Maersk is a global integrated transport and logistics company operating in over 130 countries. Founded in 1904, this Danish company has over 100,000 employees worldwide, serving customers across diverse industries. With a strong focus on innovation and digital transformation, Maersk aims to deliver seamless end-to-end customer support while optimizing operations. Maersk is a longtime Cisco customer, and leverages Cisco’s full portfolio throughout its business, including areas such as shipping, port operations, supply chain management, warehousing, and air freight. As a One Cisco partner, Webex helped Maersk deliver top priorities by bringing together the power of our full portfolio into one solution.
It was important for Maersk to reduce the complexity of its operations and streamline processes for efficiency and improved customer experience.
A need for a unified solution
Before making the switch to Webex Contact Center, Maersk had an extremely complex on-premises phone system. It consisted of UCCE and UCCX solutions, all working together with several third-party plugins, which weren’t delivering the types of results the business required anymore. This on-premise phone system didn’t offer the level of flexibility needed for a global brand, and it was also expensive to maintain.
Beyond cost, the existing system lacked the capabilities required for a modern, agile customer service experience. Supervisors had limited visibility into call data and agent performance, which hindered effective decision-making. For frontline agents, manually logging reasons for customer calls resulted in inaccurate wrap-up data, leaving the organization with limited insights into customer needs and trends. The fragmented system also slowed response times and impeded Maersk’s ability to scale or introduce digital-first enhancements like AI.
The team—which consists of 15,000 configured and 2,750 concurrent agents spread over more than 120 countries—was on the brink of an extremely costly upgrade of about $10 million, so they decided to move to a cloud-based solution. Steven Vickery is the Enterprise Voice and Contact Center Service Owner at Maersk and one of the people in charge of finding the best next step.
Moving operations to the cloud
Since the team was already familiar with Cisco and had confidence in its products, they determined Webex Contact Center was the right solution moving forward, which included Analyzer for advanced reporting. Additionally, they knew it could deliver what they were looking for: a highly reliable, more agile, and cost-effective operational platform on which to run their contact centers, serve the needs of their customers, and provide the foundational compatibility that supports the Maersk vision.
“Cisco has always been a trusted partner of Maersk,” said Steven. “It had features and functionalities that we wanted, such as intelligent routing, integrated CRM, unified user experience, and complex reporting tools, and it just met all of our requirements.”
The switch to Webex represented more than a technology upgrade—it marked a shift to a more flexible, scalable way of delivering customer service. To ensure a smooth transition, Maersk took a strategic approach. The company decoupled the contact center application from the underlying phone system, a move that created the flexibility for agents to log in from any location or device, as long as they had a reachable phone number. With Webex’s help, Maersk implemented 21 features, deploying all on time and within scope.
This reconfiguration not only reduced the technical burden but also laid the groundwork for a more agile, globally accessible customer experience infrastructure. And the team didn’t have to go through this process alone.
“The support from Cisco was exemplary,” said Steven. “We also had a very good managed service partner [Tata Communications Ltd] as well, and together with Cisco and our managed service partner, the migration was a success.”
Significant cost savings and operational improvements
The shift to Webex Contact Center has delivered measurable results, especially when it comes to cost efficiency. The decision to move away from a costly legacy infrastructure to a cloud-based system has allowed Maersk to reallocate resources and focus on more strategic initiatives.
“Webex has massively saved us operational costs,” said Steven. “Transitioning from an expensive on-premises phone solution, which needed an upgrade of about $10 million, to an evergreen cloud solution at a fraction of the legacy upgrade costs has saved us vast sums of money.”
From a supervisory standpoint, Webex Contact Center introduced new levels of visibility and control that didn’t exist previously. Prior to Webex, supervisors lacked immediate access to critical data. That changed once the new system was in place.
“Historically, [our supervisors] didn’t have the data at their fingertips,” said Steven. “Now with Webex Contact Center and Analyzer, we have granular-level information that our supervisors can consume.”
The real-time, actionable insights allow more informed decision-making and help teams optimize performance on the fly. With enhanced reporting tools, team leaders can monitor call volumes, evaluate agent productivity, and better align resources to shifting customer needs.
Improved agent and customer experiences
The benefits of Webex Contact Center have extended far beyond cost savings and supervisor visibility. One of the most critical improvements has been in the agent experience. Previously, agents had to manually input the reason for each customer call, a process prone to human error and inefficiency. Now, Webex allows for more intuitive workflows, freeing agents from repetitive tasks and enabling them to focus on high-value customer interactions.
In addition to Webex Contact Center, Maersk also plans to use Webex Connect to better communicate between agents and truck drivers for a recently acquired company called Pilot Freight Services. This solution will enable truck drivers and agents to exchange SMS messages to provide proof of postage by sending photos and more.
These platforms’ ability to provide insight into the customer journey—even before the call begins—transformed how agents engage with customers. With this upgrade, they can anticipate needs based on historical touchpoints like dropped calls or recent website interactions, which leads to quicker resolutions and a more personalized experience.
This increase in agent efficiency directly translates to a better experience for Maersk’s customers. By delivering faster, more accurate service, the company can maintain a competitive edge in the logistics space—where customer expectations are higher than ever.
Additionally, Webex Contact Center also integrated seamlessly with existing systems, including Salesforce, ServiceNow, and others. The Salesforce integration is made both through IVR—all agent and customer-related data is hosted on SFDC—and on desktop. Approximately 90% of all agents now use our Webex for SFDC connectors.
Positioned for the future with AI
With a single infrastructure in place, Maersk is setting its sights on a future that includes AI-driven capabilities to further manage call volumes and enhance agent support. Webex’s suite of AI tools offers Maersk the chance to advance with intelligent features like topic analytics, agent assist, and conversational AI agents.
Maersk plans to adopt topic analytics AI to automate the identification of why customers are calling—eliminating the need for manual tagging and significantly improving data accuracy. With the Cisco AI Assistant for Webex Contact Center customer-facing teams will receive real-time prompts and contextual support during live interactions, allowing for even faster response times. Conversational AI agents will provide self-service options for simple inquiries, allowing live agents to focus on more complex and high-value conversations.
With a flexible cloud contact center in place and new AI on the horizon, Maersk is well-positioned to deliver more seamless, proactive, and personalized service to customers around the world.
Contact our team to learn more about what Webex could do for your business.
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