Oki Enhances Call Center System

TOKYO -- Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd. (TSE: 6703) today announced that it has enhanced the functions for its call center system, CTstage(R) 4i for .NET (Chinese version), starting sales from July 2004 to the Chinese market. Oki adds three new functions, which include unified messaging functions to integrate voice mail and fax mail, outbound functions to improve business efficiency in telemarketing and survey research, and distributed call center functions that enables connectivity to call center servers in various locations.

“Ever since we introduced CTstage in Japan, we have been a strong leader, holding the top share in the CTI market. As call centers in China rapidly increased, we introduced the UnPBX*1-type CTstage for the Chinese market in April 2003 that suits call centers with less than 50 seats,” said Masashi Tsuboi, President of the Multimedia Messaging Company at Oki Electric. “Now we are adding three new functions to this product to respond to needs from our users, including Chinese companies, as well as Japanese companies making inroads to the Chinese market.”

After China’s entry to WTO, competition among companies have been rising as overseas companies actively invest in China. Such companies make effort to differentiate themselves from others not only through its products and technology but also through its customer support. Many companies have been installing CTI systems for its call center function to respond to needs such as, coordinating with other offices in China, achieving sales efficiency, and improving customer satisfaction through promotion activities.

Reflecting to such needs, Oki added three new functions to its CTstage 4i for .NET: unified messaging functions, outbound functions and distributed call center functions. The unified messaging functions integrate email, voicemail, and fax mail using CTstage server. Linking with call center functions enable users to offer various services utilizing fax and voice mail. By adding outbound functions that automatically make outgoing calls, to its original inbound functions that receives incoming calls from customers, users can conduct telemarketing, telesales, survey research and payment reminders. Furthermore, the distributed call center function connects multiple servers in different locations throughout China and allows operation as a virtual call center.

Oki will continue to take in various market needs and assist customer support structure in companies such as Chinese companies as well as Japanese companies entering the Chinese market. Oki Software Technology Co., Ltd., Oki’s local subsidiary in China, will be in charge of sales.

Oki Electric Industry Co. Ltd.