customer engagement gathers momentum, the need to support seamless, consistent user journeys across a wide range of digital touchpoints and modalities is driving a pivotal change in the contact center market. Additionally, with many industries moving to remote working models, the need for increased security is at an all-time high. A recent study found that 70% of cloud contact center users cite security and compliance as a reason to invest in cloud technology. The impact of the past year has truly driven the need for seamless, secure, PCI DSS compliant solutions as more customer payment transactions occur on the phone or over digital communication channels.
With less opportunity to shop in-person, people are exploring other ways of making purchases. Digital transformation is accelerating, and consumers want to be served in the channel of their choice – whether by phone, SMS, chat or email, they expect to be able to initiate and complete payments across any and all channels.
The integration of Semafone’s best-in-class, DevConnect certified, secure payment technology with Avaya OneCloud enterprise Session Border Controller (SBC), enables Cardprotect Voice+ to be deployed and used across all global Avaya OneCloud contact center solutions. With flexible deployment options, PCI DSS compliant telephone payment transactions can be delivered to Avaya customers in the cloud, via hybrid cloud or on-premises, helping contact centers to deliver a secure and frictionless customer experience.
Avaya and Semafone are expanding their partnership further with future plans to integrate Cardprotect Relay+, Semafone’s omnichannel payment solution with Avaya OneCloud CPaaS (Communications Platform as a Service), further cementing the growing need for privacy and PCI DSS compliance across the CX industry.
“Data privacy and compliance are today’s common challenges across every touch point of the customer journey, and Avaya puts security front and center in our Avaya OneCloud platform of solutions,” said Eric Rossman, Avaya VP, Technology Partners and Alliances. “We have worked on multiple, successful security programs with Semafone in various markets. This agreement cements an existing strong alliance and grants our business partners and customers access to the value that their solutions bring. This partnership will allow us to not only deliver the best customer experience but relieve contact centers of a growing compliance burden as the global regulatory landscape evolves.”
“With upwards of 40 shared customers and many mutual channel partners, formalizing this partnership was a natural next step,” said Iain Regan, Chief Revenue Officer, Semafone. “As we continue to expand globally, Avaya will be instrumental in bringing our data security and compliance solutions to new markets. Our ability to address complex compliance issues as many organizations are migrating to remote working models will enable Avaya and its partners to help contact centers create secure and positive customer experiences across all customer engagement channels no matter where agents are based.”