The message across the industry is now crystal clear: AI isn’t coming. It’s already running the show.
The focus has shifted from ‘what could be’ to ‘what’s happening now’. Real-world adoption strategies are front and centre, with security, compliance, and vertical use cases taking top billing. Nowhere is this shift more apparent than in the bold, AI-forward moves made by Zoom, Microsoft, and Five9.
Zoom’s Tailored AI Tools and Vertical Integration
Zoom’s AI Companion is no longer a feature, it’s the foundation. With 45 new Agentic AI features, Zoom is leaning hard into productivity, orchestration, and bespoke digital agents.
The standout innovation? Custom AI Companion, allowing organisations to create AI agents tailored to specific needs. These agents can handle multi-step tasks, access data across platforms, apply reasoning, and evolve over time, all while seamlessly integrating into workflows.
Picture a contact centre where AI instantly surfaces warranty details, CRM data, and shipping updates while auto-filling return forms and logging the entire interaction. That’s not future talk. That’s now.
Zoom is also going vertical. With industry-specific experiences for healthcare, education, retail and beyond, Zoom Workplace is aligning comms tools directly with sector needs, from HIPAA-compliant video consults to integrated digital signage in retail.
And with the arrival of Zoom Drive, content management gets a smart overhaul. Meeting recordings, chat logs, and shared files are now searchable, secure, and accessible, all within the Zoom ecosystem.
From smarter Zoom Rooms to hybrid office tools, Zoom is shaping how and where we work, with AI leading the charge.
Five9: Turning Conversations into Strategy
Zoom may be owning the unified comms narrative, but Five9 is setting the benchmark for AI in the contact centre.
Their headline act? Spotlight for AI Insights. A tool that transforms call transcripts and customer conversations into actionable intelligence. Think topic detection, sentiment analysis, and visual dashboards that let teams actually see what’s going on in their customer interactions.
The tech is impressive, but the real strength lies in Five9’s practical approach. Intelligent routing, agent assist, and real-time coaching tools are delivering tangible CX transformation, today.
For CCaaS organisations, it’s clear: AI is making contact centres more responsive, more human, and more effective.
Microsoft: Enabling a Connected CX Future
Microsoft continues to reshape Teams as more than a meeting tool, it’s fast becoming a powerful CX platform in its own right.
Recent enhancements to Teams Phone and Teams Extensibility are bridging the gap between internal collaboration and external customer engagement. From embedded voice in business apps to custom call flows, the result is a more integrated, agile communications strategy.
New features like Storylines add rich context to conversations, while the UI refresh improves multitasking for busy teams.
And with the latest MDEP 2025.1 update, Teams-certified devices are now even more tightly integrated, making frontline environments smarter and more interoperable.
Microsoft’s role in the UC and CC space is clear: it’s not replacing your platforms, it’s connecting them, and empowering your people to deliver better experiences.
The Future of Comms Is Connected
The evolution of UC and CC isn’t about one platform dominating. It’s about building a connected ecosystem: AI-enhanced, insight-driven, and tailored to how people actually work.
Whether it’s automating the mundane, amplifying agent capability, or making decisions in real time, the tools are here. And they’re already making an impact.
The next chapter is already being written, and it’s intelligent, integrated, and industry-ready.
