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[ October 11, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

Scaling Intelligent Engagement: Infobip’s Blueprint for the AI Era

At CASA25, Boris Maric, Commercial Excellence Officer at Infobip, took the stage with a bold statement: “Conversations are becoming the operating system of customer experience.”

Not the interface. Not the channel. The operating system.

It’s a radical reframing—but one that cuts straight to the heart of what Intelligent Engagement really means in this next era.

And Infobip isn’t just theorizing. They’re building. Testing. Scaling. Pivoting. Because for Boris and the team, it’s clear: if we don’t evolve from messaging to orchestration, someone else will.

From Channels to Conversations to Orchestration

Infobip’s journey is grounded in a simple but powerful insight: conversations are now the homepage of CX.

What used to be done across websites, apps, and disconnected touchpoints is now collapsing into a single thread—literally. One WhatsApp conversation. One RCS flow. One smart agent that knows what you need before you ask.

It’s the convergence of three forces:

  • Conversational Messaging Boom – Already embedded in our daily lives.
  • Messaging Channels Becoming Super Apps – Seamless, in-channel discovery, action, and support.
  • The Rise of Agentic AI – Moving from assistive to autonomous engagement.

This shift means the interface shrinks and the backend complexity explodes. If you’re doing it right, the customer sees a single, simple thread. Behind it: orchestration, personalization, security, failover, and real-time data—powered by a blend of CPaaS infrastructure and generative AI.

Trust. Guide. Act.

Boris introduced a simple but compelling model: Trust, Guide, Act.

It’s not about “blasting messages.” It’s about embedding value inside a conversation.

  • Trust is the entry point—built through verification, branding, and secure network APIs.
  • Guidance comes through rich UI elements: suggested replies, contextual content, personalized flows.
  • Action is the goal: a purchase, a booking, a service interaction, all within one seamless journey.

And when all three align? “The interface shrinks.” One thread. One customer. One intelligent engagement.

From Use Cases to Agentic Workflows

Infobip’s current focus includes:

  • Smart chatbots and AI assistants
  • AI-supported call center flows
  • Fraud detection and prevention (leveraging network APIs)
  • End-to-end campaign orchestration

But Boris emphasized a critical next step: evolving from isolated use cases to agentic workflows.

This means AI doesn’t just support the flow—it becomes the flow. Taking action, triggering transactions, orchestrating across systems.

In a world where AI eats SaaS, that shift becomes existential.

The Hard Truth: CPaaS Must Change

Boris didn’t shy away from the elephant in the room. Growth is slowing. Margins are under pressure. AI isn’t just a buzzword—it’s a disruptor.

AI is disintermediating SaaS, allowing enterprises to build more in-house.

Ecosystems are gaining power, simplifying procurement and increasing stickiness.

Messaging is commoditizing, and unless CPaaS evolves, it risks being relegated to the plumbing.

To lead in this new landscape, CPaaS providers must:

  • Control the omnichannel orchestration layer
  • Extract and leverage the value of first-party and contextual data
  • Accelerate Network API adoption with telcos
  • Build AI-native, agentic solutions that drive outcomes

In Boris’s words: “We need to take the orchestration part and lead the entire industry.”

Redefining CPaaS: Three Layers of Intelligent Engagement

Infobip’s framework to navigate this shift breaks CPaaS into three interconnected layers:

  • Trust Layer – Network APIs and telco-grade infrastructure
  • Omnichannel Layer – Preferred channels, failover scenarios, and real-time adaptability
  • Action Layer – AI and agentic systems that execute, decide, and perform tasks autonomously

The future? Not just richer conversations, but conversational operating systems—fully integrated, intelligent, and outcome-driven.

What’s Holding Us Back?

Despite the vision, there are friction points. Boris didn’t sugarcoat them:

  • Slower telco alignment on Network APIs
  • Regional fragmentation in operator models
  • Lack of orchestration maturity across the stack
  • CPaaS industry inertia: stuck in “messaging” while others build full-stack solutions

But there’s a path forward.

Start with use cases that work.

Build them with startups and risk-takers, not just enterprises.

Orchestrate across channels, data, and AI—and make it seamless.

Final Word: This Is the AI Opportunity

Infobip sees two key accelerants ahead:

Agentic AI – to drive real-time, autonomous action CPaaS as the orchestrator – leading enterprise and telco transformation

And Boris left us with this clear call to action:

“We sit on a ton of data. We already have the infrastructure. The next battle is orchestration. If we win that, we win the future.”

Watch this space. The future of customer experience is being rebuilt—one intelligent conversation at a time.

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Conference
[ October 11, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

What Users Want, Not What We Build: Vonage’s Fight Club Masterclass on Real Outcomes

At CASA25’s now-infamous Fight Club session, the rules were simple:

Don’t talk CPaaS. Talk customers. Talk outcomes. Talk impact.

And Vonage’s Marc Marchal de Corny did exactly that.

