Constellation ShortList™ Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS)
Executive Summary
About This Constellation ShortList
As the great debate over building versus buying continues, Communications Platforms as a Service (CPaaS) continue to evolve and add depth to their toolsets, frameworks and overall capabilities. Fundamentally, a CPaaS is a cloud-based platform delivering APIs and SDKs to developers building real-time communications features across multiple channels including, but not limited to, voice, messaging, video and email. These tools and frameworks allow developers to embed communications directly into their applications and stacks to deliver more scalable customer and employee experiences without the burden of also building a complex communications infrastructure from ground zero.
As the CPaaS market evolves, so do the list of expectation from developers and the organizations they are building for. Beyond the standard capabilities of multichannel communications, developers expect a robust catalog of APIs and SDKs to connect voice, text and chat into a cohesive, scalable and highly secure network for experience. But CPaaS buyers can also feel as if they are constantly catching up to ever-changing communications expectations of their customers. This requires a near constant state of experimentation, testing and exploration as the engagement mix of channels and interfaces evolves and changes. Because of this need, CPaaS vendors must build and maintain a diverse ecosystem of integrations, connections and partner applications. CPaaS providers must also include frameworks, templates and sandboxes for developers to ideate, test and learn.
CPaaS solutions are also expected to deliver communications and engagement services across functions and teams, addressing any number of needs from automated alerts driven by operations or IT to commerce communications confirming shipments. CPaaS enables developers to build into existing applications, workflows and systems. The key for any CPaaS is the capacity to deliver speed in a simplified streamlined manner so organizations focus on driving customer engagement regardless of channel, stack, app or environment.
Threshold Criteria
Constellation considers the following key criteria for these solutions:
- Messaging services including SMS, MMS, email and, increasingly, rich communication services (RCS)
- Voice and telephony capabilities and APIs for inbound and outbound calling, forwarding, routing and masking
- Advanced applications will also support video for live, in-app video communications including chat and streaming events (like telehealth, video meetings and video-enabled support) • 3rd party messaging integrations including global messaging applications
- User authentication and authorization including One Time Password
- Comprehensive library of APIs and SDKs for design, languages (Python, Java, Node, etc) and mobile development
- Low Code / No Code tools for workflow design and rule management
- Security and compliance tools and frameworks. Common frameworks may include HIPAA, FISMA, GDPR, SOC2. Advanced solutions may offer FedRAMP status to ensure services meet federal security standards
- API documentation including AI powered interactive documentation and search
- Template library for on brand communications
- AI-capabilities to include real-time transcription, summary, sentiment tracking and tone detection in multiple languages
- AI empowered workflows, orchestration and routing
- Increasingly, industry specializations will lean into Internet-of-Things (IoT) integrations
- Robust analytics dashboards for communications tracking for both quality and delivery
- Event driven microservices based architecture to address traffic, reliability and scale
- Event and webook frameworks including Pub/Sub integrations
- Workflow automation for event driven and triggered campaigns
- Integrations with critical customer systems including CRM, marketing, CDP, Data, Access and Identity, ticketing and commerce systems. Integrations across UCaaS and CCaaS tools are also an expectation
- Real time monitoring, redundancies and failover paths. Uptime guarantees, live 24/7 support and enterprise SLAs
- Developer sandboxes
- Marketplace ecosystem for partner apps
- Robust user community for peer level learning and inspiration
The Constellation ShortList
Constellation evaluates more than 21 solutions categorized in this market. This Constellation ShortList is determined by client inquiries, partner conversations, customer references, vendor selection projects, market share and internal research.
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8X8
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CISCO WEBEX CONNECT
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CM.COM
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INFOBIP
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RINGCENTRAL
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SINCH
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TWILIO
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VONAGE
Frequency of Evaluation
Each Constellation ShortList is updated at least once per year. Updates may occur after six months if deemed necessary.
Evaluation Services
Constellation clients can work with the analyst and research team to conduct a more thorough discussion of this Constellation ShortList. Constellation can also provide guidance in vendor selection and contract negotiation.