Insider Report January 2025

Curated Enterprise Communications News and Insights from January 2024

January is a tough month. Our resolutions are still in effect, and many of us are in recovery from all that family and spending in December. It’s also the coldest and darkest month of the year (in the Northern Hemisphere). This year, it was particularly stressful due to the freakish fires in California and an extreme changing of the guard in DC. 

Enterprise comms, especially CX, was relatively quiet. We have included some of the news from ISE, even though that’s technically February content. We will have significantly more coverage from Barcelona over the next few weeks. Also, TalkingPointz will soon publish a research note on Alianza acquiring Metaswitch. 

Featured

The big story this month is DeepSeek. It was embarrassingly predictable, yet few of us saw it coming. How many times do we fall for this? The game was about who could spend the most capex the fastest, and it was largely narrowed to Google, Meta, OpenAI/Microsoft, xAI, and a few well-funded runts like Perplexity and Anthropic. All of them fighting over chips, data centers, and power. 

With few exceptions, the big capex game is a losing bet in tech. The scale-up race gets disrupted by smaller, distributed approaches. We have seen this play out over and over. Mainframe->Mini->Micro->Mobile or Big iron->Distributed computing->Internet. We understood the answer but failed to recognize where it came from. We asked the biggest data center companies how to build next-gen AI, and the answer was bigger data centers (surprise!). 

A familiar example occurred in the ’70s, when the need to network our computers emerged. We asked the telcos, and they prescribed big capex improvements to the phone network. The future was ISDN! But that’s not what happened. Silly universities were networking over primitive and free technologies. Pioneering efforts created new protocols, such as HTTP and HTML, which made IP networks less nerdy. Several open-source initiatives gave us Linux, Apache, and the web browser. The internet was created for cheap, and it didn’t come from AT&T. 

DeepSeek, a Chinese company, created a top reasoning model called R1 that distills weak models into powerful models — at a fraction of the cost of the US approach. Adding salt to the wound, this Chinese company has a clever name and publishes everything as open source. Wait, there’s more. They also published a free, detailed technical report — the first of its kind. 

No wonder it was cheap; they cheated! Instead of spending all that time and compute on training, they told it to train itself — and it did. This is one of those moments in history. We say that because it’s rightfully being compared to a prior moment in (AI) history. 

In 2016, Google trained AlphaGo to play Go using millions of human matches. A year later, Google took a different approach with AlphaGo Zero and just gave it the rules without training — and it trained itself. AlphaGo Zero destroyed AlphaGo and also beat the human Go and Chess champs. It wasn’t slowed down by the human approach, nor does it play like a human. AlphaGo Zero plays in surprisingly unconventional ways. This exposed an important flaw in our approach to AI. Is the goal to create a machine that solves problems like a human or a machine that solves problems?

There’s a wonderful line in the film “Star Trek IV.” A dangerous alien probe sends a message to Earth, but we don’t understand it. One speculates that the message is a greeting. Spock retorts, “Only human arrogance would assume the signal must be meant for mankind.” Human arrogance is training our AI machines with human baggage like biases. It is called Artificial Intelligence, yet we keep forcing human methodologies into it. We are training the powerful AI on internet data — that’s crazy. The coming debate isn’t about American vs. Chinese AI; it will be about human intelligence vs. artificial intelligence. We wonder, which is favored to win? 

The tech giants are still defending their approach, and they may be right. However, the telcos defended ISDN for at least 20 years while the internet flourished. All we know now is that Nvidia stock will continue to go up or down. We also know, without any doubt, that there will be a broader sell-off of AI stocks. The question is when or in which decade will it occur? Meanwhile, DeepSeek’s R1 app quickly propelled to the top of Apple’s Top Free Apps. America considers TikTok a threat, but not DeepSeek? #GoFigure

Only 48 hours after the explosion of DeepSeek news, and in the most extreme case of the pot calling the kettle black, OpenAI accused DeepSeek of “stealing.” Can’t make this stuff up. And the last January story added to this Insider: Alibaba releases AI model it says surpasses DeepSeek. Hold on to your hat.  