In a punchy, practical session, Marc showed what happens when we stop obsessing over technology—and start focusing on what users actually need. From fighting fraud to speeding up onboarding, the message was clear: real-world use cases, measured by real-world results, are what drive adoption. Everything else is noise.

From the First SMS to Today’s Identity Crisis

Marc started with a throwback: the first SMS in 1992. Since then, we’ve created amazing apps, connected billions of devices… yet we’re still authenticating users the same way—via SMS and one-time codes.

But the world has changed.

Fraud is now a $10 trillion industry.

Threats like synthetic identity fraud, social engineering, and OTP interception are everywhere. Yet many businesses still rely on the same outdated flows.

It’s time for something better.

Enter Network APIs: Invisible, Instant, Secure

Vonage’s answer? Network APIs, embedded within their Verify platform. These APIs work silently in the background—using mobile network data to authenticate users without them ever leaving the app, typing a code, or even noticing.

Two standout use cases showed the power of this approach.

Use Case 1: Sumeria (formerly Lydia) – Reducing Fraud, Not UX

Sumeria is France’s leading neobank. Like Revolut, they rely heavily on phone numbers as identity. But that made them vulnerable to account takeover attacks—and created friction in the onboarding process.

What they needed:

✅ Stronger security

✅ Seamless UX

✅ Lower drop-off rates

What Vonage delivered:

  • 🔐 99% reduction in account takeover fraud
  • 🚀 22% drop in sign-up abandonment
  • ⚡ 3–5x faster user authentication
  • 📱 6 million users verified via silent authentication

Crucially, this wasn’t just about swapping SMS for a new API. It was about rethinking the experience, eliminating interruptions, and restoring trust at scale.

Use Case 2: Cabify – Don’t Make Me Wait

For Cabify (the Uber of Latin America and Southern Europe), the challenge wasn’t fraud—it was speed. Travelers arriving at airports needed a ride now, and any delay in sign-up meant lost customers.

With Vonage’s network API-powered flow, Cabify:

  • 🕐 Reduced onboarding time by 50%
  • 🔐 Decreased OTP sharing and fake accounts
  • 📈 Increased sign-up completions
  • 🌍 Reached 50M+ users globally

Fast, secure, and invisible—the authentication just happened, in seconds.

Why Isn’t Everyone Doing This (Yet)?

An audience member nailed the big question:

If the benefits are this obvious, why aren’t all enterprises using this already?

Marc’s answer was honest:

“The use cases have always been there. What’s been missing is the operators’ ability—or willingness—to deliver at scale.”

But let’s be clear—this is not just a supply-side issue.

Even when the APIs are available, adoption takes time. Because switching is not just a technical decision—it’s a strategic transformation. It means:

  • Updating customer journeys
  • Rethinking identity models
  • Aligning with compliance and legal
  • Getting buy-in from risk, procurement, and CX teams
  • Proving ROI to business stakeholders

And that means we, as an industry, have to do more than just ship APIs.

We need to:

  • Talk benefits, not backend systems
  • Explain outcomes, not architectures
  • Guide customers through the entire change journey—not just integration

From CPaaS to Intelligent Engagement

What Marc gave us wasn’t a product pitch. It was a live case study in intelligent engagement.

It’s not about replacing SMS. It’s not about voice vs. data. It’s not even about CPaaS.

It’s about delivering value faster—for both the business and the end user.

Whether it’s signing up for a neobank, hailing a cab, or verifying identity across channels, the winning strategy is always the same:

  • Invisible tech.
  • Seamless UX.
  • Measurable results.

That’s intelligent engagement in action.

And that’s what the future of this industry needs more of.

Final Word: It’s Time to Work Together

If we want network APIs—and intelligent engagement more broadly—to go mainstream, we need a new playbook.

It’s not enough to build great tools.

We need to embed them into outcomes.

To work across teams, not just tech stacks.

And to support customers every step of the way, from idea to implementation.

Because in the end, it’s not about what we can build.

It’s about what users actually need.

And that’s where the real fight is.

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[ October 11, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

From Connectivity to Outcomes: Vonage’s Vision for the Next Cloud Era of Telecom

At CASA25, Vonage’s new CMO Neelam Sandhu took the stage to deliver the first industry keynote—and reframed the room’s expectations from the very start.

Yes, the talk touched on network APIs, CPaaS, and 5G. But more than that, it was a wake-up call: the telecom industry needs to stop selling features and start delivering outcomes. It needs to stop defining itself by what it connects—and start defining itself by what it enables.

This, Neelam explained, is where Intelligent Engagement begins: not as a tool or a trend, but as a way of thinking about how mobile networks can finally fulfill their potential in the digital economy. The same way cloud computing reshaped every industry over the past 20 years, mobile networks could reshape the next 20. If, that is, the industry can think—and act—like a platform.

1. What Cloud Did for Digital, Mobile Can Do Next

Neelam drew a powerful analogy between the rise of cloud and the untapped potential of mobile networks. Cloud computing didn’t succeed because it was technically clever. It succeeded because it unlocked new value—speed, flexibility, scale—for every business model it touched.

