We’ve had some partners over the last many months asking for more customization with our UCaaS platforms than already exists. First, it got me thinking about customization in general for UCaaS systems. There is a lot of customization already built in – that is, there are a lot of options for administrators to choose from. What’s allowed / not allowed per user, dial plans to set up, etc. And as mobile and desktop apps become more and more the norm, there are even more options and settings with that to set up. This is generally not what the requests for customization are about.
What they are really talking about is wanting more services to be connected to the UCaaS platform. I’ll call them mini-services, because I don’t want anyone being confused about microservices and that word’s association with CPaaS. It’s really more about notifications when something happens in the system, or simple notifications tied to the contact center (functions of which are becoming more and more tied to UCaaS), or sending text messages, or some other what I’ll call basic/simple communication functions tied to the partner or customer specific vertical app.
These requests are becoming more commonplace. Someone could use a CPaaS system to do this, but that would mean that the partner or customer would need developers. And while that works for some, it doesn’t work for the vast majority. No matter how “easy” CPaaS might look, it’s still coding, and it still requires people, support and care. So, customers are starting to ask us about this.
We’re fine with it. In fact, we have been creating these mini-services already, using our CPaaS platform because we had already understood that using a CPaaS platform wasn’t for everyone – many of our customers wanted more final / packaged applications to run with our UCaaS platforms, and so that’s what we are doing.
But even beyond this, many customers want to integrate with other platforms (CRM, vertical specific solutions, etc.) and have data flow back and forth between them. And this is where developer APIs come in – because we can’t do everything. We want to enable as much 3rd party integration as possible. And that integration is also enabled by our CPaaS platform. At Sangoma, our DNA is customization and for 40 years we’ve been helping our partner to build the present and the future of communications.