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Home → Unified Communications → CPaaS →

Where is CPaaS Headed in 2021? Expert Round Table 

ANWESHA ROY

To understand where the Communication Platform as a Service industry is

headed in 2021, we spoke to industry experts

 January 29, 2021 Insights

CPaaS opens up a world of possibilities for organisations (particularly contact centres) to interact
with customers on a range of platforms like voice, video, chat, social, etc. without having to build
expensive back-end infrastructure. In the last few years, CPaaS has seen meteoric growth, with 81%
of companies already deploying some kind of CPaaS by 2017.  

For more stats on CPaaS adoption, check out our 2020 CPaaS statistics and facts roundup. You
could also view UC Today’s CPaaS explainer video by Rob Scott here.  

Now, in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, CPaaS has important implications for companies
looking to engage with audiences through digital platforms and grow their footprint using advanced
communication APIs. It would allow contact centres to build bespoke applications and tightly
coupled integrations without getting into back-end complexities or requiring a messy infrastructure
overhaul.   

To understand where the CPaaS industry is headed in 2021, we spoke to industry experts from
Kandy, Sinch, and Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise.

What Were the Top CPaaS Trends that Shaped 2020?  

Back in 2019, we noted a dramatic growth in the CPaaS sector, already motivated by remote
working. For 2020, our experts had predicted the rise of IoT and AI as key driving forces for the
sector. This time, we asked the same question – expectedly, it was COVID-19-related WFH that had
the strongest impact.  

Predictions around IoT also saw fruition, in addition to a keen focus on data, and communications
security. Here is what our experts had to say.  

Kim Jones, Director of Marketing at Kandy

Communications, discussed the many ways in which
CPaaS reacted to the pandemic, witnessing faster
adoption, the abandoning of transactional APIs/SDKs,
and a lot of interest around browser-based
communication.   

“WFH drove demand for video conferencing and collaboration platform solutions for remote
workers,” said Jones, causing an “acceleration of digital transformation initiatives and adoption of
RTC such as UCaaS, CCaaS and CPaaS.” 

She highlighted four standout trends from 2020:  

1. Contact centre enablers – Demand for contact centre as a service and lightweight web-based
contact centre solutions that enable easy spin-up as standalone solutions or to complement
existing call centres, and/or for remote agents working from home 
 2. Healthcare use cases – Telehealth concierge applications with embedded real-time
communications, and especially with peer-to-peer video – driven by caregiver-patient
interactions under lockdowns or quarantine during the pandemic 
3. New ways to integrate – Transition from the traditional view of a transactional API and SDK
model to more of a multi-service digital marketplace model, including pre-built turnkey
applications and connectivity services, such as MS Teams, Direct Routing, STaaS, etc.  
4. Web-based access – WebRTC applications such as Live Support that enable browser-based
omnichannel communications for the digital transformation of business processes and
customer experience 

The focus was on greater flexibility aided by CPaaS technologies.  

Jonathan Bean, CMO, Sinch, agreed on the

unprecedented impact of the pandemic, noting that it
propelled several organisations to turn to CPaaS as a
speedy value generator. This was particularly true for
sectors and organisations that put off digitalising their
customer communications channels for decades –
like banks or financial services providers.  

“Till 2019, most financial institutions were only using mobile messaging for one-time passwords or
verification of their users. Suddenly, they had to actually communicate with their customers about
things like changes to their loan terms through SMS!” Bean mentioned, highlighting a small instance
that signals a much larger tectonic shift.   

2020 was spent playing catch-up for several such organisations. “Because of this, we’ve worked
with many financial organisations last year to help them quickly implement simple CPaaS solutions
in response to the pandemic,” said Bean.  

Interestingly, the shift wasn’t just to overcome the operational hurdles of communicating in a low
touch or touchless landscape. Customer demand has also changed, and without CPaaS, it may not
be possible to generate the same ROI from communication investments.  

“Last year we saw the pandemic completely transform consumer behaviour forever. As a result,
businesses and organisations had to quickly figure out how to get closer to their employees and
customers in this new reality,” Bean said.  