Today, mobile networks have that same potential. The building blocks are ready:

  • 5G is now deployed in over 80% of high-income countries
  • Programmable network APIs are being exposed
  • Cloud and AI have matured enough to bring intelligence into the network layer

“The cloud unlocked AI. Now cloud and AI can unlock the network,” Neelam said.

It’s not a metaphor. It’s a market signal. The mobile network is ready to become the next digital platform. And just like cloud, that platform needs an abstraction layer—a way for developers, startups, and enterprises to build on top of it without needing to understand how it works under the hood.

That’s where Vonage, Ericsson, and Aduna come in.

2. Vonage’s New Role: The Abstraction Layer for the Network

Vonage, under Neelam’s leadership, is no longer positioning itself as just another CPaaS player. It’s now the interface—the business-facing layer—for a full-stack platform that spans from physical network to digital engagement.

Vonage’s tech stack includes:

  • UCaaS: foundational communication channels
  • CCaaS / vertical engagement platforms: tailored to industries like healthcare, retail, and finance
  • CPaaS & APIs: the programmable glue
  • Network APIs: the new addition—connecting directly into Ericsson-enabled mobile network functions

In short: Vonage is helping turn networks into platforms, just as AWS turned servers into services.

And the key to unlocking this platform value isn’t jargon—it’s storytelling, use cases, and real-world outcomes.

3. From CPaaS to Outcomes

Neelam was candid: “If I say CPaaS on stage, I should have to put a coin in a jar.”

That’s because the CPaaS label no longer captures what the industry needs. It’s not about enabling programmable messaging—it’s about designing communication journeys that adapt to context, intent, and industry needs.

Whether that’s a first responder securely transmitting diagnostics from an ambulance, or a bank proactively engaging a customer before fraud occurs, the focus is shifting:

🛑 From APIs

✅ To orchestration

🛑 From features

✅ To outcomes

This is where Intelligent Engagement becomes more than a marketing term—it becomes the north star.

4. Aduna and the Role of Aggregation

One of the most important enablers of this transformation is Aduna, the global telco joint venture built to standardize and simplify access to network APIs.

Aduna is already:

  • Live in 17 countries
  • Working with 37 telco partners
  • Supporting 23+ APIs across network and comms layers

Much like cloud providers created standardized, scalable compute and storage APIs, Aduna is doing the same for telco capabilities like quality-on-demand, location, number verification, and more.

Neelam’s message was clear: fragmentation kills adoption. Aggregation creates markets.

And if we’re serious about making the network the next digital platform, developers need a trusted, unified interface to build on. That’s what Aduna delivers.

5. AI: Woven In, Not Bolted On

When asked about AI’s role in all this, Neelam made a key distinction:

“AI isn’t the headline. It’s a pillar.”

Rather than pushing AI as a buzzword, Vonage is embedding it across its stack:

  • In smarter routing
  • In real-time personalization
  • In predictive engagement logic
  • In tools that make human and machine agents work better together

Just like cloud became essential infrastructure, AI is becoming embedded intelligence. What matters now is how well it integrates into the communication fabric—and how much it improves the experience, not just the efficiency.

6. The Cultural Shift: From Telco to Tech

Beyond the technology, Neelam called for a mindset shift.

“We need to stop thinking like telcos. We need to start thinking like tech companies.”

This means:

  • Partnering across traditional boundaries
  • Moving faster
  • Building ecosystems, not just selling capabilities
  • Speaking in use cases, not layers
  • Seeing communications as an enabler of digital transformation, not just another service line

It also means being bold—possibly acquiring AI startups, reshaping business models, or experimenting with monetization strategies that look more like cloud marketplaces than telecom pricing sheets.

Final Reflection:

Neelam’s keynote didn’t just explain where Vonage is heading—it outlined the path for the entire industry.

The next era of growth won’t be led by those with the most APIs, or the most telco partners. It will be led by those who understand what all this technology is actually for—creating meaningful, trusted, real-time engagement between people and brands, machines and moments.

That’s the real transformation. That’s the new standard.

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[ October 10, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

Beyond the Buzz: How Agentic AI Will Transform Trust, Identity, and the Customer Journey

At CASA25, amid the intense discussions on network APIs, GTM models, and CPaaS monetization, one panel stood out for its mix of raw honesty, technical depth, and forward-looking pragmatism: Agentic AI — Consent, Identity & Trust.

Moderated with humor and curiosity by Kyle Nel of Sandbox Industries, this panel cut through the AI hype and tackled the hard questions: What really makes AI “agentic”? How do enterprises get started without getting lost? And how do we prepare humans — not just machines — for the agentic era?

