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60 2018 Visionary spotlight awards | Channel Vision and ecosystems combined together to deliver revenue growth and efficiency improvements to partners. It con- sists of two main components: Web-delivered tools and in-field seminars. The main differentiator for this program lies in its ap- proach. Instead of focusing on selling specific technolo- gies, such as how to qualify and sell SD-WAN, CNSG is focused on helping partners become business consul- tants, helping customers find prescriptive, agnostic so- lutions, specific to their needs, with higher solution ROI. The CNSG team also uses a singular “CNSG Blue- Print” for success – custom-built for the unique chal- lenges found in the indirect channel. No matter where partners are in the sales process and no matter their familiarity with the set of technologies in play, the Blue- Print shows how to move the deal forward and offers sales tools designed to help do that. OneStream was recognized for helping a global en- terprise find an integrated solution to meet connectivity and communications needs; it involved deploying and installing 70 sites around the world, including global of- fices and the headquarters, and data centers. OneStream, working with partners, installed a BroadSoft unified communications (UC) PSTN replacement in every country, with advanced global SIP trunk consolidation. It also voice-enabled existing global MPLS WAN global de- ployment services and delivered an SD-WAN from Versa Networks to manage voice quality and offer advanced man- aged security. The project was completed in 12 months. Comcast , Nextiva , Telarus , BullsEye , Impartner , EvolveIP and Unified Office all took home a Top Inno- vation Award this year. Comcast was recognized for its Xfinity Assistant, an intelligent virtual assistant accessible via My Account Mobile, Comcast’s flagship account manage- ment application. It soon will be available for custom- ers to access via user interfaces across various prod- ucts and communications channels where customers can ask questions using natural language and receive helpful responses, quick resolutions or the ability to connect with customer service agents or directly gen- erate support tickets when appropriate. The product delivers the customer immediate as- sistance for a variety of troubleshooting, account man- agement and informational topics, and uses machine intelligence and natural language understanding; it has been evolving each week since its November launch, and Comcast said it will continue to expand in functionality, support coverage and accessibility into the future as part of the broader Comcast aiQ (pro- nounced “IQ”) program to intelligently and proactively treat and resolve customer issues. “It’s an innovation that drives a better experience and outcome for 28 million Comcast customers,” the cableco said. “The Xfinity Assistant makes the cus- tomer’s relationship with Comcast easier and provides feedback into the business about the top issues impact- ing customers. In addition to our customers, Comcast customer service agents and technicians are empowered with precise contextual data about customers’ network and product health as well as previous interactions.” All of these features enhance the customer experience tremendously, building confidence in the brand and products. Meanwhile, Nextiva builds communications tools for businesses, including voice, chat, surveys and CRM. NextOS is the underlying platform that enables these tools to work together, creating an all-in-one communica- tions platform that gives a holistic and real-time insight into the customer journey. At a glance, agents will know whether a customer is satisfied, upset or somewhere in- between – thus, they’ll be able to make quick decisions on the actions needed to improve the customer’s experience and/or take advantage of time-sensitive actions such as sending emails to ask for referrals from happy customers or setting up a call with a supervisor when a customer is upset. Meanwhile, Nextiva Analytics captures all data from across the system, providing a holistic view of customers. “This allows for easy access to all data, from one spot and eliminates costly integrations,” the company said. “Previously, businesses needed to invest in several different tools (email marketing systems, website chat, online surveys, social media monitoring and more) and then spend more money integrating the systems or pay- ing for employees to export all of the data from disparate systems and then analyze the information gathered.” Top Innovation Award Ov e ra l l E xc e l l e nc e Award s :