O2 Upgrades Media Exchange for iPhone's Visual Voicemail

Mobile phone carrier O2 UK and Convergys Corporation announced on Tuesday that the operator's award-winning Intervoice Media Exchange solution was upgraded so as to offer support for the visual voicemail service for its iPhone users. The Media Exchange solution comes with multi-application capabilities, which enable the carrier to deliver both visual voicemail and traditional voicemail services from a single platform. The upgrade performed by O2 affected hardware, software, and professional services, the carrier added.

Visual voicemail is the latest enhancement in voicemail and comes as a user-friendly service that enables mobile phone owners to play messages directly from their handsets, without the need to call a separate number to do so. The new upgrade is set to enable iPhone users on O2's network to play, rewind, fast forward, and delete messages with the touch of a finger. As for Media Exchange, this is the mechanism that provides users with the possibility to enjoy the service, as it transforms the messages into data packages that are then sent to the handset.

“When Convergys acquired Intervoice and its portfolio of solutions, we knew that service providers worldwide, including O2 UK, regarded Media Exchange as a strategic differentiator in the provision of new services,” said Frank Sherlock, senior vice president and managing director, International, Convergys Global Business Unit. “User-friendly visual voicemail, provided by O2 and powered by Media Exchange, is placing the latest technology right at subscribers’ fingertips.”

Media Exchange is a part of Convergys’ portfolio of Relationship Management solutions, and comes as an IP-based, multi-media communications platform based on open standards. Through this solution, operators can offer voice-navigated messaging to their users, as well as personalization or video, web, and WAP access. Moreover, the services can be offered either via landlines, mobile devices of via the Internet. “These cutting-edge applications help operators attract new subscribers, increase usage by current subscribers, and increase customer satisfaction to generate higher average revenue per user (ARPU),” Convergys adds.