Why Swim With Sharks When You Can Sound Off With Orcas
Filmmakers Adam May and Amy Zimmerman created an immersive HoloLens experience (called Critical Distance) to tell the story of a threatened orca and her pod. Orcas, stuck with the historical name “killer whales,” are mammals and the largest in the dolphin family. They are apex predators, able to hunt in “packs” and known as killers […]
AVI-SPL Is Now a Microsoft Managed Partner
AVI-SPL announced today that it has become a Microsoft Managed Partner, enhancing its role as an “end-to-end lifecycle management solutions provider for Microsoft Teams and Microsoft Teams Rooms.” Less than 1% of the 400,000 organizations in the worldwide Microsoft Partner Network earn Microsoft Managed Partner status. To be selected as a Managed Partner, AVI-SPL “consistently demonstrated […]
Appspace Announces New Integrations With Microsoft
Appspace announced the launch of Appspace for Microsoft. Appspace integrations claim to enhance Microsoft’s capabilities and work from inside the Microsoft apps customers know to deliver an improved time to value and ROI. The partnership connects Microsoft Teams, SharePoint and Viva with modern intranet and employee app solutions. Organizations can now integrate company content and […]
AVI-SPL Named a Finalist for 2022 Microsoft Surface Hub Partner of the Year Award
AVI-SPL today announced it has been named a finalist for the 2022 Microsoft Surface Hub Partner of the Year Award. The company was honored among a global field of top Microsoft partners for demonstrating excellence in innovation and implementation of customer solutions based on Microsoft technology. AVI-SPL holds Gold-level competencies for Cloud Productivity, Communications, Collaboration and Content, and Project and Portfolio Management. […]
Salamander Designs Adds New Products to List of ‘Designed for Surface’ by Microsoft
Salamander Designs announced the addition of several additional products to the growing list of Salamander Designs’ products that have been designated “Designed for Surface” by Microsoft. Additions to the group include the Salamander Wall Stands, Mobile Carts and Mounting Adapter Kit that support the 85-inch Microsoft Surface Hub 2S. Also included is a new Salamander […]
AVI-SPL Earns Gold Level Cloud Productivity Competency from Microsoft
AVI-SPL announced that it has earned the Cloud Productivity competency from Microsoft at the Gold level. Microsoft Gold competencies demonstrate best-in-class capabilities within a specific solution area. As a Gold Cloud Productivity competency holder, AVI-SPL earns new benefits and support from Microsoft to meet the growing demand for cloud productivity solutions that fuel the modern […]
Carousel Digital Signage Integrates With Power BI for Business Analytics
Carousel Digital Signage has added business analytics to its Carousel Cloud software through integration with Power BI, Microsoft’s AI-powered data visualization toolset for enterprise businesses. Power BI integration allows Carousel Cloud users to create and share business information across corporate digital signage networks, empowering executives and workers to make data-driven decisions that drive strategic actions. Power BI provides users with a business intelligence […]
Shure Announces Microphone as Microsoft Team Certified
Shure announced its MXA710 Linear Array Microphone is now certified for Microsoft Teams. The MXA710 joins Shure’s portfolio of Conferencing Solutions already certified for Microsoft Teams, giving installers and end users even more options for their environments. The MXA710 is designed for audio capture in premium AV conferencing environments. Patented Steerable Coverage technology captures audio […]
Work Today Sucks — and Microsoft Just Proved It
Microsoft just completed its “2021 Work Trend Index: Annual Report.” And parts of it are frightening. While the world debates the future of work after the pandemic, this Microsoft report mainly zeroes in on the state of work today. This survey was conducted by among 31,092 full-time employed or self-employed workers across 31 markets between […]
Embed Signage Offers ‘Secure Integration’ With Microsoft Power BI
Embed Signage has launched what the company is calling “secure integration” with Microsoft Power BI. Power BI is a data visualization platform from Microsoft that allows businesses to connect and visualize data from over 120 different sources such as Dynamics 365, Azure SQL Database, Salesforce, Excel and SharePoint. Users of Embed Signage are now able […]
Securing AV: The SolarWinds Attack of 2020 (Actually 2019)
