Industry executives and experts share their predictions for 2026. Read them in this 18th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.
By Barbara Dondiego, CEO of AVOXI
Companies spent the past several years racing toward digital channels-chat, email, self-service-assuming voice was fading out. Many gated it behind overengineered IVRs, buried phone numbers at websites, and immature caller bots.
The result? Frustrated customers, weakened logos, and lost revenue. The fact is, customer experience architects want to use the best channel possible to solve client problems.
Voice is a proven channel to address complex issues, and natural language processing is further prioritizing speaking instead of texting to engage with brands. In 2026, enterprises are going to re-center voice as a core element of customer experience (CX).
Contact center voice, a $20B+ industry, is one of the fastest IT and operational areas to integrate AI. As the pendulum swings, CTOs will focus on three priorities that shape global communications and AI architecture.
Enterprise Cloud Migration Accelerates and Voice Moves With It
As cloud transformation matures, enterprises are treating voice like any application: unified, API-driven, and centrally managed. After years of provisioning telephony using physical connections, many organizations now operate 10-20 regional voice providers-causing integration challenges, lack of visibility, fragmented manual processes, and a drive to streamline.
In 2025, 58% of enterprises were already consolidating service provider ecosystems to a single partner.* Organizations that unify layers will deliver faster innovation, stronger reliability, and a smarter, more consistent customer experience. Moving to a singular cloud voice platform will:
- Centralize control of routing, quality, and provisioning.
- Enable faster, cleaner integrations with CCaaS, UCaaS, and AI systems.
- Establish consistent global compliance and security.
- Automate processes that lower operating costs and improve efficiency.
- Provide visibility required for AI training, monitoring, and analytics.
Voice optimization isn’t a niche project. It’s a foundational IT infrastructure initiative.
AI-Readiness is a Make-or-Break Requirement
No longer a legacy channel, voice has become the fuel powering real-time AI for communications. 82% of companies expect AI to increase voice traffic as it reduces cost per call, accelerates resolution, and boosts satisfaction, whether interactions involve a human agent, AI-assisted agent, or AI voice bot.*
The increased use of AI raises voice to the top of the CX tech stack.
Agentic AI, NLP, and voice-led automation are quickly redefining CX-putting pressure on enterprise IT to modernize infrastructure. AI models depend on clean, high-quality conversational data-any degradation weakens transcription accuracy, intent detection, agent guidance, and automation outcomes.
To realize AI’s value, applications must connect directly and reliably to the enterprise’s international voice network, so the voice layer isn’t operating in isolation:
- Voice quality directly impacts AI accuracy. Jitter, poor audio, or latency reduce model performance.
- Routing must be AI-aware. Consistent SIP and session control paths are required for real-time data.
- Cloud voice platforms need open APIs and event streams. AI tools have to ingest call events, metadata, caller profiles, and audio.
- Security and compliance responsibilities expand with voice-to-AI workflows. Standardized controls worldwide are an enterprise IT critical success factor.
The question isn’t whether AI will transform voice, it’s how fast will enterprise architectures evolve to support AI at scale.
CX Cloud Orchestration via Software is Inevitable
As companies advance from AI pilots to enterprise-wide deployments, splintered provider networks and platforms have become a barrier. IT and Contact Center Operations leaders will expect intelligent software to orchestrate AI CX across all environments. They’ll simplify tech stacks, retire on-premise products, and unify platforms across CCaaS, UCaaS, LLMs and conversational AI stacks to achieve:
- Reduced infrastructure complexity.
- Reliable data flows.
- Predictable AI performance.
- Simplified compliance.
- Lower total cost of ownership.
As enterprises double down on AI-driven digital transformations to the cloud in 2026 and beyond, voice is poised to become the most strategically important channel for customer experience and operational intelligence.
*State of International Voice for the Contact Center Report
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Barbara Dondiego is the CEO of AVOXI, a global leader in cloud voice software for contact centers. Also a member of the Board of Directors, Barbara brings 25+ years of technology industry experience to the SaaS platform provider. She�s passionate about providing AVOXI�s 5K+ clients with next-gen call quality and analytics to manage AI-ready voice for superior CX.
