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2002 was the year of collaboration right up until the very end as three companies–Hipbone Inc., SiteScape Inc. and eDial Inc.–announced new collaboration offerings Monday.
Hipbone introduced Synetry 3.5, the latest release of its Internet-based customer service platform. New in this release are extensions to the Synetry Chat+ text chat application, including a new Supervisor Console that permits real-time queue monitoring against response-time thresholds and allows customer service supervisors to drill down into sessions being handled by a specific agent.
Supervisors are also given the ability to coach agents by sending private chat instructions to an agent during a customer service session or creating a three-way session with the supervisors chat comments visible to both the agent and the customer.
In addition, supervisors are able to re-balance agents across queues in response to spikes or drop-offs in inbound requests for live assistance.
The Synetry FileShare application in this release provides users with a wizardlike environment that converts and uploads Microsoft Office documents including PowerPoint, Excel and Word to a secure repository for online collaboration using Synetry Cobrowse or Synetry Chat+.
Converted documents can be viewed by individuals who have permission and only within the bounds of a Synetry Cobrowse session.
Synetry 3.5 has been developed specifically for security-conscious environments, including the financial services, insurance and health care industries, according to Hipbone officials in San Carlos, Calif.
Also on Monday, Maynard, Mass.-based SiteScape released Forum Program Management, an add-on to its SiteScape Enterprise Forum 7.0 collaboration application.
The new add-on brings project management capabilities to Enterprise Forum, giving users the ability to drill down into multiple projects from a dashboard interface.
Forum Program Management creates a searchable record of project or program activities, including meeting history, agendas, action items, and calendars for reuse or reference at a later date.
It uses Enterprise Forums underlying framework of threaded discussions, document management, calendar sharing, workflow, chat, instant messaging and real-time conferencing.
Finally, eDial, of Waltham, Mass., announced Audio Presenter 4.0, an audio conferencing appliance with integrated Web presentation capabilities.
Audio Presenter 4.0 installs into a companys existing telephone and data networks.
New features in this version include record and playback of conference calls, support for “hand-raising” to allow questions to be asked during conferences, shared control of PowerPoint presentations, password protection, support for up to 96 call participants, and bulk generation of dial-in access codes.