Nortel's UC hospitality play

Nortel continued its aggressive expansion of UC offerings in the hospitality space Tuesday with the announcement of five hot customers that have created new revenue and improved guest experiences with Nortel solutions. Hotels and resorts with diverse customer needs and preferences have seen benefits in guest loyalty and staff productivity by turning up Nortel, according to the set of releases.

At the Venetian Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, guests can now order tickets to shows and other events through a Nortel-powered contact center that also gives them personalized message capabilities. At the Shangri-La Hotel in Vancouver, Canada, where customers seek a very natural, "tech-free" experience, Nortel's solution runs behind the scenes, optimizing the staff's time to guarantee as much face time as possible with the guest.

Wes Durow, vice president of global marketing, said the hospitality industry is migrating to IP for a variety of reasons.

"We're seeing increased UC adoption in the hospitality space because it lets hotels and resorts give a new guest experience that is more personalized," Durow said. "We're also seeing demand because of increased productivity by staff because of IP communications and the new revenue streams that they are able to generate from the level of personalization the systems allow."

Sandra Thomson, hospitality marketing manager for Nortel, said the hotel's main goal of making a guest a repeat customer is at the heart of the migration to UC.

"You want the guest to come back, and little things like being able to greet them by name, or remembering the temperature they like their room can make that difference," Thomson said. "Also, when you have something unfortunate happen, like an overflowing toilet or something similar, the UC solution helps the hotel manager find the closest maintenance person who can help."

Durow said Nortel is able to better serve its hospitality partners than other companies offering UC because the company understands "that the relationship between a hotel and a guest is not purely transactional, it's personal." He also noted the reduced energy footprint of Nortel's solution as a plus mentioned by customers.

For more:
- see the releases at Nortel's website [1]