Siemens Announces Version 2.0 of HiPath OpenScape Presence Collaboration Portal

BOCA RATON , Fla. - Siemens Information and Communication Networks Inc., a subsidiary of Siemens AG (NYSE: SI), announced the Version 2.0 of its HiPath™ OpenScape™ presence collaboration portal. The OpenScape solution, a real-time enterprise communication tool, is helping Siemens customers to lower overall collaboration costs, simplify workflows and streamline interaction-intensive business processes.

Via Web interfaces, including Web speech and groupware, the OpenScape portal gives each user a single dashboard from which they can easily manage multiple levels of availability, including the option to be available to some contacts and unavailable to others. A user also selects, at any given time, a preferred communication device (mobile phone, desk phone, home phone or e-mail, for example). The application also brings presence to team communication, making it a one-click option to establish ad hoc or meet-me collaboration with multimedia collaboration tools embedded in the portal.

As a next-generation communication and collaboration solution, the OpenScape solution is based on open standards such as Session Internet Protocol (SIP), SIMPLE and Web services allowing for easy deployment of real-time, presence-aware communication capabilities into common business processes such as customer relationship management (CRM) databases, customer service and other back-office platforms. With Version 2.0, the OpenScape solution offers a Web Services Toolkit for developers and integrators, including well-documented Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), for easier deployments of multimodal applications to fit specific enterprise customer needs. The toolkit provides a SIP-based and SOAP/XML-based open application environment that operates independently of existing voice platforms. Its extensible, modular architecture leverages a Web-services model to help developers create custom enhancements to the OpenScape solution, or create entirely new applications.

New user feature highlights of Version 2.0 include:

• Tell Me When feature to receive instant notification when an urgent contact becomes available.
• Text user interface (TUI) support for mobile user access to directories, conferencing, calendars, task lists, etc.
• Voice portal support for natural speech recognition.
•  Rules Wizard for automated changes in presence status and device preference.

While most businesses have not yet embedded new presence technologies into their business processes, a Nemertes Research study projects that 57 percent of organizations plan to embed presence throughout their organizations within three years; 21 percent say they are working on the process right now. More than 90 percent of enterprises say that instant messaging (IM), one of the earliest forms of presence-based communication, is being used informally within their organizations.