For each column in this series, rAVe writer Paul Konikowski takes a deeper dive into a recent security event or data breach, shedding light on supply chain vulnerabilities, infrastructure, and cyber-physical security. While most Americans are still processing the recent attack on the United States Capitol building, many cybersecurity researchers and professionals believe the real […]
What’s Next for 2020-21? Learnings from SYNNEX’s Latest of the LAVNCH Days
Thursday marked the third of the SYNNEX COLLABSolv LAVNCH Days (if you need reference material as to what those are, find some previous coverage here), and this event in particular promised to cover a topic at the forefront of all our minds: hybrid connections. What are they? What do they look like in our homes? […]
“We’re Also an Audio Company,” Says Microsoft
From “Hey, Cortana” to cloud-enabled interactive sound for HoloLens to Windows Sonic (Windows 10 comes with support for virtual surround sound), Microsoft invests heavily in research on audio. And the company is convinced the ProAV market fails to recognize this. They have a point here. Did you know speaker detection technology developed by Microsoft researchers […]
Microsoft Follows Zoom and Launches Personal Teams Devices for Homes and Offices
Microsoft has announced new Microsoft Teams displays, a category of all-in-one dedicated Teams devices (basically a personal Teams touch screen) integrated with voice control via Microsoft Cortana. Microsoft is marketing these as personal workspace devices that integrate with Teams collaboration and communication for your home and small office environments — think of them as personal […]
AVer Announces Certified Video Collaboration Solutions for Microsoft
THIS IS A PROMOTED POST FROM AVer INFORMATION INC. AVer has announced a collaboration focused on creating videoconferencing technologies that work with Microsoft software. AVer Video Collaboration Solutions for Microsoft will be a complete line of AVer USB videoconferencing products developed and certified with Microsoft Teams in mind. These AVer products will feature HD cameras, […]
Microsoft Teams Now Available for Linux
Starting today, Microsoft Teams is available for Linux users in public preview, enabling collaboration experiences for the open source community at work and in educational institutions. Users can download the native Linux packages in .deb and .rpm formats here. The Microsoft Teams client is the first Microsoft 365 app that is coming to Linux desktops, […]
Cisco, Microsoft Teams and Zoom Will Be Totally Interoperable by Mid-2020!
By Chris Mcintyre-Brown Associate Director, Futuresource Consulting As video conferencing solutions proliferate, remote working continues to rise and the number of inter-company video conferences increases, a lack of system interoperability has become a major pain point for many users. Internally focused video conferences are less problematic, as everyone is familiar with their system of choice. However, once […]
Soon Zoom and Microsoft Teams Will Be Natively Interoperable
Zoom and Microsoft have worked together to enhance conference room interoperability and simplify how you connect to third-party meetings. How? The companies are collaborating to provide interoperability between both conference room solutions and streamlined meeting experiences. Available in early 2020, Zoom Rooms will be able to join Microsoft Teams meetings, and Microsoft Teams Rooms will […]
Sharp Ships Windows Collaboration Display With Microsoft Skype for Business
Sharp Imaging and Information Company of America (SIICA) announced it’s shipping the world’s first Windows Collaboration Display (WCD) with Microsoft’s Skype for Business certification. The native 4K 70-inch is integrated with Microsoft Azure Digital Twins to monitor collaboration spaces. The Sharp Windows Collaboration Display is marketed as the world’s first large-format interactive display to achieve […]
Zoom Is the Apple of AV, Cisco Is Microsoft and Poly Is Motorola
I had this thought back at Zoomtopia 2018, but after Zoomtopia 2019, it’s clear: Zoom is the Apple of the AV industry. Zoom is what? All of the eyes in AV were looking at Zoom yesterday. If you don’t believe me, look at the social stats of tweets and LinkedIn posts about Zoom Video Communications, […]
Everyone Was Wrong: Microsoft Surface Hub 2S Is Real — And a Surprise Accessory
Microsoft actually launched the Surface Hub 2 right after running out of the first version — on May 15, 2018 — yes, over a year ago. But, since then, crickets. What followed was a host of chatter from both WCD (Windows Collaboration Display) hardware manufacturers as well as from a plethora of the AV press […]
Introduction to Windows Collaboration Displays