Here are the highlights and takeaways from the session featuring:

  • Kyle Nel (Sandbox) – Moderator, venture investor, AI outsider-turned-ally
  • Adnan Saleem (Radisys) – CTO of Software & Cloud Solutions
  • Mark Castleman (Intel) – Ecosystem lead for AI and deep tech
  • Olaf Wallaart (CM.com) – Lead Data Scientist, Agentic AI platform
  • Remco Magielse (GLBNXT) – Startup founder tackling the “proof of concept to scale” gap

🔁 From AI Hype to Agentic Reality

Kyle opened the discussion with a simple question: “Who here is actually using agentic AI?” A few hands went up — but more had used AI in their personal lives. As he noted, the consumer world is once again leading the enterprise, signaling what’s to come.

But as Olaf Wallaart pointed out, most organizations are still trying to figure out the basics — how to write a proper prompt. The magic agent that handles everything on its own? “It doesn’t exist,” said Castleman. “You need a hundred agents, each tuned to a specific outcome, with checkpoints along the way. It’s a recipe — not a single ingredient.”

Agentic AI isn’t just a smarter chatbot. It’s the orchestration of intelligent agents capable of executing tasks, calling APIs, and interacting with other systems. But the infrastructure of most businesses — especially telcos — is still too fragmented, siloed, and legacy-heavy to support this at scale.

🎯 Where to Start: Low Complexity, High Impact

Remco’s team uses a simple framework to assess use cases: map complexity vs. impact. The goal? Find the “wow” moments — high-impact wins that are easy to implement and explain on a single slide.

“You don’t want safe,” he said. “You want something that gets people to go: Whoa, this changes how we work.”

Adnan echoed the point: “Don’t aim for sci-fi agents yet. Start with low-hanging fruit that improves productivity, then build from there.” Internal tools — like secure ChatGPT-style assistants — are often the best starting point.

🧠 AI Literacy Is the New Digital Literacy

The panel agreed that a huge part of the challenge is human, not technical. We’ve spent decades teaching people to write short keyword queries. Now, we must teach them to write long, rich prompts — to treat machines like collaborators, not search engines.

Olaf shared how CM.com formed an internal AI team tasked with helping every department identify their top problems — then co-create solutions. “They become like a beacon of AI, promoting ideas, showing what’s possible, and building internal momentum.”

Training helps. Practice is better. And curiosity is the ultimate success signal.

“Curious people engage deeply,” said Castleman. “Transactional ones don’t. Look across your org — who’s asking better questions? Those are your early adopters.”

⚙️ Infrastructure, ROI, and the Spaghetti Stack

Agentic AI reveals the cracks in enterprise systems. Legacy platforms, dirty data, and siloed infrastructure become instantly visible when you try to automate tasks end-to-end.

Castleman explained it through the lens of ROI: the cost per token per watt changes radically based on the task. Complex reasoning needs exponentially more compute — and therefore more budget. That’s why enterprises freeze: they can’t yet model the risk of going below-zero on ROI.

“The agent is the chef,” he said. “But you have to account for the entire supply chain behind each ingredient. And if the recipe isn’t worth the cost, you kill the project.”

🤝 Telcos: From Dumb Pipes to Agentic Enablers

The final part of the panel tackled the telco opportunity. As Castleman put it bluntly: “In the old app era, telcos lost because they tried to figure out the apps instead of enabling them. This time, they need to expose all the little levers and let the agents go wild.”

Agentic AI breaks apps down into atomic functions. Telcos and CPaaS players sit on a goldmine of these functions — but they must make them available as APIs that agents can trigger.

Identity, trust, and consent become key. As Olaf noted, telco networks have something unique: reliable identity. That’s a massive asset in an era where bots can imitate humans — and vice versa.

🧪 Final Words: It’s About Agency — Not Just AI

The last round of the panel shifted from tech to philosophy.

“If done right, AI gives us back our agency,” said Olaf. “We get to build quickly without begging for budget. We get to focus on what’s fun and impactful.”

AI might reduce cost. But the panel’s message was clear: it’s about productivity, creativity, and revenue growth — not just optimization.

And it’s about people. Give them tools. Train them. Let the curious ones lead.

Because in the end, agentic AI isn’t just software. It’s a shift in how we work, build, and think.

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[ October 10, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

“Why Telcos Keep Failing at Innovation — and How to Fix It”

Insights from Gamma, Sandbox Industries, and Intel at CASA25

When you put a telco CEO, a venture capitalist, and a technology investor on the same stage and ask them to “fix telco innovation,” you don’t expect consensus.

At CASA25, Nicolai Schaettgen (Match-Maker Ventures) did just that—casting Mike Mills (Gamma) as the telco CEO, Dan Phillips (Sandbox Industries) as the corporate shareholder, and Mark Castleman (Intel) as the tech and investment veteran.

The result was an unfiltered reality check on why innovation in communications keeps stalling—and what needs to change.

1. The innovation illusion

Telcos, Mills admitted, know where they want to go—but can’t always find how to get there.

“We know our strategy. We know the direction. What’s missing is finding capabilities that aren’t mainstream—investing where one plus one can become three.”

For years, telcos have poured money into “innovation” through corporate venture capital (CVC) arms, incubators, and R&D labs. But the hit rate is abysmal.

