ACP: The Amazon Connect Podcast

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This week we welcome Bentley Paton, a Cloud Interact solutions architect, to discuss Amazon Connect’s Agentic CX Designer following AWS’s NLX acquisition and its move from preview to GA.
This isn't just a review of features - it's talking candidly about the good and the bad of the new Agentic CX Designer with someone who is actually building production solutions with it today.

Bentley explains how it combines agentic and deterministic IVR design in a drag-and-drop UI, removes the need to build Lex bots, and is invoked from a single Amazon Connect contact flow block that routes into CX Designer applications and flows. 

We compare prior Connect AI agents and Lex-based approaches, cover when deterministic logic is preferred (e.g., payments) and how AI can invoke deterministic tools, and review integrations (currently REST/API calls often via API Gateway rather than direct Lambda). 

We also talk about built-in chat-based testing, debugging, and automated test replays, note limited live-call audit visibility, discuss environment deployment via aliases, JSON export limits, business-user readability benefits, iteration needs in production, and current pricing understanding, including separate costs for related services and mention of Live Sync.
Find out more about CloudInteract at cloudinteract.io.

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Host Tom Morgan runs a solo episode of the Amazon Connect Podcast to play five unedited recordings of Amazon Connect Customer AI agent calls and explain what’s happening under the hood.
Four clips come from CloudInteract’s multi-industry demo environment and one from a noisy conference floor. Scenarios include airline fare lookup with email capture, retail banking identity verification, transaction clarification, balance and loan payoff (with calculations done via external tools) and a guarded handoff for address change, a retail order address-change handoff showing the value of ID verification and intent capture, healthcare appointment rescheduling with mishearing detection/correction and a safety transfer for medication side effects, and a conference concierge agent that performs well amid background noise.
Tom emphasizes guardrails, tool use, 100% QA via evaluations and rules, AI agent performance metrics, and the GA release of the Agentic CX Designer visual canvas.

Find out more about CloudInteract at cloudinteract.io.

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Join us as we welcome Kevin Kito (President & CEO) and Allan Gaspe (Solution Architect) from 911 Secure to discuss 911 obligations and solutions for cloud contact centers, especially Amazon Connect. 
They explain common misconceptions about 911 location accuracy, the complexity introduced by cloud and nomadic workers, and key U.S. legislation: Kari’s Law (direct 911 dialing, routing to the local PSAP, and immediate on-site notification) and Section 506 of RAY BAUM’s Act (dispatchable location beyond just an address).
They describe how 911 Secure’s Gatekeeper maintains dynamic location using network signals and prompts remote users to confirm location, how Amazon Connect queries their API only during 911 calls, and how shared callback numbers enable PSAP call-backs to reach the correct agent.
They also cover cell-phone 911 alerting via geofencing with RapidSOS and stress the real-life stakes of getting E911 wrong.
Although this is a more US-focused episode than normal, there is definitely something for everyone here, and we end with a discussion about the moral, not just legal, obligations that administrators worldwide have when considering emergency calling.
Find out more about CloudInteract at cloudinteract.io.

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Join us as we welcome Mark Pritchard, a senior platform and automation consultant at Jabra, to discuss Jabra’s move to Amazon Connect starting in 2021 and how the shift improved flexibility, number management, and cloud operations after COVID. 
Mark explains the challenges of running four global Connect instances with a small admin team, the need to standardize IVRs, scripts, and flow design for easier troubleshooting, and practical conventions like embedding related phone numbers in flow attributes.
He describes replacing a third‑party callback solution with a native Connect approach, then using AI tools (nicknamed “Bob”) with Cursor and GitHub Copilot to build internal portals for callback visibility, skills-based routing changes, and a new migration portal to selectively move resources to new instances during a major business separation, while sharing tools via a new LinkedIn group: Amazon Connect Tools Development.
Find out more about CloudInteract at cloudinteract.io.

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This episode of ACP recaps a busy July of Amazon Connect Customer updates.
The headline is a major quality upgrade to Amazon Connect’s AI voices (announced July 20), adding 100 new voice options across 50+ languages, improved turn-taking and interruption handling, fewer gaps, and more control over speed, volume, emotion, and SSML-like markup (including optional laughter 😂). 
We play before/after demos in US English plus Australian and UK variants, noting increased naturalness but limited regional UK accents. 
Additional releases include new supervisor dashboard metrics for agent queues, automatic example evaluations to support agent coaching, workforce planning/forecasting expanded to emails and tasks, a new “interrupt agent” flow block to force routing to specific agents even when unavailable, and rule-based redaction that blurs specified apps or web pages in agent screen recordings to reduce PII exposure.
The episode also reiterates AWS’s April rebrand splitting Amazon Connect into four products under an agentic AI banner.
Find out more about CloudInteract at cloudinteract.io.