Videoconferencing Revolutions

The COVID pandemic has a clear impact on videoconferencing solutions. And the outcome has been quite profound so far.

First of all it is clearly a technology for the mass market. A simple tablet or a laptop is sufficient, proving the fancy "systems" from the legacy companies like Polycom or Cisco are no longer needed.

Then it proves the mobile 4G infrastructure is absolutely sufficient to run high quality video calls. I have been doing just that since the first lockdowns in March. After decommissioning the poorly performing ADSL line I bought a 4G router in a local T-Mobile store and have been running 6-7 hours of teleconferencing calls every day. It is ultra stable, with up/down speeds of 20Mbps and latency around 25ms. Who needs 5G?

On the accessories side Jabra absolutely rules with their Jabra Speak line. Nobody comes close, especially for the price they offer. They definitely have some secret sauce when it comes to echo cancellation and voice clarity.

And then is the software. WebEx has lost it completely. It does work, but the interface and the options are looking now like from the ancient era. Microsoft on the other hand has managed to ride the wave with Teams, getting their feature set on par with Zoom, while offering significantly more trust in terms of security and privacy. While Zoom has captured the casual conferencing market, Microsoft Teams has clearly claimed the crown from Cisco's WebEx and has been ruling now the corporate world.

Google has a decent product - the Meet - which we have been using as part of the Google for Business package. For some reasons Meet is not gaining popularity as quick as Zoom or Teams. The trend for Google is probably still better than WebEx or GoToMeeting, but somehow it seems Google has missed the opportunity. Or simply Microsoft's installed base was larger an that served better for launching Teams so the videoconferencing product for business use.