eDocs addition

eDocs has acquired the Brightware business unit of Firepond. eDocs says the move complements its existing e-billing, Web self-service and assisted care offerings.

The company reports it plans to make significant investments in the Brightware business, including expanded plans for new product releases and packaged integrations with its existing customer self-service and e-billing suite. Brightware employees will join eDocs as part of the acquisition.

eDocs’ existing product suite includes e-billing and payment, online account management, order and service management, natural language search, personalization and application integration technologies.

eDocs is acquiring the following products with the Brightware suite:

• Answer for e-mail response management—an automated response management system that determines the intent of incoming e-mail messages and composes personalized answers that can be automatically dispatched to customers or routed to service agents for a single-click review;

• Converse for real-time chat management—a real-time assistant that provides immediate interactions between customers and contact center agents; and

• Concierge for knowledge management—an intelligent KM solution that leverages the Brightware knowledgebase to automatically direct inbound customer requests to the most appropriate information or resource.