Industry news
Industry news
Headlines from across the customer support and live chat software industry - each links to the original reporting on the publisher's own site, with our one-line take on why it matters.
Zendesk Employee Service AI Agents Are Almost Here. The Employee Portal May Be in Trouble Zendesk's incoming employee-service AI agents could displace dedicated portal tools, folding IT and HR support into a single AI-powered layer. The 3 Security Gaps Enterprises Must Fix to Limit AI Agent Threats Enterprises using AI agents for support must close three specific vulnerabilities before bad actors can manipulate automated workflows or expose customer data. Beyond the Blind Spots: How Agentforce Service and Slack Solve Enterprise Support Silos Salesforce pitches Agentforce Service and Slack as the fix for disconnected support workflows between front-line agents and back-office systems in large enterprises. LivePerson (NASDAQ: LPSN) Pushes Stockholders To Back SoundHound AI (NASDAQ: SOUN) Takeover Before August 20 Vote LivePerson's board is pushing stockholders to approve the SoundHound AI acquisition before the August 20 vote, a deal that reshapes AI-powered customer engagement. SoundHound AI Plans to Update Guidance at Close of LivePerson Acquisition, Which Is Expected Before Yr End SoundHound AI expects to close its LivePerson acquisition before year-end and will then revise financial guidance, marking a near-term consolidation in AI-driven customer support. SoundHound AI (SOUN) Pushes LivePerson Deal As Investor Town Hall Nears SoundHound AI is pressing shareholders to approve its LivePerson takeover, a deal that would fold a major enterprise live-chat platform into a voice AI company. Freshworks named a Leader in Gartner's 2026 Mag... Freshworks' Leader status in Gartner's 2026 Magic Quadrant gives buyers an independent benchmark when shortlisting help-desk vendors. Freshworks Appoints Ryan Manning As Chief Product And Technology Officer Freshworks unifies product and technology under a new CPTO, a structural move that will shape its roadmap for support and CRM tools. Freshworks Will Unite Product and Engineering Under One Leader Aug. 10 Freshworks is consolidating product and engineering under a single leader, a structural move that could accelerate development of its AI-powered help-desk and support tools. Genesys acquires Pinkfish to accelerate agentic AI in contact centers Genesys's Pinkfish acquisition adds agentic automation depth, accelerating its push to automate complex contact centre workflows end-to-end. What Does an AI-Native Contact Center Actually Look Like? Zoom CX Made the Case at CCW 2026 Zoom's CCW 2026 appearance gives support leaders a concrete benchmark for what an AI-native contact centre looks like in practice. Talking Freshworks with CRO - Ian Tickle - Freshworks' CRO sets out the company's go-to-market priorities and how it plans to compete in customer support software. Genesys Buys Pinkfish for Contact Center Automation Second report on the same deal; Genesys gains contact centre automation expertise as competition for agentic AI supremacy intensifies. 65% of Contact Center Leaders Call Their AI Successful. Yet 43% of Projects Are Delayed or Stalled New survey data reveals a wide gap between leaders claiming AI success and actual delivery, flagging an industry-wide execution problem. eGain Announces AI Agent for Zoom Contact Center eGain's AI agent brings knowledge management and guided assistance directly into Zoom's contact center platform for agents. Five9 Launches Voice AI Agents to Replace Contact Center IVR AI voice agents replacing legacy IVR could cut costs and improve call routing for support centers modernising their contact infrastructure. Krisp Expands Contact Center AI Platform With Voice Security and Speech Analytics Krisp's expanded platform brings voice security and speech analytics to contact centres, covering both quality monitoring and conversation protection. What the landmark Google ruling means for contact center AI The landmark Google ruling could shift how AI vendors partner and compete for contact centre deals, with real procurement implications. CX orchestration is the new hard part As AI tools multiply in support stacks, orchestrating them into a seamless customer journey is fast becoming the hardest engineering problem. Big CX News from Salesforce, Cisco, NiCE & Afiniti A multi-vendor CX roundup covering moves from Salesforce, Cisco, NiCE, and Afiniti worth scanning for competitive and product signals. Afiniti Wants to Own Contact Center AI Decisioning Afiniti is staking a claim to the AI decisioning layer within contact centres, a position that could influence routing and outcomes at scale.
Industry headlines from other publications. Each links to the original reporting on the publisher's own site.