Telestax Announces Strategic Agreement with NEC to Bring Programmable Communications and CPaaS Applications to the NEC Global Enterprise User Base

Today, Telestax, the leading provider of CPaaS enablement to global communications companies, announced a strategic agreement with NEC Corporation of America (NEC), the leading international provider and integrator of advanced IT, communications, and networking solutions. With this agreement, NEC is partnering with Telestax to bring CPaaS functionality to their extensive customer base and channel partner network. NEC has already incorporated the Telestax programmable SMS functionality into NEC UC-Suite, the company's integrated unified communications solution. The agreement ensures NEC will continue to add programmable SMS and voice, and release new CPaaS turnkey applications to customers throughout the 2021 year.

NEC was most recently recognized as the world's number one provider of call control products to the small and medium business markets (source: MZA Call Control Market Reports). With tens of millions of business users worldwide, NEC is in the top three globally for installed unified communications seats and ranks number one for global line shipments over the past three quarters. This partnership agreement with Telestax represents NEC's rapid global expansion into programmable cloud-based communications and collaboration services.

"At NEC, we see the world's SMB market as one of the top priorities to maintaining our leadership position," said Ram Menghani, President of NEC Enterprise Communication Technologies. "By working with Telestax, we can now deliver the best CPaaS capability to this critical market we already know so well. Thanks to the Telestax business model, it has been simple to integrate and white label their CPaaS platform into a full NEC experience. The Telestax offerings are designed for companies like ours that are strategically focused on rapidly bringing programmable cloud communications to the market."

With this agreement, NEC has SMS-enabled a number of their products to improve communications and create new digital channels. The Telestax CPaaS platform has allowed NEC to add multiple new features and benefits, including:

• SMS enable any fixed line: The NEC UC-SUITE UNIVERGE^® SV9100 Contact Center application can now send text messages to colleagues, customers, and vendors just as easily as an internal chat message. With SMS enablement, any fixed line can now support SMS communication. This functionality ensures communications reside in the organization's UC-Suite environment and opens up new opportunities for customer service and support channels.
• Text colleagues a visitor has arrived on-site: The NEC Front Desk Assistant has become critical in providing contactless check-in powered by biometrics. By integrating with the Telestax CPaaS platform, the Front Desk Assistant sends a text message to alert employees that their guest has arrived, fostering a better, socially distant process.

"As soon as we partnered with Telestax, we were off to the races in bringing API-based functionality to our products, customers, and channel partners," said Menghani. "And we are absolutely not done. We are already working on several new cloud features and products with Telestax using their innovative voice and messaging capabilities. We are also examining their line of turnkey applications as new solutions for our customers. I personally can't wait to introduce these new offerings later this year."

Telestax Turnkey Applications include:

• Smart 2FA - the ability to send a one-time password using the user's preferred channel - voice, messaging, or email. Two-factor authentication protects against phishing attacks and can provide customers with secure access to portals, account data, order status, and more.
• Number Masking - the ability to cloak a customer or agent's number to ensure communications privacy during a phone or text exchange.

"We are extremely proud that a company as large as NEC rapidly applied our rich communications APIs to release new features to their global SMB footprint," said Kevin Nethercott, Chief Commercial Officer for Telestax. "Before the global pandemic hit, we were not thinking of contactless screening, but with CPaaS it's easy to pivot and innovate. Now NEC has a solution to ensure front desk areas have a safe way to intake visitors and send convenient SMS alerts to others. We enjoy working with the NEC team and look forward to more success stories this year."

Solutions from NEC such as UC Suite with SMS enablement and Front Desk Assistant with thermal screening are available now. Learn more at https://www.necam.com/UnifiedCommunications/UCSuite/. To inquire about becoming a Telestax partner, please visit http://www.telestax.com or email Telestax at [email protected].

About Telestax
Telestax is the leading CPaaS enabler for communications service providers and creator of the award-winning Restcomm API platform. Originating in the largest industry open source community, managed by Telestax, Restcomm has been tested by over 10,000 telecom developers and contains over 6 million lines of code. As a trusted partner in real-time communications, Telestax delivers Restcomm Cloud to innovative companies around the world. When service providers join with Telestax, their customers gain the advantage of a superior network and full CPaaS capabilities such as programmable SMS and voice. With bring your own carrier options, white labeling, and a complete suite of voice and messaging APIs, service providers benefit from new revenue streams and a competitive edge in the evolving digital transformation marketplace. Restcomm Cloud removes the friction in application development and business workflow integration with user-friendly tools like the Visual Designer. The Telestax RESTful API gives experienced developers control to create robust omnichannel applications alongside technologies such as advanced IVR and intelligent chatbots. Learn more about Telestax, Restcomm Cloud, and CPaaS enablement at www.telestax.com today.

About NEC Corporation of America
NEC Corporation of America (NEC) is a leading technology integrator providing solutions that improve the way people work and communicate. NEC delivers integrated Solutions for Society that are aligned with our customers' priorities to create new value for people, businesses and society, with a special focus on safety, security and efficiency. We deliver one of the industry's strongest and most innovative portfolios of communications, analytics, security, biometrics and technology solutions that unleash customers' productivity potential. Through these solutions, NEC combines its best-in-class solutions and technology and leverages a robust partner ecosystem to solve today's most complex business problems. NEC Corporation of America is a wholly-owned subsidiary of NEC Corporation, a global technology leader with a presence in 160 countries and $29 billion in revenues.

© 2021 NEC Corporation. NEC and UNIVERGE are registered trademarks of NEC Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Other product or service marks mentioned are the trademarks of their respective owners.