Cisco Live kicked off yesterday (27th January) and continues until Friday (31st) – the collaboration company made several notable news announcements about its Webex suite. Starting off the annual developer conference, this year held in Barcelona, Spain, Cisco said the Webex Assistant would soon speak Spanish. In a statement, Amy Chang, Executive Vice President, Cisco Collaboration, said Spanish just made sense:
“Spanish is one of the most widely-spoken languages in the world and it was our number-one customer request for which language Webex Assistant should learn next. Now, it can speak and understand Spanish”
Made possible by conversational AI first-introduced into Cisco’s Webex platform in 2017 – Cisco would later heighten Webex with the Sept. 2019 acquisition of California-based voice AI firm Voicea. The company’s technology now assists Cisco in endowing its Webex portfolio with a transcription service that blends automated speech recognition (ASR) to listen to meetings, take notes, and capture important moments during meetings.
Cisco said it had 300 million collaboration users at ‘Live,’ 2020 and that Webex will also gain some other handy functionalities, features that make editing and sharing meeting assets simpler.
More of What’s on Offer at Cisco Live
Developers at Cisco have also been building what they call ‘true end-to-end encryption and multilayer security.’ According to the company, Cisco will soon let customers choose where Webex data such as users, messages, and files are, in Europe or the United States.
Webex already shows closed captioning, performs real-time-transcriptions of what people say in meetings, and users can tell the assistant what to focus on. New to the platform is searchable recorded meeting transcripts that let users assign action items with custom speaker labels to remember who should handle what.
Catering to small-to-mid-sized businesses, Cisco also said it will introduce a new Webex Room USB device. The entry-level video device, built for huddle rooms, is as my description suggests marketed as ‘affordable.’ Cisco said the new USB is for SMBs looking for easy installation and management.
Cisco’s Riding A Wave of Innovation
Cisco is riding a long wave of Webex innovation and the networking company’s found a comfortable home for Voicea’s technology, having fully-integrated it into its contact center portfolio. Placing a lot of trust in Voicea, Cisco seems confident in the acquisition. And the move could assist Cisco in setting Webex apart from the likes of Zoom and Microsoft Teams. At the annual developer conference, Chang told attendees:
“Voicea users reported saving more-than six hours each week per user and said they had more actionable and efficient meetings. Cisco believes Webex users will experience similar results”
And the collaboration giant hopes to create high value for collaboration customers with the layout of such a clear plan, Cisco wants to put the ideal conditions in place for improved workplace collab and suit the experiences to businesses of any size.
Such force on the first day of Cisco Live could suggest we’re in store for more groundbreaking product news as the event lasts through Friday, January 31, 2020. Can’t make it in person? The lineup at this year’s event is available via live stream.