Why? Because most telcos still apply improvement logic to innovation problems.

2. You can’t get ice cream from a meat grinder

Castleman, who’s raised hundreds of millions as a founder and investor, put it bluntly:

“Large systems like telcos are designed to improve what they do, not to deviate. Every output is the perfect output of that system. If you want something different, you need a different system.”

Innovation, he argued, means deviation, not optimization. You can’t expect a compliance-driven, quarterly-report-focused machine to suddenly start taking moonshots.

“You can’t put ice cream ingredients into a meat grinder and expect ice cream,” he joked. “You need a different system.”

The reason most corporate venture units fail is because they’re still tethered to the parent company’s antibodies—its incentives, KPIs, and politics.

3. Why telco CVCs don’t work

When Schaettgen asked who would still set up a corporate venture fund, none of the panelists raised a hand.

Castleman:

“If I’m not in the business of making bets, how am I suddenly going to succeed at venture investing? Better to put that capital into professional funds that already have access, insight, and deal flow.”

In other words, invest in the investors.

Don’t pretend to be one.

For telcos, the goal isn’t financial return—it’s access to innovation.

That access can be achieved far more effectively by becoming a limited partner (LP) in specialized funds or joining curated ecosystems—like the CPaaS Acceleration Alliance—where visibility, not ownership, creates advantage.

4. What shareholders actually want

Phillips, representing the shareholder view, described the telco dilemma succinctly:

“My focus is growth and margin. My frustration is that telcos build the infrastructure, but others capture the 90 percent gross margins and giant exits.”

To many investors, telcos look like annuities—slow-growth, dividend-paying utilities.

When those companies start putting cash into “high-risk, low-promise” innovation bets, shareholders see it as their dividend being spent.

The smarter play?

Spread smaller investments across a wider ecosystem. Gain visibility into innovation rather than trying to control it.

“What you really want is clarity so you can reduce your five-year risk horizon,” Castleman said. “Spread visibility of access—not ownership.”

5. What it takes to absorb innovation

Even if telcos partner with external innovators, success depends on internal readiness.

Phillips warned that without structure and leadership commitment, innovation dies in the middle:

“There needs to be organizational buy-in from the CEO down, and a process for working with startups—or scaleups. Otherwise, things stall after a few pilots.”

That means:

Dedicated processes for contracting and onboarding smaller partners (not the same RFP that takes three years for a core system). Clear KPIs for pilots—defined outcomes, time limits, and ownership. Different language—talk about scaleups and tech partners, not startups. The word alone is a red flag in boardrooms.

Mills agreed:

“The clash between telcos’ need for scale and compliance and a startup’s need for speed is very real. Managing that cultural challenge is hard—but necessary.”

6. Startups: grow up

The other half of the problem lies with the innovators themselves.

Castleman reminded founders that working with a telco isn’t a playground—it’s mission-critical infrastructure.

“If your network goes down for minutes, you can calculate churn by the minute. Startups need to stop acting like startups and start acting like grown-ups.”

Innovation doesn’t mean chaos. The goal isn’t to stay a startup forever—it’s to mature fast enough to meet enterprise-grade standards.

As he quipped:

“A six-year-old startup is a startup that’s been failing for four years.”

7. The CPaaS angle: sell outcomes, not features

Finally, the conversation turned to the CPaaS perspective.

Castleman reframed how platform players should approach telcos:

“If I’m a CPaaS player, I’m going to go to the telco CEO and say: I understand your outcome. I’ll help you achieve that with X percent more growth. Let’s define it together and hold me accountable.”

This is the opposite of a typical tech pitch—no laundry list of APIs, no “400 tools to help you do more.”

It’s co-creation around measurable outcomes.

And it’s exactly how intelligent engagement and network-API ecosystems need to evolve.

8. The CASA25 takeaway: change the system

Schaettgen closed the session by thanking the panel for the candid discussion—and for playing along with his “role-play therapy for telcos.”

The verdict was unanimous:

Stop building CVCs that mimic VCs but operate like procurement departments. Invest in visibility through specialized funds and innovation alliances. Build internal processes that can actually absorb external innovation. Speak the right language—scaleups, not startups; outcomes, not ideas. Remember: innovation isn’t about tweaking the machine. It’s about building a new one.

Epilogue: From CASA25 to CASA26

The conversation at CASA25 echoed a growing truth across the industry: the future belongs to ecosystems that can learn faster than any single company can innovate alone.

As capital, cloud, and communications continue to converge, the winners will be those who stop guarding the gate—and start opening it.

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BusinessConference
[ October 10, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

From Vision to Action: CPaaSAA and Sandbox Industries Launch Strategic Innovation Partnership

A new collaboration to unlock industry-wide impact through targeted investments and customer-backed innovation.

At the close of Day One at CASA25, as the lights dimmed and attendees leaned into what they thought was the final moment, one more thing took the stage.

