Unified communications as a service

The increasing demand for higher quality video and more desktop based collaboration should be translating to opportunities for those in the channel pitching 4K services.

Video conferencing has moved from just residing in the boardroom and increasingly sits on the desktop with the latest services able to take advantage of a more robust corporate infrastructure.

The experience of most employees at home with their TVs has seen that desire for ultra high definition come into the workplace and the demand for 4K services has risen as a result.

Richard Middleton, country manager for UK&I at Lifesize, said that the video conferencing market had developed significantly over the past few years and the demand for desktop solutions had been one of the main changes.

"There are one or two reasons to explain why it has taken off. People have more powerful devices and you can now make a video call on 4G and five or six years ago that wan't possible or feasible," he said.

There had also been an increase in mobility with more staff working flexibly and collaboration across offices and locations also increasing in most workplaces.

"People also want to use the technology but don't also have the room for a conference room. it is not just the mount of real estate but it can also be difficult booking a meeting room. What desktop technology brings is the flexibility to pick up a laptop wherever as long as you have a camera and microphone," said Middleton.

The 4K factor is also having ripples across the industry as users look to exploit the latest technology and take advantage of the monitors and screens that they already have to support that level of quality.

There has been a growth in the number of Huddle Rooms, smaller mid-sized meeting places that offer 4K quality services, and the channel can help establish more and service the existing number.

Middleton said that the changes presented an opportunity for the channel and it was working with a broad spectrum of partners, not just those that had come from an audio visual background.

"Some organisations might never have looked at video conferencing but have products that are sold in a similar way. This offers subscription based recurring revenue and our resellers are getting access to an end to end solution," he said.

Recent research from fellow cloud video conferencing player, StarLeaf, found that UK employees participate in conference calls 26 times a month on average. There was room for some improvements to the service with 83% voicing a desire to see content sharing abilities improved.

“The need to support the ‘always-on economy’ is shifting the dynamic of the modern workplace. Enterprises are increasingly empowering employees to work flexibly and become more productive in their jobs, regardless of whether that is in the office or working at home. For this to be effective, the right collaboration technologies must be implemented," said Shallu Behar-Sheehan, CMO at StarLeaf.

"Enterprise users want video conferencing to be intuitive, allowing them to focus on the meeting and not have to be hindered by technology issues. Reliability is fundamental to meeting room systems in order to achieve a consistent service, which enables employees to connect, communicate, share, and collaborate in an instant," he added.

Source: computerweekly

Industry: Unified Communication news