“For many businesses and organisations, this meant having to implement changes they were
planning on making in five years but in the space of just five months. Therefore, like all good
technology shifts, the deployment of simple CPaaS solutions offering quick ROI and simplicity for
businesses and consumers was the biggest trend in 2020.” 
Noel Pierre-Yves, Strategic Marketing Director for Cloud services, Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise, told
us the trends his company observed in 2020 and its
tactical response by creating a “Connector’s Factory.” 

 “As Enterprises were trying to cope with the sanitary

crisis by facilitating “work from anywhere”,
programmable communications and CPaaS have
helped enterprises communicate in a more efficient
way,” commented Pierre-Yves.  

And it isn’t just about replicating the same communication dynamics in a different location. Pierre-
Yves argues that by embedding comms into software that people use every day, it is possible to
receive the right information at the right moment with the right (read the least) amount of effort.  

“In that sense, Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise has created a Connectors Factory so that communications
can reach and be used in mainstream software solutions. We also see enterprises eager to see
business, IoT and infrastructure delivered directly to people through their favourite communication
application in real-time, allowing employees and customers to make better decisions. This
convergence of data into the workplace allows the enterprise to simplify work for employees while
creating value for their customers and partners,” said Pierre-Yves.   

This transformation of bare-bones or functional communication into data-enriched messages has

two implications according to Pierre-Yves.  

First, there are opportunities to automate internal and external workflows, taking off from the data
that is shared. Second, security is a major concern: “As communication includes more business
data on top of typical text, voice and video communications, security becomes an even more
relevant topic to communication APIs.” Pierre-Yves shared with us how Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise is
planning to preempt security concerns going into 2021.   

“Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise values data security for their customers and is one of the main
European platforms in the CPaaS market. We are investing in security around data to
ensure data sovereignty for our customers, specifically in European countries”  

Which New Technologies are Creating the Biggest Opportunities?

CPaaS is in a unique position, in that it is a relatively mature market, having been around for several
years. However, the pandemic has given it a leg-up that could push growth well beyond any other UC
sector average. From $4.54 billion in 2020, CPaaS will be worth $26.03 billion by 2026 at a CAGR of
34.3%. We asked our experts about the technologies creating this incredible opportunity for growth.
The answers ranged from ecosystem solutions powered by the cloud to targeted APIs for e-
commerce, IT provisioning, omnichannel, etc. 
Interestingly, one expert zeroed in on blockchain as the most game-changing technology-enabler for
CPaaS on the road ahead. Read on for the full insights.  

For Kim Jones, the following technologies should be on CPaaS leaders’ and users’ radar:  

WebRTC 
Video (P2P and multiparty) 
Artificial Intelligence (AI) 
UCaaS in the cloud 
Ecosystem of real-time comms 

Speaking on WebRTC, Jones said, “WebRTC is now mainstream in all major web browsers, and is
frictionless/plugin-less in order to enable ubiquitous use.” WebRTC could be instrumental in
extending traditional UCaaS capabilities into specific applications and business processes including
contact centre apps, she added.  

In addition to blockchain, AI was the other emerging technology that could unlock opportunities for
CPaaS. Jones mentioned that AI-enabled services could make a genuine difference in chatbots, and
interactive voice response (IVR), reducing manual dependencies to a large extent. All of this will aid
in the creation of a communication ecosystem powered by APIs for voice, video, messaging, chat,
rich chat, etc., along with non-comms APIs for security, e-commerce, billing, provisioning, and
configuration. 

Finally, like several industry leaders we’ve spoken to in the last few months, Jones mentioned the
potential of Microsoft Teams in the CPaaS arena – “MS Teams and DR/DRaaS for Teams could
enable dial time access to the PSTN without using Microsoft calling plans.”  