Kevin Nethercott, Managing Partner of CPaaS Acceleration Alliance, and Chris Zock, Co-CEO of Sandbox Industries, made it official: a new strategic partnership between the Alliance and Sandbox has commenced — aimed squarely at driving innovation in the communications industry through targeted collaboration.

A Shared Vision for Impact

Since its inception, CPaaSAA has challenged its members to think beyond today—to ask not only how to grow, but how to shape the future. As Kevin put it during the announcement:

“We’ve talked for years about how we can make a real impact on the industry. About how we ensure the startups that don’t even exist today become our biggest customers in 3–5 years. This partnership with Sandbox is how we make that future possible.”

The partnership is built on more than capital—it’s about aligning strategic problems with entrepreneurial solutions, and doing it in a way that’s tailored to the realities of regulated industries like telecoms.

Why Sandbox?

Sandbox Industries has deep roots in complex, regulated markets like healthcare and insurance. With over 20 years of experience, their model has centered on forming coalitions of corporates with shared challenges and goals—then matching them with the right startups and scaleups, and investing in ways that create real alignment.

Chris Zock summarized their approach simply:

“We help companies in highly regulated industries achieve their strategic goals—primarily by helping them harness innovation. And we do that by pairing capital with customers and backing it with deep domain understanding.”

One example Chris shared was a startup that went from $500K to over $1B in recurring revenue in seven years—precisely because it was backed not just by funding, but by a community of engaged customers who helped it learn, scale, and refine quickly.

Now, Sandbox and CPaaSAA aim to apply the same strategic engagement model to the world of cloud communications, CPaaS, and telco innovation.

Not Just Another Venture Fund

Unlike generalist tech VCs chasing the latest AI or API buzzword, Sandbox and CPaaSAA are aligned on a different mission: solving real strategic problems with startups that can scale within and across telcos, service providers, and enterprise communications ecosystems.

“When Chris started talking about solving strategic issues—not just funding cool AI tech—we knew we had found the right partner,” Kevin noted. “This is why we built the Alliance in the first place.”

The partnership isn’t focused on chasing trends. CPaaSAA and Sandbox aim to serve as a catalyst for transformation—supporting companies that can partner with CPaaSAA members to solve their top challenges in customer experience, go-to-market models, security, AI, and more.

What Happens Next?

Over the coming weeks, the joint CPaaSAA-Sandbox team will begin discussions with members interested in learning more about the partnership. Chris issued a simple invitation during the session:

“If this sounds like a good fit for your organization, we’d love to have a one-on-one call. Come with your top 3 strategic challenges—what you’d love to solve with the right entrepreneurial partner. From there, we’ll share more details and explore where we can go together.”

Kevin closed the announcement with a call to action for the entire CPaaS community:

“We believe this is how we create real, lasting impact. This isn’t just about funding startups—it’s about helping all of us become more relevant to our customers, and shaping what the next 100 years of communications looks like.”

Join the Movement

As the industry evolves from cloud-first to AI-native, and from APIs to intelligent engagement, CPaaSAA’s partnership with Sandbox represents a strategic leap forward—bringing new tools, new partnerships, and new opportunities to everyone in the ecosystem.

Members and partners interested in learning more can reach out directly to schedule a conversation. And if you missed the fireside chat—don’t worry, we’ll be sharing video highlights and updates in the coming weeks.

Because the future isn’t just invented. It’s invested in.

And with the right partners, it’s accelerated.

[ September 18, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

Vconic Launches to Bring vCons Into the Mainstream — And to CASA25

A new chapter in communications technology has begun. Vconic, a spin-off from Strolid, has officially launched with one clear mission: to bring vCons — conversation containers — into the commercial world. At the helm is Thomas Howe, now CTO of Vconic, who has long been one of the driving forces behind The vCon Foundation.

Thomas isn’t going it alone. He’s joined by two legends in technology: the father of modern messaging and the co-founder of MapQuest. With this team, Vconic is positioning itself to turn vCons from an emerging standard into the backbone of how conversations are stored, shared, and analyzed.

What Exactly Is a vCon?

Think about how we treat images. You don’t wonder which app took the photo or which vendor stored it — you just save or share the JPEG file, because the format made images universal.

A vCon does the same thing for conversations. Instead of a picture, a vCon file contains the full context of an interaction:

  • Media: the voice recording, text transcript, or video
  • Metadata: participants, timestamps, channels
  • Compliance details: disclosures, rules, regulatory tags
  • Context: AI-derived insights like sentiment, intent, or outcomes

In short: a vCon is a conversation in a box — portable, self-contained, and ready to be stored, analyzed, or moved anywhere.

Papa in a Box

The origin of vCons — and one of its most compelling stories — comes from Strolid itself. The “Papa in a box” idea refers to Vin Micciche’s father, a veteran of the automotive sales world. Over decades, he built up deep expertise in how dealership conversations with customers worked: what questions mattered, how tone changed decisions, and which responses drove trust and sales.

When Vin thought about his father eventually retiring, he realized all of this tacit knowledge risked disappearing. Unless those conversations could be captured, stored, and analyzed, the insights inside them would be lost forever.

