Luiz Domingos, the Chief Expertise Officer and Head of Massive Enterprise R&D at Mitel, has constructed a distinguished profession spanning over 20 years. Identified for his modern method and deep technical experience, Luiz has persistently delivered high-quality options in enterprise communication, contact middle programs, community administration, and cloud companies.
In his present function at Mitel, Luiz units the strategic route for know-how, emphasizing innovation and reliability. He leads the introduction of cutting-edge applied sciences and ensures the corporate’s portfolio stays on the forefront of the trade. Earlier than becoming a member of Mitel, Luiz served as Chief Product and Expertise Officer at Unify, the place he efficiently managed your complete product portfolio and spearheaded the event of disruptive cloud choices.
Mitel is a worldwide chief in enterprise communications, offering a complete vary of options that empower organizations to attach, collaborate, and serve their prospects extra successfully. Providing every thing from on-premises programs to cloud-based communication platforms, Mitel delivers dependable, scalable, and modern merchandise that deal with the varied wants of companies of all sizes. With a give attention to seamless integration and a dedication to high-quality person experiences, Mitel helps firms keep linked and aggressive in right this moment’s quickly evolving office environments.
Many firms nonetheless depend on legacy communication instruments. Out of your perspective, what are the most important obstacles that outdated programs current to companies right this moment?
Many firms depend on outdated Non-public Department Change (PBX) programs, contact facilities, and fragmented collaboration instruments. Utilizing legacy instruments resembling these can result in an absence of integration and interoperability, as they function with closed architectures and lack correct SW interfaces. This makes integrating with fashionable AI-driven options, CRM platforms, and cloud-based purposes a lot tougher.
When organizations use fragmented, legacy instruments, person expertise (UX) and productiveness can endure as software implementations will not be tailored to fashionable, versatile work modes – distant, workplace, or cellular – and don’t present omnichannel capabilities. Moreover, when too many outdated programs are used, safety dangers change into heightened, resulting in elevated vulnerabilities and compliance gaps as a result of evolving information safety rules like GDPR. Lastly, these legacy instruments additionally trigger increased product upkeep and repair or operational prices, growing the entire price of possession.
How do these communication bottlenecks influence a corporation’s means to implement AI-driven options successfully?
AI purposes depend on real-time information availability, seamless integration throughout a number of media channels, and automation mechanisms. Nonetheless, legacy programs are inclined to retailer information in inside proprietary codecs that AI cannot entry or faucet into, which impairs AI’s true potential and, in some circumstances, results in fragmentation. To operate accurately, AI requires each structured and unstructured information. Since legacy programs’ information buildings will not be conducive to that method, these programs restrict AI’s means to investigate conversations, extract enterprise worth, and personalize communication exercise.
Moreover, many AI-driven purposes, resembling sentiment evaluation and speech-to-text, depend on real-time analytics. Outdated infrastructure typically lacks the processing energy and real-time connectivity wanted for such purposes, resulting in latency and inefficiencies inside a enterprise. True AI-driven automation – digital assistants, workflow automation, and so on. – requires deep integration with communication platforms. Usually used legacy programs with outdated or lacking API help create obstacles and bottlenecks to integration and additional hinder automation capabilities.
Addressing these communication bottlenecks may help organizations unlock the complete potential of AI-driven options, bettering effectivity, decision-making, and UX.
How does Mitel method communication system modernization for big enterprises transitioning from legacy programs?
Mitel takes a strategic, hybrid method to modernizing unified communications (UC) instruments, serving to enterprises transition from their legacy programs. Moderately than implementing a full overhaul, Mitel advocates for and affords hybrid options composed of on-premise purposes and personal and public cloud options with full interoperability. This hybrid mannequin integrates telephony infrastructure, SBC/gateway tools on the community’s edge, UC purposes, and cloud-based collaboration apps, permitting enterprises to modernize at their very own tempo.
As an answer orchestrator, Mitel focuses on creating the mandatory integrations and companies throughout all customer-deployed purposes. Key rules guiding this method embrace:
- Hybrid Cloud Deployments – Moderately than a whole rip-and-replace method, Mitel maintains and updates present on-premise and personal cloud PBX/UC/Contact Facilities whereas integrating fashionable collaboration instruments within the public cloud, making certain enterprises can evolve with out main disruptions.
- APIs and SDKs – Mitel continually updates and develops APIs and SDKs to bridge the hole between legacy programs and fashionable purposes in collaboration, CRM, and ERP environments. This flexibility permits companies to steadily undertake new companies with out inflicting main disruptions to their day by day operations.
- AI Integration with Legacy Programs – Mitel enhances present communication platforms with AI-driven capabilities resembling visible voice mails, digital assistants/brokers, and real-time transcription. These AI features work with cloud LLMs and likewise leverage small language fashions (SLMs) that may be operated with out main infrastructure funding or upgrades.
- Safety & Compliance-Pushed Upgrades – Mitel prioritizes safety and regulatory compliance, implementing safety requirements resembling end-to-end payload and signaling encryption and information encryption at relaxation. It certifies all merchandise to adjust to the newest rules in sure industries and regional legal guidelines and rules.
AI is reworking enterprise communication. What do you see as the subsequent main developments in AI-driven unified communication programs?
AI is getting used to rework UC programs by enhancing effectivity, automating duties, and bettering enterprise communications. It is usually getting used to strengthen safety. Issues resembling person authentication with voiceprint, steady vulnerability assessments, and system safety auditing contribute to stronger safety measures for enterprises.