General News

Fires: The fires in Southern California are the latest unprecedented fires. Paradise, Boulder, Maui, and Palisades stand out because they occurred in cities with fire hydrants. Experts at AccuWeather say extreme weather events and disasters in the past 12 months have had the costliest and most widespread impacts Americans have faced in nearly a century. We start February with an atmospheric river deluge. There’s no place to hide from extreme weather. The only logical business strategy is distributed, remote work!  

Meet the New Boss: As much as we love to avoid politics in the Insider, we have to acknowledge the US presidential change. Tech and finance industry executives have high expectations for their political support. Five of the world’s 10 wealthiest billionaires attended Trump’s inauguration. There will be some sweeping changes in regulation, employment practices, visas, and FCC oversight. 

Trump’s reign as President began with less than half of January remaining, but he swiftly signed executive orders, and some even mattered. This month, we saw the end of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs across federal agencies, the removal of civil service protections from some federal workers, and the end of remote work programs for federal employees. There were also more rapid changes, including pardons for the January 6 convicts. By the time you read this, those will all be old news. Busy times. 

In terms of AI, Trump revoked the Biden AI mandate and signed his own, with ambiguous objectives. For example, an intent to develop AI systems “free from ideological bias or engineered social agendas.” David Sacks, the venture capitalist who is Trump’s AI and crypto czar, and Michael Kratsios, Trump’s assistant for science and technology, were charged with drawing up a plan to “sustain and enhance America’s global AI dominance” in the next 180 days. That should be easy!? 

Many industry executives expect Trump to ease environmental and energy regulations to pave the way for more AI data centers. Trump is also expected to accelerate Stargate, a $500B data center fund that OpenAI and SoftBank put together with Oracle and MGX. 

Stargate looks like theater. It intends to spend $100B this year, but that seems impossible given constraints on chips and power. The $500B commitment is also suspicious. Sam Altman said that OpenAI and SoftBank would each commit $19B, and Oracle may commit $10B. That leaves golf pros MGX, a UAE organization, to cover $462B. Other questions include who will own these data centers and who will run them. 

Also in politics this month, TikTok demonstrated just how clever its name is. It got a last-minute stay of execution, but only temporarily — it still isn’t back in the Apple and Google US app stores. The issue is that the US wants to own this app because the government knows just how influential (manipulative) social networks can be. This is probably theater, considering ByteDance has never indicated it was willing to sell TikTok (or if China will even allow it to be sold). The political power of social networks is becoming very clear: Facebook opted to follow X and remove restrictions on political content as well as end its fact-checking efforts. 

Tech Layoffs Continue (Again): Major tech companies continue to implement staff reductions. According to Reuters, Meta Platforms intends to cut approximately 5% of its employees. Business Insider reported that Microsoft is planning to cut more jobs. Avaya has experienced significant cuts worldwide. 

AI News

AI Going Free — Sort Of: Google is taking a page from Zoom’s playbook by bundling its AI capabilities into its paid subscription plans at no additional cost — although it’s offsetting the move by raising prices. This shift signals an industrywide evolution where AI is no longer treated as a shiny, standalone feature but as a utility embedded in the core of technology offerings, much like electricity powers everything around us. It’s a clear step toward AI becoming an expected baseline in tech rather than a distraction or a marketing brag.

Meanwhile, Microsoft’s approach to “free AI” feels increasingly convoluted. In the latest announcement, Microsoft has rebranded the free “Copilot for Business” to “Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat,” attempting to position it as a stepping stone toward the fully paid “Microsoft 365 Copilot” at $30 per month. This free service now incorporates AI agents within the chat interface, enabling automation of tasks such as monitoring email inboxes. Users can create and utilize these agents through Copilot Studio, with additional pricing managed via pay-as-you-go options or consumption packs. Agent usage is measured in messages, with costs varying based on the type of response, ranging from 1 cent for simple answers to 30 cents for accessing work data in the Microsoft Graph. 