Jonathan Bean from Sinch opined that the next few months in
CPaaS will be spent in responding to the challenges and
opportunities caused by the pandemic, with particular attention on
the regional rules of engagement. “The pandemic turned the march
towards digital transformation into a stampede and the biggest
opportunities were enabled by those technologies which really
helped to fast-track the deployment of simple CPaaS use cases,”
Bean said.   

Jonathan Bean Instead of blindly expanding one’s digital footprint, companies

should remember the unique modalities of different geographies to
capitalise on this opportunity.  

“The pandemic has been a truly global event, with every single country affected to some
extent, impacting billions of people worldwide. This has pushed the messaging layer of
 CPaaS to the fore as businesses and organisations try to engage with employees and
customers at scale”

“As a leader in mobile customer engagement, we know that different countries prefer different
channels and each has its own rules of engagement,” Bean observed.  

To understand and master each of these channels like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Viber and
Line across multiple countries takes huge amounts of time.”  

Sinch is doing its part with the recent launch of its conversational API, which is a singular integration
for omnichannel interactions. Bean calls it the “new gateway through which organisations can reach
customers across the world via multiple messaging channels,” effectively gaining from the
opportunities of this reimagined customer engagement landscape.  

“This is why 2020 has been a real coming of age for CPaaS,” he added. 

Noel Pierre-Yves from Alcatel-Lucent Enterprises mentioned data analytics and blockchain as the
two most game-changing technologies for CPaaS right now. As he already mentioned, functional
communication is becoming increasingly data-enriched, adding more value to everyday
communications relayed to both employees and customers.   

As a result, there are opportunities to be unlocked by tracking data response and interpreting
employee/customer behaviour in the same vein. 

“As enterprises start sharing more data between their employees, customers and providers, value
creation comes from data analytics through AI and machine learning. It is possible to understand
people’s intent using data trends and estimate how they affect the company. By analysing data
content, companies can also better understand how it can help employees to do their jobs,” Pierre-
Yves explained.  

The two implications of data-enriched comms as mentioned by Pierre-Yves were automation and
security – both of which make this a prime candidate for blockchain implementation.  

“As enterprises automate their internal business processes with real-time comms, they will see
immense benefits in automating business processes internally and with people from other
companies. While doing so, securing data exchanges with blockchain will become a must,” said
Pierre-Yves. Blockchain could potentially replace third-party audits adopted to secure data
exchange. Thanks to blockchain, enterprises could find the confidence that they need to fully tap
into the potential of data exchange through CPaaS reassured that their internal and external
communications lines are secured by blockchain smart contracts.  

“Blockchain gives companies greater control over the usage made of their data, encouraging them
to allow more real-time exchanges. This leads to the creation of more value with external
companies,” he added. 

What are the Top CPaaS Trends Awaiting us in 2021?

As the CPaaS industry continues the growth momentum set by last year, we could expect a number
of important trends. CPaaS is by no means a young or nascent market, but new opportunities are
emerging every day, powered by sophisticated APIs, and industry-wide thrust into the cloud, and
growing demand for embedded communication among customers.  

If 2020 marked the coming of age of CPaaS, 2021 is when it really matures, finding as much as 90%
later stage adoption in the next two years.  

When asked about 2021’s top CPaaS trends, Kim Jones from Kandy mentioned a move towards the
ecosystem approach, bringing together multiple comms components seamlessly.  

“There will be a move towards programmable communications that bring together the
UCaaS, CCaaS, and CPaaS worlds. We will see a multi-service world that includes a digital
marketplace and a service layer, along with e-commerce, billing, provisioning, and
configuration APIs” 

Programmable communications will be implemented at a far more rapid clip, said Jones, allowing
CSPs to compete with web or applications services providers. “Faster rollout of programmable
communications offerings through a white-label CPaaS platform will enable CSPs to launch services
in the market at web speed vs traditional telco speed,” she said.  

As a result, CPaaS providers must look at productising themselves

and ease implementation for different business use cases. Jones
believes that a managed services approach will be vital when
catering to mid-to-large enterprise rollouts/migrations – “especially
in complex, multi-site, multinational environments with global PSTN
coverage.”  

