Genesys goes after midsize market (again) with Genesys One

In 2001 Genesys came out with Genesys Express aimed at luring the SMB to its CTI platform. This was all before the computing cloud trend, so this on-premise solution was truly “Genesys lite.” The package installs the basic components of Genesys using a user-friendly wizard to walk through the deployment process. The goal was to limit customization and offer as much vanilla Genesys as possible.

It was a well-intended effort to help midsize customers. However, I think the method and execution weren’t well thought out. The first rule of contact centers? There are no two that are alike. So is it possible to drop a one-size-fits-all CTI solution into an enterprise contact center?

The solution can still be tweaked post-deployment, of course. But this often required a knowledgeable engineer or consultant to perform the work… which sort of defeats the purpose.

Apple acquires more Nortel patents

When Nortel went down in flames, its legacy was a trove of patents that any tech/telecom company would salivate over. Add on to the fact that patent litigation has now become offensive maneuvers in the tech sector, it was no surprise when the likes of BFFs (“best frenemies forever”) Google and Apple showed tremendous (albeit low-profile) interest when these patents came up for sale.

These patents were so important that Apple, Microsoft, Sony, Ericsson, and RIM actually joined forces to establish Rockstar Bidco (now Rockstar Consortium) to buy the rights to the trove. Apple dumped $2.6 billion out of the whole $4.5 billion to get access to these patents that Rockstar purchased. This was mostly a defensive move in case somebody sues.

Now Apple is going on the offensive. According to reports Apple now owns over 1,000 of these patents:

But getting full rights to the patent likely helps Apple use the patents offensively in its ongoing lawsuits. If you do not own a patent, but merely have licensed it, you can’t go out and sue someone for using the patent. Having outright ownership of a patent allows Apple to use the patents offensively.

This transfer of patents wasn’t a huge announcement so I don’t think Apple wanted to advertise this as a warning/deterrent. Apple bought these quietly, and I think it’s because they’re ready to use them with specific targets in mind.

The Cisco, CSU, and ALU drama

Cisco has been taking a PR beating recently (Dave Michels wrote a good rundown) with news of its failed bid to win a networking contract for California State University (CSU) system. This would’ve been a sale of many, many big expensive networking boxes to 23 campuses in an eight-year project schedule. The newsworthy part of this story? Cisco’s bid was $122 million compared to the winning bid from Alcatel-Lucent at $22 million. Who can blame CSU for wanting to save a cool $100 million, right?

To make matters worse, an internal Cisco memo regarding this bid was leaked to Brad Reese, an industry blogger. Now a Cisco exec is on a mission to hunt down the leaker.

Anyway, out goes the Catalysts and in comes the OmniSwitches. This is a huge coup by ALU to knock off the incumbent – of course the winning team had to brag a bit.