Despite the complex pricing structure, Microsoft aims for Copilot Chat to attract businesses. It’s wagering that the carrot of productivity enhancements will justify the complete Microsoft 365 Copilot subscription. 

Nopilot: The transition from Office 365 to Microsoft 365 was challenging, but that was a walk in the park compared to the ongoing Copilot branding saga. We mostly understood the original Copilot, Microsoft’s sprawling enterprise AI add-on for Microsoft 365. It was $30 per user per month. That seemed high when it launched, and it’s fun to see the fans who defended it eating Diet Crow now. We (and even some of the biggest Microsoft supporters) have lost track of exactly how many Copilots there are now, what they cost, and how to use them. 

To be honest, Microsoft’s AI branding strategy has left much of the tech-savvy public feeling like they’re trapped in a never-ending episode of “Lost,” with new Copilots and confusing renaming popping up seemingly every other week. Even some of those inclined to extoll Microsoft AI are tuning out, overwhelmed by what feels like a disorganized jumble of updates and branding shifts. This isn’t a critique of AI itself or Microsoft’s technical execution — both may well be brilliant — but the messaging is in desperate need of clarity. The general public is starting to resemble the villagers in “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” — immediately tuning out the moment another Microsoft AI rebrand is announced, assuming it’s just more noise.

Apple, Cisco, Google, Zoom, and others have kept their AI brands and prices relatively straightforward. Microsoft has not. At this point, people who truly care about Microsoft might need to stage an intervention if they keep pulling new Copilots and rebranded Copilots out of thin air with no cohesive strategy. Both Google and Microsoft have forced AI on for all in documents, and that’s annoyed many writers.  It turns out the blank page doesn’t intimate everyone. 

What Follows LLMs? Google thinks (or proposes) that Titans will be the next generation of AI after LLMs. This came before DeepSeek. Titans is a new architecture inspired by the human brain’s memory system. At its core, it merges short-term memory (attention), long-term memory (neural module), and persistent memory. The idea is to enable models to process the present and leverage stored data. The expected result is to allow AI to solve long-context problems at scale. Unfortunately, it uses even more compute resources than LLMs. 

Meetings and AV

Microsoft Teams January Announcements: SMS support in Teams will soon be available for US and Canada calling plans, while live web chat for small businesses will be rolling out globally by March. Teams transcription will default to “on” unless configured otherwise by admins, and users can now share intelligent meeting recap links internally. Security on voicemail greetings has been tightened, and accessibility improvements include real-time caption translation in preferred languages for Teams Rooms. Device-related updates emphasize mandatory firmware updates for Android devices by mid-2025 and support for multi-window and USB-C cameras on iPads. Microsoft also reinforced the upcoming end of Teams support for Windows 10 devices by October 2025, urging upgrades to Windows 11.  

Microsoft also introduced a few new Teams features at the very end of the month. These include an “Express Install” option for Microsoft Teams Rooms, designed to simplify and expedite the deployment process; a “Multiple Camera View” option where remote participants can switch between up to four different camera feeds in a Teams Room on Windows; the ability to position notifications on the screen where desired; and “Recording Controls” allowing MTRoW users to start or stop meeting recordings directly from the room console without the need for a companion device.

Next Version of MDEP: Microsoft has released an MDEP firmware update — version 2024.4. This version includes extended support for IP phones, including touchscreen and non-touchscreen models with SideCar accessories, as well as expanded hardware compatibility for Microsoft Teams Rooms on Android. Enhancements include simplified device provisioning with frictionless certificate workflows, Qualcomm QCS6490 chipset support, and integration of the Fluent 2 design system for easier partner customization. Accessibility improvements focus on flexible narrator audio output and better UI navigation across devices.

