Welcome to our round-up of the biggest news in the UC space over the past week.
Teams MAU Surge
Microsoft revealed that Teams now has 270 million monthly active users, while also revealing growth in Teams Rooms.
The vendor said that the number of active Teams Rooms devices more than doubled in its most recent full quarter.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella was speaking as Microsoft reported its quarterly earnings, with revenue climbing 20 percent to $51.7bn. Operating income grew 24 percent to $22.2bn.
“Teams is rapidly becoming the standard for unified communications,” he declared on an earnings call. “We’re seeing Teams growth in every segment”
Bandwidth Partners with Genesys
Bandwidth has launched a bring your own carrier (BYOC) solution for Genesys contact centre which lets enterprises unbundle telephony from their comms platforms.
Duet for Genesys lets customers of the contact centre vendor buy telephony directly from the Bandwidth.
Bandwidth said that the offering allows enterprises to integrate their entire comms stack and replace legacy telecoms carriers, while also removing most of their on-prem equipment with Bandwidth’s global IP network.
John Bell, Chief Product Officer at Bandwidth, said:
“Bandwidth’s Duet for Genesys not only simplifies the move to the cloud for global enterprises, it makes possible new customer experience capabilities to win satisfaction, loyalty, and trust”
8×8 Appoints New Channel Boss
8×8 has appointed a new channel boss to drive the adoption of its combined UC-CC offering globally.
Lisa Del Real joins from RingCentral, where she had been Vice President of Strategic Partnerships.
She said: “A strong majority of the channel view selling a single-vendor, integrated UCaaS and CCaaS solution as a differentiated advantage versus multi-vendor point solutions.
“As 8×8 enters its next phase of growth, there is an incredible opportunity to help build a Partner first channel program that drives 8×8’s efforts to expand its industry leadership for an integrated cloud communications and contact centre solution”
Zoom Launches Virtual Event Floor
Zoom has launched an event feature that lets users move around a virtual exhibition hall and interact with other people.
Expo will be available as part of the current Zoom Events licence.
Zoom’s Robin Bunevich said: “On the virtual expo floor, they can move freely around the space, network with individuals through one-on-one chat, and join other participants in Expo booths for topic-based conversations.
“Attendees also can interact with sponsors, engage in live conversation, and explore topics in a deeper way”
“Booth representatives or sponsors can host multiple simultaneous conversations in a booth, and attendees can preview those meetings before deciding to join.”
