UC Expo, London - Another Panel Session

Next week, it’s UC Expo at the ExCeL London. I recently posted about a session I’m moderating, and here’s another one I’ll be on. This is the ask-the-analyst panel, on Thursday at 2:10 pm, where I’ll be joined by colleagues Dave Michels, Oru Mohiuddin and Prachi Nema, and moderated by Gill Rowbotham. Should be fun, and hope you can make it!

I’ll be on two other sessions, including an invite-only roundtable, so I won’t be hard to find - maybe I’ll see you there. Details are here about the event, the agenda and registration.

How Speakerphones Add Value for Collaboration

Things definitely are not business as usual now, but I’m keeping plenty busy, and being home-based, I really haven’t missed a beat. Not quite as productive as normal, but am still getting some public writing done. Here’s my latest one, running now on the BCStrategies portal.

This post is one in a series sponsored by Yealink, each authored by different BC Experts, so watch for those soon. This is actually a pretty interesting topic given the rise of remote working, as well as more forms of small, ad hoc meetings in offices. These are prime use cases for speakerphones, and, it’s a problem set that Yealink has looked at pretty carefully.

Next Stop -San Francisco Area - Talkdesk and Zoom

Double-header this week, thanks to some last-minute jockeying with the folks at Zoom. Tomorrow I take an early flight to San Fran for Talkdesk’s analyst event, and will then join the tail-end of Zoom’s event on Wednesday in San Jose. It’s a long way to go for two days, but the learning will be good for both events, and I’ll have more to share soon after. As always, details of upcoming are in the Event Calendar section of my website.

Next Stop - BroadSoft in Phoenix, then MoNage in Boston

Busy week ahead, with back-to-back conferences. On Monday, and for a bit of Tuesday, I'll be at BroadSoft Connections in Phoenix. I've been to several of their conferences in the past, but not recently, and am really looking forward to getting back. BroadSoft has really hit critical mass now, and I'm certain 2018 will be the year they decide whether to keep building on their momentum, or take an exit. Other players are in the same boat, and am sure the playing field will be smaller by this time next year.

I'll be dashing from Connections on Tuesday to Boston for Jeff Pulver's next MoNage event, where I'll be speaking along with Chris Fine on Wednesday morning. Just finishing up our presentation now.

As time allows, I'll be tweeting throughout the week, and for more details, please check the Events Calendar section of my website.

Go Time for May - First Stop, Montreal and Cisco

I'm in Montreal about to start Day 2 for Cisco's 2017 Customer Care Analyst event. Been really good so far, and more to come today. I'll be writing about this shortly, so stay tuned.

After this, I'm in Phoenix for NEC's event next week, then I'm speaking in Toronto for a networking event hosted by Jeff Pulver about the chatbot/AI space. Week after that, I'm in Indy for the Genesys/ININ event, plus am playing piano there as part of the SIPtones - that should be fun. Following that, I'm speaking again in Toronto at a networking event hosted by my MBA alma mater, Schulich, running a roundtable discussion about digital transformation. 

Something different every week this month, so never dull, that's for sure. Somehow, I'll get my regular set of writing done, along with finishing off two white papers and prepping for a webinar I'm doing later this month. It's go time, and the Cisco folks are ready to start here - out for now, back soon.

ITExpo Shout-Out #2 - Panel Session: Emerging Technologies Influencing Your Business

Am moderating back-to-back sessions next Friday at TMCnet's ITExpo in Fort Lauderdale. Yesterday, I blogged about the first panel, and this one is at 11am. 

Emerging technologies covers a lot of ground, and I'll be joined by a diverse group who will have more than enough to talk about in the short time we have. Along with SAP, IBM Security and Plantronics, we'll have independent perspectives from Jeff Pulver and Chris Fine.

It will be a great way to wrap up the conference, and you won't be disappointed if you join us. More details are here on the Conference Program page - just scroll down to Friday in the Hot Topics in Tech and Telecom track.

Calliflower Bundled with Samsung PCs - Why Not?

You have to mix things up every now and then, and always be open to trying new things. There was a great example of this in Canada yesterday when two previously unconnected companies announced a pretty neat promotion. Fresh off the feel-good buzz of the Olympics, we have Ottawa-based Iotum teaming up with Samsung Canada to offer a limited time bundle.

Between now and April 30, buyers of Samsung notebooks and netbooks get one year of free service with Iotum's conferencing solution, Calliflower. As the announcement explains, resellers get a commission for Calliflower sign ups, so there's something in this for everybody.

While it's not clear which models of PCs this applies to, or how much the commmission is, or who is actually paying the commissions, you have to like the idea. I've been close to Iotum from the beginning, and they've gone through several iterations, with Calliflower being the most high profile offering. I've used the service and posted about it, and it's pretty good. I'm not a regular user of conferencing solutions, but they definitely have all the 2.0 features you'd expect, and it's a great service for any SMB - not to mention being attractively priced.

I can't think of too many examples where an application or service is being used to induce sales of PCs, but conferencing is pretty universal and should have broad appeal. It's easy to see how peripherals like headsets or software pair up nicely with a PC, but somewhat less so for Calliflower. However, once people try it, they'll see how the desktop interface and overall experience is a big step up from conventional conferencing, especially if people need to collaborate instead of just talk.

Kudos to Iotum for trying something different - and something local. I can see why Samsung is in, as PC sales have been slowing down, and the market is even more crowded/confused with tablets in the mix now. Resellers now have a better reason to promote Samsung PCs, and if it works, Iotum will now have a new roadmap for getting to market, and no doubt they'll look to do the same in the U.S. soon after. Sometimes you don't win by having the best product - although Calliflower is quite good - sometimes you just play the game better - just like our hockey teams did in Vancouver!