DEMO: Vonata bypasses call center mazes, eliminates the secretary

September 14, 2010 9:15 AM
Matthew Lynley
Add a Comment

Vonata is one of 70 companies chosen by VentureBeat to launch at the DEMO Fall 2010 event taking place this week in Silicon Valley. After our selection, the companies pay a fee to present. Our coverage of them remains objective.

Shervin Talieh wants to eliminate the call center. So the serial entrepreneur is taking another run at a tech startup with Vonata, a tool that promises to eliminate wait times to talk to a customer service representative, which he’s unveiling today at the DEMO conference.

Vonata routes consumer service requests to the customer service representatives appropriate for a customer’s needs. The customer can also specify a call time that works for their schedule.

The seven-person company, founded in 2010, is headed by Talieh. Its business model is to charge clients only when the service is used.

Vonata’s first customer will begin using the service in November. Talieh said the company is in negotiations with a large partner responsible for managing marketing campaigns for several Fortune 1000 companies.

Companies like Cisco, Alcatel-Lucent and Ribbit all offer elements of Vonata, but not the complete package, Talieh said.

Vonata has so far raised around $350,000 in two rounds from family and friends, the most recent of which was completed two months ago.
http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f8/980795693

  • barryoban

    Great to see more innovation around one of the biggest consumer frustrations (Waiting on hold). I wonder if/how it's different from LucyPhone.com — I know they have an enterprise offering as well…

  • calitalieh

    Just a note, Vonata was founded by two people, and Farsheed Atef's info should also appear on this story. He is the technical brains behind Vonata and deserves the proper acknowledgement, at least from me ;-)

  • calitalieh

    I think Lucy has a wonderful front-end. The key difference is that once you establish the call with the company, you still have to navigate the menues (“Press 1…Press 3…”), and then if you have to hold there are no more options. The other key difference is what happens when the call gets established. Vonata orchestrates a data channel alongside the voice call, and lets the agent push content to the smartphone during the process.As far as I can tell, these are two of the factors that are different. There are three other key capabilities we are working on that will be rolled out in January. That being said, I completely agree with you that this is a problem that is dying for a solution (many solutions), and I am happy to see LucyPhone do what they are doing.

blog comments powered by Disqus