Google Meet Adds Interoperability: Google has announced that Logitech’s Android-based Google Meet hardware devices, including the Rally Bar, Rally Bar Mini, and Rally Bar Huddle appliances, can now directly join Cisco Webex and Zoom meetings. End users can join Webex or Zoom meetings by selecting the desired platform on their touch controller or adding the room to a scheduled event with the appropriate meeting details. The rollout will begin February 13, 2025, and is expected to take up to 15 days for full visibility. While this announcement was only about Logitech devices, we expect other Android device manufacturers to add this capability shortly. It’s great to see any increase in interop (especially from Google), but we suspect this will create a similar experience to Direct Guest Join, with many features not supported and some users seeking a more premium, third-party experience.

Integrated Systems Europe: As you read this, we’re attending the ISE2025 expo in Barcelona. Below, we’ve included the announcements we were pre-briefed on. The February Insider Report will include a roll-up of all the new announcements from the event. One key trend to emerge: Small is the new Big Deal. Multiple video manufacturers are releasing new or updated video bars meant for small rooms.

Cisco New BYOD: At ISE, Cisco previewed a new solution for smaller rooms. They cleverly removed the touch panel from their room bar and called it the Room Bar BYOD. At about $1.5K, it works as a BYOD-only device — but still has comprehensive network management capabilities — but then immediately upgrades to a full room bar with codec if you add the touch panel back to it — in a unique upgrade path for users. 

Neat New BYOD: At ISE, Neat announced a new solution for smaller rooms. They cleverly removed the Neat Pad from their Neat Bar and Neat Bar 2 and are calling the feature “Neat Select” to meet BYOD needs. Neat Select works as a BYOD-only device on both models — but still supports comprehensive network management capabilities through Neat Pulse.

Jabra New Devices: Jabra has introduced a little brother to the Panacast 50 VBS. The Panacast 40 VBS boasts all the same features but is intended for slightly smaller rooms. With a list price of under $1,500 US, it will be one of the lowest-cost all-in-one Android (and BYOD) devices on the market. Additionally, Jabra released a new headset — the Perform 75, specifically designed for retail shift workers to enhance collaboration and productivity. The device features advanced noise-canceling technology, a push-to-talk button, and a durable design tailored to the demands of retail environments.

New Products From Logitech: In January, Logitech introduced three new products: Logitech Spot, a battery-powered sensor that detects room occupancy and monitors environmental conditions; Rally Board 65, an all-in-one 65” portable video conferencing solution; and the Rally Camera Streamline Kit, a USB Pan Tilt Zoom video solution for quick access to presets. The Spot is an innovative product that will align well with Logitech’s schedulers as well as Microsoft Places and (eventually) Zoom Workspace Reservation. The Rally Board’s chief innovation is that it can be flipped to have the camera on top or on the bottom.

Barco Firmware Update: Barco’s ClickShare winter 2025 firmware update introduces dual content-sharing, allowing users to share two content streams simultaneously when using the latest ClickShare Desktop App and compatible Base Units. The update also includes improvements to application stability and security.

AudioCodes AI: AudioCodes has introduced its AI-First Intelligent Virtual Agent (IVA) platform, designed to enhance customer interactions by integrating advanced artificial intelligence capabilities. This platform offers features such as natural language understanding, voice recognition, and seamless integration with various communication channels. Additionally, it provides tools for analytics and real-time insights. AudioCodes it will provide meeting summary capabilities by room (as opposed to the Microsoft’s user model). This means users of AudioCodes MTR systems can get these summaries regardless of individual Copilot subscriptions. Six months of this service are included with purchase.

Crestron Adds Noise & Cost Suppression: Crestron’s new firmware update for the Videobar 70 has a noise suppression feature that quiets typing, rustling, and even a hair-dryer in their demo, so all you hear are the voices speaking in the room. The demo is impressive. Managing Crestron devices will now be done in a free tier of XiO. Users will only incur charges when managing non-Crestron gear. This update brings Crestron in line with several other manufacturers in the space.