In addition to this, she predicts the following four trends in 2021:  

Steady momentum for migrations from on-premise PBX to Kim Jones

UCaaS in the cloud  
More communications and collaboration work being done
remotely and from home, permanently 
 Increased adoption of UCaaS, CCaaS, and CPaaS solutions in key market verticals, such as
financial services, smart cities, and citizen connectivity initiatives in the public sector  
Integration with on-premise EDGE devices for quality assurance and security  

Jonathan Bean from Sinch singled out just one trend that will shape CPaaS in the next twelve
months – “the big trend for 2021 will simply be the exponential growth of CPaaS.” He pointed out
that in 2020, just 20% of global enterprises were leveraging API-enabled CPaaS offerings to enhance
their digital competitiveness. 

This number will rise to 90% by 2023, he said, referring to Gartner forecasts – firmly cementing
CPaaS as a business staple.  

The usual one-way communication model perpetuated by legacy rich communication services (RCS)
could be a thing of the past, making room for a far more sophisticated RCS opportunity. “We can
expect a radical shift among organisations, as they transition from having one-way communication
with their employees and customers to embracing true two-way conversation. This conversational
shift will be enabled through the OTT channels (WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, etc) including the
RCS opportunity, plus chatbot solutions like Chatlayer,” Bean said.  

The implications of this are immense. With the rise of non-call communication channels,
organisations have an opportunity to transform customer experiences while also reducing service
costs as investments are diverted away from expensive call centre solutions. This would allow
CPaaS users to increase revenue and conversion while increasing overall customer satisfaction. 

As Bean put it, “If you’re not already taking advantage of this, why not?” 

Noel Pierre-Yves from Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise noted that CpaaS has successfully brought about
enterprise automation in several cases, and 2021 will only add to this, by enabling secure integration
with external companies and by data-enriching communication services.  

“A lot of automation in enterprises (within their business processes) has already been achieved
using cloud platform adoption and integrating on-premise software,” Pierre-Yves mentioned. “2021
will see 2 elements add even more efficiency to Enterprise automation.” 

These are: 

Automation without borders – “Enterprises will continue automation outside of their own
“borders” by exploring real-time communication integrations within enterprise workflows that
connect with other companies, bringing context and value to people anywhere when they need
it most.” 

Value creation from data – “Hybrid architectures will blur the border between cloud and
premise, securing data exchanges and allowing value creation from various data sources,
including people communications. This will break down data silos in the enterprise
 infrastructure as well, allowing more contextual data to be available to processes for
automation and to people for decision making. Think of CCTVs, room occupancy, access
control, and location-based services, etc.”  

Both these trends are powered by the interaction between programmable comms interfaces and
programmable infrastructure, enabling what Pierre-Yves calls value creation in “the programmable
enterprise.” 

He also discussed how Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise is pursuing this

objective, preparing for these imminent trends of 2021.  

“At Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise International, we will use these

technology trends to build strong technology partnerships in
selected vertical segments. We are convinced that enterprise
comms is a standalone element in the software ecosystem of each
vertical. So, we are organising and investing to develop technology
partnerships in key verticals like healthcare, government, and
Pierre Yves Noel education. This will help us bring communications at the hearts of
our partners’ solutions,” he told us.  

It is this combination of cross-border automation and data-enriched comms that holds tremendous
opportunity for the sector in 2021, transforming “value transmission between people, business
processes and infrastructures.” 

The advent of CPaaS marks a true revolution in how businesses communicate, putting the customer
at the centre of it all. End-customers can expect heightened flexibility when choosing to interact with
their favourite brands here on, without compelling said brands to invest exponential time, effort, or
spends in overhauling their communications infrastructure. The simplicity, extensibility, and the
increasingly stronger security of CPaaS will reach vital information to the hands of the relevant
audience, creating a connected communication ecosystem in 2021.  

We would like to thank Kim Jones, Jonathan Bean, and Noel Pierre-Yves for taking the time out to
share these enlightening insights with our readers.

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