With the Internet protocol (IP)-based contact centers poised to take over, the interaction customer relationship management (ICRM) market is on the threshold of a new trend.

Enterprises are reaching the end of their product lifecycle in the Asia Pacific markets, and hence, replacements of existing applications such as automatic call distributor (ACD) with IP-ACD solutions have gained priority.

New analysis from Frost & Sullivan, Asia Pacific Interaction Customer Relationship Management Market, reveals that funding for this market totaled $671.4 million in 2004 and projects to reach $1418.3 million in 2011.

IP contact centers expect to find greater uptake in countries that do not have fully developed voice networks. However, to firmly establish themselves in the contact center market, IP technology vendors need to resolve certain glitches in three areas — quality of service, infrastructure reliability, and network security.

The ICRM market is likely to get another boost with the increasing demand for self-service solutions, as contact centers look for ways to lower costs. This is creating wider markets for e-mail, interactive voice response (IVR), and speech technologies.

The ICRM market projects to increase at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.3 percent from 2004 to 2011, mainly due to the returns from the IP contact centers, hosted contact centers, and self-service solutions. This growth rate can be improved once the market participants adopt strategies to effectively tap into the price-sensitive and emerging small and medium enterprise (SME) market.

Vendors have to offer multimedia capabilities; ACD, computed telephony integration (CTI), and IVR functionalities; and statistical reporting tools to better manage incoming calls and agent staffing. Vendors and channel partners have to strategize innovatively, as they need to factor in the budget constraints of the SMEs, which differ significantly between countries.

The Asia Pacific Interaction Customer Relationship Management Market study is segmented into ACD, CTI, IVR, outbound systems, call monitoring, workforce management, speech technology, e-mail management, and real time Web collaboration. It analyses major industry challenges, market drivers and restraints, and potential threats faced by the market participants along with a comprehensive analysis of the market.

Source: PRNewswire

Contact center technologies, however, have to compete with other IT enterprise expenditure due to the limited budgets of the end-user companies. Hosted contact centers expect to solve this issue and expand the market by bringing informal contact centers to the mainstream, especially since they offer cost advantage with low initial investment.