Who’s Leading the Communications Revolution? Developers

The last year and a half has been a crucial and transformative time for the tech and communications industry. Companies have been challenged to not only adopt new practices and infrastructures overnight, but to then continuously integrate and deliver to meet customer demands. Especially when it comes to greater client communications, transparency into the process and efficient execution of deliverables.

As we ideate about what’s ahead and ensure that all can remain at the forefront of the next normal, it’s clear that we’re just getting started. The communications revolution is underway, and the tech industry is continuing to generate communication capabilities that will take us further than we’ve ever imagined.

But how does that actually get accomplished? Developers. What once used to be a vague understanding of how tech comes to fruition, has become undoubtedly essential knowledge. Developers are at the core of this revolution as they create all the applications that help individuals and businesses perform a specific task, as well as the systems that run devices and control networks.

Continuous Innovation Fuels Communications

As a global cloud communications leader, Vonage has been at the forefront of transformational technology that empowers businesses, employees and the world to remain connected.
Companies of all sizes entrust that developers will create and provide them with diverse capabilities to perform better, connect easier and enhance experiences.

The Vonage Communications Platform offers customers and developers alike with expansive access to open APIs to augment existing applications with voice, video, messaging, social chat, and verification. These enable feature-rich programmable capabilities designed to be dynamic, customizable and embeddable, and to provide seamless access to the latest integrations — directly within existing platforms and workflows.

Leveling the Playing Field

The flexibility of APIs provides businesses with the ability to customize the way they engage with each other and with their own customers in limitless ways. By providing customers and developers with the building blocks to create a greater level of customer engagement, technical support, and transparency, they are able to feel more integrated throughout the communications process, thus democratizing the business model. Through communication, Vonage is able to empower small-to-medium-sized businesses, startups, and more to compete with the biggest companies in the industry.

For instance, by implementing customized software infrastructures, a flower delivery startup is able to communicate like some of the most established brands in the world. By connecting with its customers via the channel of their choice — such as SMS or chat — this small shop is able to share the real-time information that matters most with its customers — which florist is preparing the order, when the flowers are being prepared, how the order will arrive to them and when.

By ensuring these brands are able to make customers feel that they have an honest glimpse into the process and their needs are being met, the playing field becomes even.

Learn. Build. Communicate. Connect.

Within the developer community is one sector that leverages the Vonage Communication Platform in a consistently innovative and unique way — startups. Vonage recognizes that its network of more than one million registered developers, as well as the startup community as a whole, is the lifeblood of the technology sector and looks to empower them to be successful and remain so.

Which is why Vonage developed Vonage for Startups, a program aimed at supporting early-stage companies to build products faster, efficiently and effectively, and help fuel the developer world. By connecting them with best-in-class products, people, and APIs, Vonage is able to provide them with the necessary educational resources and supportive environment that meet their needs, no matter how individualized they are.

The nature of communications has fundamentally changed, which is why Vonage works to continuously innovate and provide forward-thinking tools to accelerate the world’s ability to connect. With the Startup program, Vonage has designed part of its business to meet the differentiating needs of startups by building a program that was designed with four key pillars in mind:

• Learn — Gain access to Vonage technical resources and curate start-up content, like learning how to use APIs and save valuable time
• Build — Utilize products through a credits package and tailored technical sessions to build your MVP, enabling you to reach more customers and grow your business
• Receive Tailored Support — Selected startups can leverage Vonage resources tailored to their needs to solve challenges they’re facing
• Connect — Join our community and have the opportunity to engage with other founders, developers, and advocates

Voice-first collaboration platform and startup Commons utilizes the Vonage Video API to virtually recreate an in-person office environment where users can connect and collaborate via video and audio conversations with teammates — from anywhere.

“Collaborative work requires lots of back-and-forth interaction. The faster and more organically it flows, the better. But this type of interaction isn’t always possible in today’s modern workplace, where teams may be spread across locations or virtual work environments,” said Patrick Burns, Commons co-founder. “In an increasingly virtual and digital world, we are revolutionizing enterprise collaboration with the Vonage Video API by bringing back that face-to-face and personal connection by embedding rich, programmable video and voice capabilities into the Commons platform.”

What’s Next?

As the new normal becomes more, well, normal, and as we gain more insights into what that will look like moving forward, there’s much to be excited about. The communications revolution will allow us to continually connect and communicate in the most innovative ways, and further test the limitations of the tech industry, allowing the developer community to continue to create the digital transformation.

If you’re an incubator, accelerator, angel investor, venture capital firm or other startup enabling organization looking for support, let us keep you connected through our Vonage Startup Program.