I have been evangelizing the benefits of audio and videoconferencing for over 20 years. If you know me, you know it’s a passion of mine. For a long time, I have spent my days sharing how the benefits of quality audio and video give companies a competitive edge. It’s thrilling to see not only the vast adoption of video conferencing but the explosion of solutions on the market today. In fact, there are so many great choices from on-prem to cloud that our industry is being challenged to simplify communications that have become more complicated.
Only a few years ago IT decisionmakers could buy on-prem solutions that connected only to internal users on a single homogenous platform. IT would stick devices in the conference room with instructions and not have to think about it.
Wow, the world has changed fast. IT pros realize that video conferencing is no longer a nice to have – IT IS A MUST HAVE –which has grown in popularity, usage and complexity. To stay competitive in the market, organizations need to deliver great collaboration experiences to keep employees engaged, productive, and happy.
The proliferation of cloud solutions is a game-changer and the options are growing with vendors like Zoom, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Cisco, BlueJeans, GoTo Meeting, and many more – like the new multi-user Facetime or Facebook’s “Portal.”
How do you satisfy everyone? What happens if you choose one platform, then after six months corporate strategies change? What do you do if one solution doesn’t have the capabilities IT has standardized on and a set of users needs to use something else? What do you do if you need to communicate outside of your organization and they are using something other than your standard? This is happening today and is the new reality. And once you do settle on just the right platform for your needs and budget, how do you make sure it will be adopted?
This is the new reality every company faces whether you are a global multi-national company or a small business. What to do? What to do? Well, Polycom has focused on making audio and video conferencing simple and easy for over 25 years, and we are stepping up to help solve this complex problem.
First, you need the right technology solution, and Polycom Trio is that solution. Polycom Trio brings significant value to customers; Amazing audio, easy to add video and collaboration capabilities, hybrid registration to connect to multiple platforms, deep Microsoft integration and many other capabilities. What makes Polycom Trio so great is the user experience. Polycom created the first speakerphone, and the new generation of Polycom Trio brings a clean, beautiful user interface with simple controls to any audio or video experience.
Next, we need to partner with the big video conference cloud providers. This has been a major focus for Polycom to give customers and users the flexibility to connect to the many different solution in a consistent and easy to use way while hiding the complexity.
Ultimately, we believe that users need a consistent and simple way to connect to whichever solution they want to use in any size room while being easy for IT pros to manage.
Polycom Trio already supports major cloud-based VaaS providers such as Zoom, Microsoft, and BlueJeans. I am happy to tell customers that as of today, Polycom Trio now supports Cisco Webex. Cisco Webex customers can benefit from the Polycom Trio experience in every room.
Just as Polycom provides a consistent and easy way to schedule Microsoft Skype for Business, Zoom and Blue Jeans meetings, this is now extended to Cisco Webex. A user schedules the Webex meeting as they always do and invites the room that the Polycom Trio is in. Then all the user does is click the “join meeting” button on the Polycom Trio to join the meeting. Just as they would for any of the other platforms! It’s just that easy! Easy to schedule, easy to join!
This is another major step forward towards our goal of providing the only device that will support all VaaS solutions and is a game-changer for IT pros to have the flexibility to offer the right solution in the right room for their employees.
What a relief when your system interoperates with what your employees want to use. But that’s not all. Polycom Trio lets you register to multiple call control platforms and operate them from the single Polycom Trio interface, allowing you to toggle between each. And we didn’t stop there. When migrating to the cloud, Polycom Trio allows customers to use their existing investments while introducing new cloud solutions (no more rip and replace!) You bring this flexibility and compatibility for IT pros and a simple user experience, legendary sound quality, and facial tracking for employees. This is clearly a WIN/WIN.
You can probably sense I love Polycom Trio because I know it solves a huge and growing problem I hear from customers every day. Adding support for Cisco Webex is another step forward on our mission to be the trusted experience in every room.