On the identical time, Agentic AI and digital assistants are increasing. Organizations are enhancing these AI-powered assistants with multi-modal skills that help varied communication features, together with dealing with complicated queries, automating responses, aiding with scheduling, and knowledge retrieval.
AI can be driving improvements in voice-to-text capabilities, real-time multilingual translations, and sentiment evaluation. These enhancements profit Contact Facilities by bettering worker productiveness and total person satisfaction.
Moreover, the usage of GenAI for content material administration is rising as LLMs are being built-in to generate analytics experiences, summaries, authorized and compliant information, and so on. We’ll proceed to see extra AI adoption to drive the UC area as enterprises use AI-driven language fashions to arrange, retrieve, and share enterprise information to enhance collaboration and data-sharing optimization throughout organizations.
How is Mitel getting ready for the rise of AI-powered digital assistants, automation, and predictive analytics in office communication?
Mitel started its AI journey a number of years earlier than the arrival of LLMs, and we proceed to combine AI into our product and know-how partnerships. When relevant, we incorporate AI capabilities into our portfolio to boost buyer options, with a robust give attention to agentic AI, together with Digital Assistants and Digital Contact Heart Brokers. Moreover, Mitel affords AI capabilities resembling pure language processing (NLP), name and assembly analytics, system analytics and predictive reporting, and low code/no-code workflow automation, which all streamline UC and Contact Heart purposes.
How is Mitel leveraging AI and huge language fashions (LLMs) to boost communication and collaboration for enterprises?
Mitel leverages AI and LLMs to enhance the general communications and collaboration expertise inside an enterprise. As talked about earlier, Mitel integrates AI and LLM capabilities into its merchandise, leveraging superior speech and textual content evaluation (particularly NLP and speech-to-text), clever digital assistants with context reminiscence, and activity automation. Mitel can be providing an answer for self-help and buyer help with AI, incorporating the shopper information base by way of an AI mannequin coaching course of. These applied sciences improve real-time communication, optimize buyer interactions, guarantee system safety, and supply cost-effective, 24/7 monitoring and help.
What are the most important challenges in integrating LLMs into enterprise communication programs, and the way is Mitel addressing them?
There are a couple of challenges with regards to integrating LLMs into enterprise communication programs, together with information privateness, safety, latency, and the necessity for versatile AI integration. As a worldwide group, information privateness considerations and regulatory compliance (GDPR and the European AI Act) are our prime priorities. So, we’re making certain our AI options defend buyer information in any respect prices. For enhanced safety, Mitel is investigating the utilization of SLMs deployed on the buyer’s community edge to restrict and defend information that might be uncovered to public cloud LLMs. In hybrid cloud environments, it’s crucial that every one merchandise have the correct interfaces/APIs to include AI safely and securely. Mitel has modernized its merchandise to allow AI integrations throughout on-premise, hosted, and personal and public clouds. We’re additionally creating versatile workflow creation capabilities that can enable a “deliver your personal LLM” (BYO-LLM) method to keep away from vendor lock-in.
Trendy communication requires LLM responses to be instantaneous for real-time collaboration instruments like voice and video, which creates infrastructure challenges. Mitel’s imaginative and prescient is to depend on Edge AI to course of real-time communication and scale back latency for a pure expertise and interplay with AI assistants. Lastly, Mitel is engaged on AI fashions that may be fine-tuned for particular industries like healthcare, finance, and hospitality, making certain extra vertically related and context-aware AI-driven communication.
When it comes to AI-powered pure language processing, what purposes are you most enthusiastic about inside Mitel’s product ecosystem?
Given the measurable and instant return on funding, Mitel Contact Heart is essentially the most thrilling space for AI-driven LLM and NLP options. The AI-powered digital brokers with chat and speech interplay can deal with buyer inquiries and collect info earlier than escalating to a stay agent, lowering workload and bettering response instances. Options resembling name recordings with transcription, summarization for compliance, sentiment analytics for buyer satisfaction, and agent coaching all enhance operations. Mitel’s UC options embrace visible voicemail, sensible search, information administration, and noise cancellation for clearer calls.
As AI reshapes communication, how ought to companies method the moral concerns of AI-driven office interactions?
AI is considerably reworking office communication and collaboration, introducing new person and buyer experiences. Nonetheless, these adjustments don’t come with out moral challenges. Moral concerns needs to be continually addressed at each stage of AI implementation, together with coaching AI fashions on numerous datasets to keep away from bias and guarantee honest decision-making. One of many greatest considerations with AI is transparency and explainability, which requires clear phrases and circumstances and disclosure of AI use. The usage of AI ought to develop human augmentation and empowerment, however it’s not a alternative.
Moreover, safety and AI misuse prevention needs to be thought-about to guard towards deepfakes and manipulation of person information and credentials.
What steps can organizations take to make sure a clean transition for workers as AI turns into extra embedded in day by day workflows?
Enterprises should take steps to foster adoption, belief, and productiveness to make sure a clean transition to AI-based options. Step one for organizations is to create AI insurance policies and enterprise governance to outline AI’s function inside the firm after which follow them. Management also needs to align on messaging and advocacy for AI adoption and provide coaching to all workers on how AI works, its limitations, and the way to use it successfully.
Concurrently, organizations ought to introduce AI collaboration instruments and integration frameworks that empower workers with AI help to boost the decision-making course of whereas sustaining human oversight. Management also needs to deal with moral and job safety considerations and supply channels to assemble worker suggestions and measure the incremental worth launched by AI.
By doing all this stuff early within the AI adoption course of, workers will really feel extra assured utilizing the instruments, and organizations will see a sooner ROI on their investments.
Thanks for the nice interview, readers who want to be taught extra ought to go to Mitel.
