/EINPresswire.com/ -- SANTA CLARA, CA and SANTA CRUZ, CA -- (Marketwired) -- 11/17/15 -- Avaya and Plantronics (NYSE: PLT) today announced a new co-development initiative to address the growing need for simplified communications in contact center and unified communications (UC) environments. The first initiative under this expanded relationship is focused on ensuring compatibility and tight integration between select Plantronics headsets and Avaya's Chrome-based contact center apps, including Avaya Agent for Chrome and Customer Engagement OnAvaya™ -- Google Cloud Platform. With this powerful combination in play, contact center agents will enjoy seamless voice and non-voice interactions with customers, including chat, email, and SMS.

"Plantronics has been working diligently to align its classic endpoint business with solutions that make it easier for agents to positively engage with customers," said Nancy Jamison, principal analyst, Customer Contact Center group, Frost & Sullivan. "Expanding the partnership with Avaya with its similarly attuned mission will go a long way in moving the needle on customer engagement."

According to a recent survey by the International Customer Management Institute (ICMI),(1) 71 percent of contact center leaders believe that difficulties with systems and inefficiency of tools are top contributors to agents' workday stress. The report also noted that being equipped with the necessary resources to do their jobs more effectively and efficiently had the greatest positive impact on performance.

"The number one requirement our customers look for is simplicity and ease of use," said Mark Monday, vice president and general manager of Team Engagement Solutions at Avaya. "Increasingly, our customers come to us asking how Plantronics and Avaya can collaborate to create a better engagement experience. Through this partnership, Avaya and Plantronics are integrating multichannel collaboration capabilities with business processes and applications for an effortless engagement experience for our customers."

"Both Avaya and Plantronics share a common vision to provide an improved communication experience on joint solutions, which we believe delivers value to our customers," said Joe Burton, executive vice president and chief commercial officer, Plantronics. "The co-developed solutions will help streamline access to multichannel communications, making it a more natural, intuitive experience for people who may or may not spend their days at a desk. Our long partnership, which marries the best capabilities of both companies, will give Avaya customers solutions with unique and differentiating features to help them work more effectively and efficiently."

Avaya and Plantronics have a long-standing partnership that spans decades. During this time the companies have developed a deep level of technological integration that has helped fuel contact center innovation and create enhanced audio and video experiences for businesses. Most recently, the companies released the Seamless transfer snap-in as part of the Avaya Engagement Assistant, which enables people using a Plantronics' sensor-enabled Voyager Legend UC headset, to fluidly transition from a mobile call to a video-enabled Avaya Scopia desktop session without losing audio. The solution leverages Plantronics' proximity APIs with the Avaya Engagement Development Platform (EDP) and is an example of how developers can create custom integration in minutes using standards-based APIs and the Avaya EDP.

"As an early adopter of Customer Engagement OnAvaya -- Google Cloud Platform, we see this collaboration between Avaya and Plantronics as a win for Summertime Potato Company," said Susan DeFazio, director of business processes, Summertime Potato Company. "Our business is all about personal relationships, and in a small business such as ours, our team members wear various hats. Moving to a cloud environment will give us the flexibility to multi-task while interacting with our customers and suppliers, and the tighter integration of our contact center solution and headsets means less potential downtime and support issues."

To learn more about the Avaya/Plantronics Partnership, please visit these resources:

• Watch: Plantronics Audio Solutions for Customer Engagement OnAvaya -- Google Cloud Platform
• Watch: Imagine with Plantronics
• Read: Avaya+Plantronics Solutions Page
• Read: Avaya and Plantronics: Customer Satisfaction, Smarter Customer Service

About Avaya
Avaya is a leading provider of solutions that enable customer and team engagement across multiple channels and devices for better customer experience, increased productivity and enhanced financial performance. Its world-class contact center and unified communications technologies and services are available in a wide variety of flexible on-premises and cloud deployment options that seamlessly integrate with non-Avaya applications. The Avaya Engagement Environment enables third parties to create and customize business applications for competitive advantage. Avaya's fabric-based networking solutions help simplify and accelerate the deployment of business critical applications and services. For more information please visit www.avaya.com.

About Plantronics
Plantronics (NYSE: PLT) is a global leader in audio communications for businesses and consumers. We have pioneered new trends in audio technology, creating innovative products that allow people to simply communicate. From unified communications to Bluetooth® headsets to gaming solutions, we deliver uncompromising quality, an ideal experience, and extraordinary service. Plantronics is used by every company in the Fortune 100™, as well as 911 dispatch, air traffic control and various mission-critical applications for those on the frontline. For more information, please visit www.plantronics.com or call (800) 544-4660.

Certain statements contained in this press release may be forward-looking statements. These statements may be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "anticipate," "believe," "continue," "could," "estimate," "expect," "intend," "may," "might," "plan," "potential," "predict," "should" or "will" or other similar terminology. We have based these forward-looking statements on our current expectations, assumptions, estimates and projections. While we believe these are reasonable, such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond our control. These and other important factors may cause our actual results to differ materially from any future results expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. For a list and description of such risks and uncertainties, please refer to Avaya's filings with the SEC that are available at www.sec.gov. Avaya disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements.

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Plantronics is a trademark of Plantronics, Inc. registered in the US and other countries. The Bluetooth® word mark and logos are registered trademarks of Bluetooth SIG, Inc. and any use of such marks by Plantronics is under license. Plantronics and Voyager Legend are trademarks of Plantronics, Inc. registered in the US and other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.

(1) ICMI, Agent Apathy: The Root Cause of Poor Customer Service, April 2015