So the vision was born: put Papa’s conversations in a box. Capture every call with customers — the audio, the transcript, the context, the compliance — and package them in a standardized format. That way, Papa’s expertise doesn’t just vanish; it lives on, and can be used to train new employees, improve customer experiences, and even fuel AI systems.

That simple, personal idea became the foundation for vCons: making conversations durable, portable, and intelligent.

Why vCons Matter — And Why They Matter Now

Conversations have been digital for decades, but two forces are converging to make vCons urgent today:

  1. Compliance pressure is exploding. In finance, healthcare, telecom, and beyond, regulators demand proof of what was said, who said it, and whether rules were followed. Having conversations scattered across different platforms makes this nearly impossible. With vCons, every interaction can be packaged into a verifiable, portable record — a compliance file as easy to handle as a PDF.
  2. AI needs structured data. AI can’t thrive on messy, siloed transcripts. It needs clean, standardized, contextual data to process, analyze, and understand conversations at scale. vCons provide exactly that — the raw material for agent assist, intelligent automation, and next-gen customer experience.

Put together, compliance and AI create the burning need for vCons right now. Without them, enterprises face risk and missed opportunity. With them, they gain trust, insights, and competitive advantage.

And crucially, vCons are not just an idea — they are an IETF standard-track protocol, just like SIP, HTTP, and SMTP. That places them firmly in the lineage of the protocols that built the internet and global voice.

From Strolid to Vconic: The Next Step

The idea of vCons was incubated at Strolid, where the standard was developed and the vCon Foundation was created to steward it through the IETF.

With the launch of Vconic, the focus shifts from theory and standards to real-world adoption. This is the commercial engine that will help enterprises, telcos, and service providers embed vCons into products and workflows.

The involvement of heavyweight technology leaders underscores how critical this step is. It’s about moving vCons from concept to industry-wide practice.

vCons at CASA25

The launch of Vconic couldn’t be better timed. At CASA25 in Amsterdam (September 22–24), vCons will take center stage as one of the most anticipated themes of the program.

  • The vCon Foundation is a Silver Sponsor of CASA25 — showing its commitment to driving this standard forward.
  • Keynote: Thomas Howe will introduce vCons, the journey from Strolid to Vconic, and why this matters for compliance and AI in the future of communications.
  • Dedicated track time: A good part of the first afternoon of CASA25 will be focused on vCons, with panels exploring real-world use cases, compliance needs, and business implications.
  • Hands-on workshop: For those who want to dive deeper, a workshop will give participants the chance to explore the nuts and bolts of vCons in practice.

CASA25’s DNA is “less talk, more impact” — and vCons embody this, moving quickly from idea to adoption in real business contexts.

The Power of Ecosystems

No standard succeeds on technology alone — it takes an ecosystem. That’s what makes The vCon Foundation so powerful: it brings together developers, vendors, enterprises, and regulators to make vCons universal.

But ecosystems also need scale. That’s where the CPaaS Acceleration Alliance (CPaaSAA) comes in. As the umbrella that connects telcos, CPaaS providers, enterprises, analysts, and investors, CPaaSAA gives The vCon Foundation the platform it needs to reach bigger audiences, gain traction, and translate vision into industry-wide results.

At CASA25, that ecosystem is coming together. With The vCon Foundation as a sponsor, Vconic as a commercial driver, and CPaaSAA providing the connective tissue, we’re laying the groundwork for vCons to become the next SIP — the next trillion-dollar standard that redefines communications for the AI era.

Looking Ahead

Just as SIP unlocked global voice and fueled a trillion-dollar industry, vCons — as an IETF standards-track protocol — are positioned to underpin the next two decades of AI-driven communications.

The question isn’t if vCons will become universal, but how quickly. And the driving forces are clear:

  • Compliance is non-negotiable.
  • AI is inevitable.
  • Ecosystems turn standards into industries.

At CASA25, we’ll begin answering the key questions:

  • How fast can vCons be adopted?
  • Which industries will lead the way?
  • What new business models will emerge when conversations become truly portable and intelligent?

The answers start here — with Vconic, The vCon Foundation, and the CPaaSAA community.

👉 Read more in Thomas Howe’s guest blog.

👉 Join us in Amsterdam for CASA25, September 22–24 — where vCons and AI meet the real world.

[ September 17, 2025 by Rob Kurver 0 Comments ]

Purpose Over Tech: A Conversation with Neelam Sandhu, CMO of Vonage

When Vonage recently announced Neelam Sandhu as their new Chief Marketing Officer, it marked more than just a leadership change. It signaled a shift in how one of the most recognized names in cloud communications wants to show up in the industry: not with more product specs or technical jargon, but with purpose.

In our latest CPaaSAA Talk, I had the privilege of sitting down with Neelam. What struck me immediately is that she doesn’t default to speeds, feeds, or features. Instead, she speaks about people, culture, and outcomes. And that feels refreshing in an industry that often risks drowning in its own acronyms.

Why Vonage?

