All news in category "Vendor and Hyperscaler Watch"

Real-Time Cloud Detection and Response from CrowdStrike

🚨 CrowdStrike announced new cloud detection and response capabilities aimed at reducing mean time to respond (MTTR) and improving protection across hybrid and multi-cloud environments. The release highlights two headline features: Real‑Time Cloud Detections in Falcon Cloud Security and Automated Cloud Response Actions. CrowdStrike says streaming detections, an expanded library of real‑time IOAs and Falcon Fusion SOAR workflows — augmented by its agentic AI Charlotte AI — enable faster, cross‑domain triage and control‑plane remediation.

AWS and Google Cloud Launch Joint Multicloud Networking

🔗 AWS and Google Cloud announced a jointly engineered multicloud networking solution that integrates AWS Interconnect - multicloud with Google Cloud’s Cross-Cloud Interconnect. The collaboration introduces an open API specification to automate private, high-speed connectivity and shifts multicloud setup from physical circuits to a managed, cloud-native experience. Customers can provision dedicated bandwidth in minutes via console or API, while the service enforces quad redundancy and MACsec encryption for secure, highly available links. The APIs are published openly for other providers and partners to adopt.

Google and AWS Launch Managed Cross-Cloud Interconnect

🔗 Google Cloud and Amazon Web Services have jointly previewed the Cross‑Cloud Interconnect for AWS, a managed, on‑demand service that provisions private, secure connections between Google Cloud VPCs and AWS VPCs in minutes. The collaboration is published under an open specification to enable partner contributions and wider industry adoption. Preview bandwidth begins at 1 Gbps and will scale to 100 Gbps at GA, with MACsec encryption and managed key rotation as default security controls. The offering emphasizes simplicity, quad‑redundancy, and managed operations to reduce setup from days to minutes.

Amazon Connect adds business-controlled custom UIs

🔧 Amazon Connect now enables business users to create and use custom UIs to adjust queues, routing, and customer-experience settings in real time without technical resources. Administrators can define key configurations in data tables and expose role-specific actions through persona-based workspaces to maintain governance and security. These capabilities are available in all AWS regions where Amazon Connect is offered.

Amazon Connect Chat Adds Agent-Initiated Workflows

🔔 Amazon Connect Chat now supports agent-initiated workflows, allowing agents to send interactive forms and present policies or disclosures directly within an active chat so customers can provide sensitive or general information without leaving the conversation. Agents can trigger workflows at any point, making interactions more dynamic and reducing resolution time. By keeping data collection inside the chat, businesses can better preserve security and compliance controls while improving customer experience. The capability is available now in multiple AWS regions.

Amazon Connect Adds Native Testing and Simulation Tools

🧪 Amazon Connect now includes native testing and simulation capabilities that let teams validate contact center workflows, voice self-service, and business conditions with just a few clicks. You can configure caller identity, customer profile, intent (for example “I need to check my order status”), expected responses, and scenarios such as after-hours or full queues. Tests return pass/fail outcomes, execution paths, and detailed logs, and multiple tests can run concurrently to accelerate validation at scale.

Amazon Connect adds automated email responses and routing

📧 Amazon Connect now supports automated email responses and routing driven by keyword and phrase conditions. Administrators can add the Get stored content block and combine it with flow constructs such as Check contact attributes and Send message to configure automated replies and routing logic. For example, common queries about product availability or shipment status can be answered without agent involvement, helping increase self‑service, reduce manual handling time, and improve routing accuracy across supported regions.

Amazon Connect adds in-flight chat redaction and processing

🔒 Amazon Connect now intercepts chat messages before delivery to enable automatic sensitive-data redaction and custom message processing. The built-in redaction detects entities such as credit card and social security numbers across multiple language variants and can replace them with generic or entity-specific placeholders (e.g., [PII] or [NAME]). Businesses can also integrate custom processors for translation, profanity filtering, or other transformations to meet compliance and CX needs. The feature is available in multiple AWS regions.

Amazon Connect Adds AI-Powered Case Summaries for Agents

🤖 Amazon Connect now offers AI-powered case summaries that let agents generate concise, multi-interaction case overviews with a single click. Summaries capture issue background, actions taken, follow-ups, and recommended next steps to reduce manual wrap-up and speed resolutions. Administrators can configure custom prompts and guardrails to enforce organizational style and compliance.

Amazon Connect adds AI agent assistance and summarization

🤖 Amazon Connect now offers real-time AI agent assistance and automated contact summarization for Salesforce Contact Center with Amazon Connect (SCC-AC). The capability surfaces customer CRM records and knowledge-base articles to AI agents across voice and chat and provides agents with live transcripts and contextual recommendations. Supervisors gain enhanced call monitoring inside Salesforce, and automated post-contact summaries help agents quickly update cases, reducing administrative burden. Administrators can deploy and configure the integrated solution in minutes; it is available in all AWS Regions where Amazon Connect operates.

