RingCentral Buys CommunityWFM For AI-Fueled Work Force, Contact Center Operations Capabilities

‘This positions our channel partners at the forefront of the transformation happening in workforce management, driven by cloud, AI and automation—giving them the tools to win in both new customer acquisition and expanding their existing RingCX install base,’ says RingCentral’s channel leader, Brandon Thomas.

Unified-Communications-as-a-Service giant RingCentral bought AI-powered workforce management provider CommunityWFM to strengthen its contact center chops, the two companies revealed Monday.

The acquisition will bring together contact center and workforce management into one AI platform—RingCentral’s RingCX—for the company’s partners and customers. RingCentral said that via the new addition to its portfolio, businesses will gain a complete set of tools to optimize operations and empower their employees and agents.

The two companies did not disclose the price tag of the transaction.

Richardson, Texas-based CommunityWFM was founded in 2005 and provides cloud-hosted forecasting, scheduling, adherence and workforce management for contact centers of all sizes, according to Crunchbase. The company’s tools give agents control over their work schedules through AI-based scheduling and automated management of shift preferences.

Bringing the two companies’ technologies together will give end users one platform for intelligent workforce management and contact center operations, according to Belmont, Calif.-based RingCentral. The company added that AI-driven forecasting and scheduling algorithms complement RingCentral’s existing analytics and automation capabilities.

Channel-focused RingCentral has more than 16,000 partners around the world, and the company has been listening to its partner community, Brandon Thomas (pictured), vice president and head of channel, said in an email to CRN.

“Our channel partners have been asking us to add native Workforce Management to our RingCX portfolio as RingCX has been gaining rapid traction in the market. With this acquisition, we will be able to deliver a robust, comprehensive AI-first workforce management solution that will add strength and differentiation to our RingCX portfolio,” he said. “This positions our channel partners at the forefront of the transformation happening in workforce management, driven by cloud, AI and automation—giving them the tools to win in both new customer acquisition and expanding their existing RingCX install base."

RingCentral’s most recent acquisition prior to CommunityWFM was Hopin in 2023 for the company’s events management and audience engagement technology.