Neelam shared that when she chooses a company to join, she looks for three things:

  1. Culture – Integrity, authenticity, and a shared sense of purpose.
  2. Leadership – Leadership that is visionary and principled, inspiring action and building trust.
  3. Vision & Purpose – A reason for being that is industry defining, and connects business results and global progress.

Vonage, she said, ticks all three boxes. Having spent just over two months in the role, she affirmed that the decision has already lived up to its promise.

And there’s an additional dimension: Vonage is part of the Ericsson family. That means the company’s purpose extends well beyond CPaaS—it’s about bringing communications innovation into the very fabric of the global mobile ecosystem. The mobile tech world is at the heart of digital life, and Vonage’s role is about shaping how that world works with purpose at a global scale.

Purpose as the Anchor

For Neelam, purpose isn’t marketing spin. It’s the compass. Vonage’s heritage is well known, but its next chapter isn’t about nostalgia—it’s about relevance. She sees Vonage as uniquely positioned to empower enterprises and developers to transform how they engage with customers.

What does that mean in practice? It means focusing on why communications matter: enabling access to healthcare through virtual care, helping education go borderless, supporting businesses to connect with customers in moments that really matter.

Marketing with Integrity

One phrase that stayed with me from our talk: “Marketing is not just about telling the world what you do, but showing the world why it matters.”

Too often in the CPaaS space, marketing collapses into buzzwords. AI, APIs, omnichannel—it can quickly become noise. Neelam wants Vonage to cut through that by staying anchored in real-world impact stories. It’s less about how advanced the platform is, and more about what the platform enables.

APIs Don’t Sell Themselves

Another important point Neelam raised: APIs themselves do not sell. The myth of “build it and they will come” simply doesn’t work in our industry. Publishing a library of APIs is not enough. What matters is enabling founders, developers, and enterprises to succeed with those APIs.

That means providing more than documentation. It means storytelling, playbooks, go-to-market support, and ecosystems where innovation can thrive. It’s about guiding startups, scaleups, and enterprises not just to use an API, but to turn it into a business outcome.

This is especially true when it comes to Network APIs—the very place where telcos and CPaaS providers meet. APIs can open access to network capabilities, but without use cases, business models, and support for the innovators who will turn them into solutions, they won’t drive adoption or value. Neelam’s stance underlines the same conviction we hold at CPaaSAA: it takes a collective effort to turn APIs into industry-wide outcomes.

Why This Resonates with CPaaSAA

This philosophy mirrors what we’ve been striving for at CPaaSAA. Our focus has never been to compete on specs but on outcomes.

  • Use Cases First: Like Neelam, we believe the real power of CPaaS is in the stories—the ways telcos, service providers, and enterprises use communications to drive business results, not just the APIs they expose.
  • Outcomes & Playbooks Over Specs: Our Service Provider Playbook, case directories, and working groups are designed around impact, not technology checklists. That’s why we talk about healthcare adoption, fraud prevention, and AI-driven customer engagement—not about protocol stacks.
  • Intelligent Engagement as a North Star: Just as Neelam frames Vonage’s purpose as enabling outcomes, we frame CPaaSAA’s mission as driving Intelligent Engagement. This means guiding the industry toward a future where customer interactions are not only seamless but meaningful, contextual, and valuable.
  • Supporting Founders and Developers: Our ecosystem work goes beyond APIs. Like Neelam, we believe that nurturing founders and their ideas—through frameworks, mentorship, and shared industry knowledge—is key to scaling CPaaS innovation.

That’s why there was such an immediate click in our conversation. We’re aligned on what matters most: not the technology itself, but the transformation it unlocks.

CAVE: Continuing the Conversation

I’m especially looking forward to continuing this dialogue with Neelam in our CAVE sessions (CPaaS Acceleration Visionary Exchange). These private, high-level conversations bring together the most strategic voices in our ecosystem. Neelam’s perspective—bridging Vonage, Ericsson, and the global mobile community—will add enormous depth to how we shape the State of CPaaS and align on what comes next.

Looking Ahead

As Vonage steps into its next chapter under Neelam’s marketing leadership, I expect to see a sharper narrative: less “what we do,” more “why it matters.” This is not just smart positioning—it’s necessary. In a crowded space, purpose is what resonates and sticks.

At CPaaSAA, we’ve always believed that the future of this industry isn’t just about platforms or APIs. It’s about the stories we tell, the value we unlock, and the human outcomes we deliver. Neelam Sandhu’s voice adds weight to that belief.

And the timing couldn’t be better. Neelam will deliver the opening keynote at CASA25 next week in Amsterdam, setting the tone for two powerful days of inspiration, insights, and impact. It’s the perfect stage to showcase how purpose, intelligent engagement, and Network APIs can come together to guide not just Vonage, but the entire ecosystem, toward a more meaningful future.

👉 I, for one, am looking forward to seeing how Vonage—and the wider industry—rise to this challenge. And I can’t wait for Neelam’s keynote to kick CASA25 into motion.