Cisco's Game-Changing Collaboration Suite Gets Even Better

News Summary:

Single Platform Advantage and unified modular app across call, message and meet lets CIOs leverage their existing on prem, cloud and hybrid investments and enable a modern workplace.

Cisco is going big with cloud calling options to enable the modern workplace.

New Webex devices packed with AI features, whiteboarding and more can create an instant office and bring next-generation immersive experiences to the boardroom.

New Cisco headsets with advanced noise cancellation enable a productive employee experience.

Customers can now buy our phones, desk- and room-sized video systems as a service.

Announcement made at Partner Summit, Cisco's annual gathering of its channel partners.

Today at Cisco Partner Summit, Cisco has announced five major innovations to its Collaboration portfolio to help CIOs step up and speed up their workplace transformation. Most CIOs are deep in transforming their organizations but are facing huge challenges including having to make big changes while protecting their existing on-prem, cloud and hybrid collaboration investments. In addition, CIOs are striving to provide a modern and unified experience for their employees across one single calling, messaging and meetings platform so they can improve employee productivity. With 95% of the Fortune 500 using Cisco's collaboration suite, Cisco is uniquely positioned to solve these issues and enable CIOs to deliver secure, easy-to-use and ultimately more engaging and energizing experiences for users anywhere, regardless of what devices they use.

For CIOs, giving employees amazing collaboration experiences shouldn't be hard. They should be able to give them the best collaboration tools on the planet. And tools should be super-secure and simple to manage, said Amy Chang, EVP and GM, Collaboration, Cisco. The good news is that we're listening, and we've tapped into our deep engineering know-how to deliver just that. All cloud? All on prem? Hybrid? It shouldn't matter. We've got it.

To help CIOs transform their workplaces faster, Cisco has announced five critical innovations. They are:

1. Single Platform Advantage and unified modular app. The Single Platform Advantage means we are delivering all workloads (calling, messaging, meeting, devices and contact center) in an integrated fashion from a single platform. For users, this means that no matter if you're on your mobile, a desktop or another device you will have a familiar, consistent way of working. Transition from your mobile device to a meeting room device with the flick of a finger. For IT this means unparalleled admin control and security from a single pane of glass.

The Single Platform Advantage includes:

- Edge and hybrid services. This allows customers to link what they currently have and deliver enhanced capabilities from the cloud.

- Cognitive Collaboration. This slipstreams context and intelligence throughout every interaction, every day.

- Enterprise-class security and compliance. Our true end-to-end encryption protects data in transit, at rest, and in use. Our multilayer security includes Data Loss Protection to meet compliance and regulatory needs and is validated and continuously monitored to comply with stringent internal and third-party industry standards.

- Analytics and management. Cisco Webex Control Hub lets you manage large-scale deployments centrally and make data-driven decisions. Real-time performance visibility and diagnostics allow you to deliver the best user experience every time. Understand how each room is being used and optimize your assets accordingly. In the contact center, understand agent call volume and customer journeys to help shape better outcomes.

And it's all delivered over a global backbone optimized for real-time media.

The unified modular app means we get it-we know you want the tools you rely on to do your job to be cut from the same cloth. We've been working hard to unify all our apps in this way-so you feel familiar with a new-to-you tool on day one. Today, we announce several new ways we've unified our call, message and meet tools. For instance, when you join a meeting from Webex Teams you'll now have the same host controls as you'd have from Webex itself. And you'll be able to see and take part in the chat, too. Also, we've unified the way you see presence-whether your co-workers are busy or free.

We also take a huge leap in offering these tools in a modular manner-it's one app, but IT can configure it to align to each group's needs or workstyles. Give your warehouse workers (who never join virtual meetings but spend all day messaging and calling) exactly what they need. No more and no less.

2. Calling is core to global business and Cisco is going big on cloud calling. With Cisco, that doesn't mean you need to abandon your on-prem calling investment. We meet you where you are and make sure your users get the advanced features they need.

Webex is the only platform that has the proven scale, security and features to meet the calling needs of today's multi-site, mid-market and large enterprises. IT management can preserve their existing Cisco and 3rd party PBX investments, while taking of advantage of Webex cloud applications and centralized management and analytics services.

Three enhancements:

New Cisco Webex Edge for Calling solutions deliver a modern unified experience on top of existing PBX (Cisco and 3rd party) investments. Now IT can unify disparate environments and take advantage of Webex cloud services to deliver global dial plans, least-cost routing and centralized services including IVR, voice mail and more organization-wide. Make global business easier with consistent calling features like extension dialing, deliver more cost efficient on-net calls and let users take advantage of one Webex app for calling,

LINK:	https://newsroom.cisco.com/press-release-content?type=webcontent&artic...
	See more stories from cisco

More from Cisco