NiCE expands RingCentral partnership with AI focus

NiCE has expanded its partnership with RingCentral under a multi-year agreement that allows NiCE to resell RingCentral's RingEX communications platform.

The deal also extends the companies' existing arrangement to market and sell RingCentral Contact Centre, which uses NiCE CXone, for another year.

The move broadens a relationship that has run for more than a decade. Under the revised structure, each company will sell a core part of the other's software offering: RingCentral will continue to offer NiCE's contact centre technology, while NiCE adds RingCentral's unified communications product to its portfolio.

That creates a two-way commercial arrangement at a time when businesses increasingly want employee communications tools and customer service systems as a more connected package. Unified communications services typically cover phone, messaging and video, while contact centre software manages customer interactions across channels.

NiCE said RingEX would sit alongside its customer experience software as part of a single offering for organisations seeking to link internal communications with customer-facing operations. RingCentral Contact Centre, meanwhile, will continue to be sold with NiCE CXone at its core.

The combined set-up is designed to connect contact centre staff with back-office employees during live customer interactions. The companies also highlighted real-time presence information and one-click access to subject matter experts within an organisation.

Long partnership

The tie-up builds on collaboration dating back to 2015. During that time, RingCentral has sold contact centre services based on NiCE technology. The latest agreement extends that route to market while adding a resale role for NiCE in unified communications.

The partnership also reflects a broader trend in business software procurement. Companies that once bought telephony, messaging and customer service products separately increasingly want systems that work together more directly, partly to reduce operational complexity and partly to give staff easier access to information during customer conversations.

Both companies framed the expanded relationship around demand for a more integrated set of tools. RingCentral described NiCE as a long-standing partner as the two companies formalised the broader agreement.

"NiCE has been a trusted partner for more than a decade, and this expansion takes our relationship to a new level," said Vlad Shmunis, founder, chairman and CEO of RingCentral.

"With NiCE now offering our UCaaS solution alongside the continued success of RingCentral Contact Centre powered by CXone, we're now giving businesses of all sizes a proven, integrated path to modernise how they connect, collaborate, and serve their customers," Shmunis said.

AI focus

The companies also put artificial intelligence at the centre of the announcement. RingCentral described RingEX as an AI-powered communications platform, while NiCE said its CX AI, backed by NiCE Cognigy, could be used alongside the joint offering across customer and employee workflows.

That positioning comes as software suppliers try to show how AI tools can be embedded in routine business communications and service operations rather than sold as separate products. Here, the emphasis is on linking human agents and automated systems within the same environment.

NiCE said the arrangement would give customers access to its customer experience platform alongside RingCentral's communications software in a tighter package than before. It cast the deal as a way to offer organisations a single supplier relationship spanning both customer contact and employee collaboration functions.

Scott Russell, chief executive officer of NiCE, said the revised agreement brings together the two groups' established strengths.

"By expanding our partnership with RingCentral, we're bringing together two recognized industry leaders so organisations gain the full strength of both: elite employee communications and an enterprise-grade CX platform, deeply integrated and ready to scale with AI," Russell said.

The expanded partnership offerings are available now.