Amazon Connect adds Bedrock knowledge base integration

📘 Amazon Connect now supports connecting existing Amazon Bedrock Knowledge Bases directly to AI agents and allows multiple knowledge bases per agent. You can attach Bedrock KBs in a few clicks with no additional setup or data duplication, and leverage Bedrock connectors such as Adobe Experience Manager, Confluence, SharePoint, and OneDrive. With multiple KBs per agent, AI agents can query several sources in parallel for more comprehensive responses. This capability is available in all AWS Regions where both services are offered.

Amazon Connect adds agentic self-service with Nova Sonic

🤖 Amazon Connect introduces agentic self-service capabilities that enable AI agents to understand, reason, and take action across voice and messaging channels to automate routine and complex customer-service tasks. Nova Sonic speech models deliver more natural, expressive, and adaptive voice interactions that respond to customer tone, sentiment, and pacing across languages and accents. The feature supports blending deterministic and agentic experiences, automating tasks like order lookup, refunds, and troubleshooting while allowing escalation to live agents and is commercially available in US East (N. Virginia) and US West (Oregon) in English and Spanish, with previews for French, Italian, and German.

Amazon Connect adds granular access controls for evaluations

🔐 Amazon Connect now offers granular access controls for performance evaluation forms, enabling administrators to restrict who can view, modify, or use specific evaluation templates. Managers can be granted template-specific edit or use permissions aligned to business lines or functions, while agents and managers can be prevented from viewing particular completed evaluations. This reduces the risk of unauthorized access and simplifies form selection during evaluations.

Amazon Connect adds native testing and simulation tools

🧪 Amazon Connect now provides native testing and simulation capabilities that let contact center teams validate workflows, self-service voice interactions, and outcomes in a few clicks. You can configure test parameters such as caller phone number or customer profile, call intent, expected responses, and business conditions like after-hours or full queues. Tests run concurrently at scale and return pass/fail results with the interaction path and detailed logs to accelerate diagnosis and reduce deployment risk.

Amazon Connect Adds MCP Support for AI Agents and Tools

🤖 Amazon Connect now supports the Model Context Protocol (MCP), enabling AI-driven customer self-service and employee assistance agents to invoke standardized tools to fetch information and perform actions during interactions. Amazon Connect offers out-of-the-box MCP tools for tasks like updating contact attributes and retrieving case information, and allows flow modules to be exposed as MCP tools so business logic is reusable across deterministic and generative workflows. Organizations can also integrate custom or third-party tools via flow modules or the Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Gateway to automate actions such as order lookups, refunds, and customer-record updates without human intervention.

Amazon Connect adds AI-powered predictive insights (preview)

🤖 Amazon Connect has introduced AI-powered predictive insights in public preview, adding five recommendation algorithms to its Customer Profiles. The capabilities analyze interaction history and behavior to power suggestions across self-service and agent interactions, supporting cross-sell, complementary product suggestions, and intelligent product discovery. The preview is available in multiple AWS regions and uses pay-as-you-go pricing for utilized profiles.

Amazon Connect Outbound Adds Multi-Channel Journey Builder

📣 Amazon Web Services has added a visual journey builder to Amazon Connect Outbound Campaigns, enabling creation of multi-step, multi-channel engagement journeys directly in the console. You can orchestrate voice, SMS, email, and WhatsApp interactions and combine time- or behavior-triggered flows. Integrations with existing Connect Flows, AI capabilities, and Customer Profiles let you personalize interactions and route customers to live agents when needed. The feature is available in all AWS Regions that support Outbound Campaigns.

Amazon Connect links related contacts to cases using flows

🔗 Amazon Connect now lets agents link related contacts — including email replies, call transfers, persistent chats, and queued callbacks — to an existing case using configurable flows. By enabling follow-up contacts to attach automatically, Amazon Connect Cases removes the need for custom logic or manual linking and helps present a unified customer journey to agents. The capability is available in multiple AWS regions; see the Amazon Connect Cases documentation to get started.

Amazon Connect Automated Evaluations for Self-Service

🔍 Amazon Connect now lets businesses automatically evaluate the quality of self-service interactions and surface aggregated insights to improve customer experience. Managers can define custom criteria and populate evaluations manually or automatically using conversational analytics and other Connect data to detect issues like repeated failures to understand customers, negative sentiment, or transfers to human agents. Insights are available in aggregate and at the individual contact level alongside recordings and transcripts to help identify opportunities to improve AI agent performance.

Amazon Connect adds message streaming for AI chats

💬 Amazon Connect now streams AI chat messages as they're generated, presenting progressive responses and status prompts such as 'One moment while I review your account.' This reduces perceived wait times and reassures customers that an AI agent is actively reasoning, invoking tools, and composing answers. The feature is available in ten AWS regions and can be integrated into existing contact flows and front-end components to improve conversational transparency and responsiveness.