Presented by Joshua Peterson of Avocor at the 2019 Almo Professional AV E4 Experience On June 2018, Microsoft announced a new category of interactive displays that extended the PC desktop experience to room scale, while bringing IoT sensors into meeting room environments. These collaboration displays bring a unique mix of capabilities and benefits for multiple room designs […]
CTOUCH Launches a Collaboration System for Microsoft Teams
CTOUCH entered the UCC market with a collaboration system for Microsoft Teams called Leddura 2Meet Teams. Following up on their Leddura 2Meet Skype for Business back in 2017, CTOUCH aims to make the transition to Microsoft Teams collaboration easy. The integrated system allows you to draw, meet, share and book a room directly on a […]
Windows Collaboration Displays by Avocor Debut
Avocor today introduced the first Windows collaboration displays featuring touchscreen, Windows 10 and Microsoft 365. The first Windows collaboration displays by Avocor will ship in December of 2018. Avocor says they worked with Microsoft to create a single-cable solution that connects a Windows PC to the display. It allows for immediate control of the camera […]
Crestron Wins 2018 Microsoft Global IoT Partner of the Year Award
Crestron today accepted the 2018 Microsoft Global Partner of the Year Award for Internet of Things (IoT) in a ceremony at the Microsoft Inspire event in Las Vegas. Microsoft recognized Crestron for providing solutions in IoT in the form of Crestron XiO Cloud built on the Microsoft Azure platform. Crestron XiO Cloud is designed for […]
Microsoft Fixes Surface Hub and Sets New Bar with the New Surface Hub 2 Collaboration Board
Taking a page from the Samsung playbook, Microsoft’s new Surface Hub 2 is thinner, lighter and now being primarily promoted to be used like a digital flip-chart — in addition to being marketed as a “traditional” Collaboration Board for Huddle Spaces and meeting rooms. Microsoft says the Surface Hub 2 was designed from the ground up to be […]
Advanced Creates Interactive Product Kiosks for Microsoft
As consumers evolve to expect personalized, exciting shopping experiences, brands and retailers are developing new ways to attract attention and create meaningful in-store interactions. A prime example of this shift is Advanced’s recent installation of new Microsoft kiosks at eight Best Buy locations throughout Canada, which highlight Microsoft’s most popular software and hardware products with motion-activated ads, tutorials and demos. According […]
Black Box Introduces Emerald KVM Platform
Black Box today introduced the Emerald Unified KVM Platform. Emerald is a converged KVM solution for distributing video, audio and peripheral signals throughout expanding hybrid environments that include both IP and proprietary direct-connect networks. Emerald supports DisplayPort 1.2 4K video at 60 Hz and 10-bit color depth over standard IP network switches and connections and offers virtual machine support […]
Crestron Expands Support of Microsoft Teams
Crestron has expanded its solution portfolio with Microsoft to include Microsoft Teams integration to equip meeting spaces of every size with innovative Intelligent Communications technology. With the newly announced capabilities, Crestron SR and the Crestron Mercury conference system will not only be able to run Microsoft Teams in spaces of all sizes: from huddle rooms and multi-purpose rooms to executive meeting rooms and large auditoriums; organizations can […]
Crestron Rumored to Be Starting an AV-over-IP Alliance with Microsoft and Intel
Update: I spoke to Robin van Meeuwen, president and CEO of Crestron EMEA, at ISE 2018, where he confirmed this story to be true. I think it’s possible that Crestron is, behind the scenes, forming an “alliance” of sorts of AV-over-IP companies that focus exclusively (for now) on the 1Gig method of sending AV signals over an IT […]
TrueConf Announces Skype for Business Interoperability
TrueConf has announced an integration with Microsoft’s Skype for Business through its latest offering, TrueConf Server v. 4.3.9. The integration adds interoperability for TrueConf and Skype for Business users, including audio, video and instant messaging functionality. TrueConf and Skype for Business users can easily participate in joint video calls and conferences, as well as invite legacy room endpoints. TrueConf […]
A Visit with Microsoft
When we think conference room and collaboration technology, we too often think of audiovisual collaboration technology, and when we think about that we think of a small set of traditional AV manufacturers, largely unknown to those outside of the industry. We think of control system manufacturers such as Extron and Crestron, of Vaddio and its […]
