By Andrew Berg
Monday, March 30, 2009
Alcatel-Lucent today announced its Rich Communications Manager (RCM), which will deliver unified rich messaging through a single Web portal to provide enhanced messaging and communications to fixed, mobile and IP devices.
The new functionality will allow mobile and wireline end-users to retrieve, view, respond and forward video, photos and text from a Web portal that also integrates address books between user devices.
Leveraging familiar desktop concepts, subscribers can drag and drop content across voicemail, SMS, MMS, e-mail, faxes, calendars and address books.
In addition to eliminating the traditional silos between various networks by making all mobile and PC communications visible in one place, RCM eliminates multiple logins, user interfaces and contexts defined by different messaging applications, the company says.
It will also allow users to visually see a converged message queue, as well as originate and listen to voicemail messages online. It provides voice-to-text functionality to allow users to read a voicemail transcription.
The move by Alcatel-Lucent can be seen within the context of the impending public launch of Google Voice, which will provide its users with a similar converged messaging center.
The Rich Communications Manager is a finalist for the 2009 Andrew Seybold Choice Awards "Most Innovative Mobile Applications" category; the winner is to be announced on April 1.