Huddly and Shure: Huddly has been selected as the official camera provider for Shure’s new IntelliMix Room Kits, which are Microsoft Teams Room solutions combining Huddly’s AI-powered video technology with Shure’s collaboration devices. 

New HP Bar: HP Launched a new video bar for small spaces — the Poly Studio V12 USB Video Bar. It is compatible with all the same platforms as other Poly USB bars, yet made with over 50% recycled plastic and shipped in eco-friendly packaging. HP had to update the P15/R30 series because parts were no longer available from its supply chain.

New Owl Certifications: Owl Labs’ Meeting Owl 3 and Owl Bar products have achieved certification for Microsoft Teams. The Meeting Owl 4+ is currently undergoing the certification process.

New DTEN Devices: DTEN has announced new collaboration solutions, including the DTEN Vue and Vue Pro, designed to enhance video conferencing and hybrid meetings in small to large meeting rooms. The Vue is a camera system featuring multiple ultra-HD lenses and AI capabilities to provide dynamic, immersive views of participants and meeting spaces. 

Nureva iOS App: Nureva, manufacturer of a unique large-room microphone system, has launched an iOS version of its app, featuring an acoustic check tool that simplifies measuring and analyzing acoustic performance in larger spaces. The app predicts audio performance, optimizes placement of its systems, and enhances room setup without requiring specialized equipment.

DePortal: Meta has pulled another one out of its playbook. In October 2018, it launched the “Facebook Portal” device as a tool to enhance video calling with features like a smart camera that could follow users as they moved. At the time, Danto said no one would take the product seriously because no one trusts Facebook. In 2022, Meta decided to refocus the product away from a consumer audience. Then, with a week left to go in January ’25, every Portal sported an onscreen message that the devices would no longer support Zoom calling or voice services from Amazon and Google as of January 31. (Alexa, why aren’t you answering?) Meta’s current darling product is its Ray-Ban AR glasses. Danto feels now like he felt then: Anyone buying a hardware product from Meta will eventually be disappointed when they abandon it. On the trust scale, he believes it’s hard to get lower than Meta. 

Customer Experience

Intercom Investment: Intercom has invested $100M in AI, expanded its team, and provided details about its AI customer service agent, Fin. Intercom reported that Fin has handled millions of queries since its launch. 

Twilio Business Announcements: Twilio reported its first GAAP-operating profit, said it plans to integrate AI through partnerships with OpenAI and AWS, and launched a $2B stock-buyback program to enhance shareholder value. The company says it anticipates continued profitability and double-digit revenue growth while focusing on smarter customer communication solutions.

Nuance: HCLTech, the technology arm of India’s HCL Group, will take on all 550 Nuance Enterprise Professional Services employees and existing contracts. Additionally, HCLTech will offer the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Contact Center solution and provide migration services from Nuance. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed, but it can be inferred that it will result in cost savings for Microsoft. Since acquiring Nuance for $20B in 2021, Microsoft has largely left it and its brand unchanged. However, Nuance was tightly linked to Dynamics 365 Contact Center — at least at launch.

8x8 CC: 8x8 announced recent enhancements to its integrated platform spanning CC, UC, and CPaaS. CC updates include expanded 8x8 Secure Pay digital payments functionality, AI-powered payments, 8x8 Knowledge Base shortcuts, an enhanced Interaction Retrieval Widget for proactive monitoring, and a Connect multi-channel sender. 8x8 wants to ensure its customers stay ahead in an evolving digital landscape with the tools needed to transform CX.

OpenAI Operator: OpenAI announced this month it is launching a research preview of Operator, a general-purpose AI agent that can take control of a web browser and independently perform certain actions. Perhaps you thought generative AI was going to replace your agents — that was wrong. Perhaps you thought it was Agentic AI that would replace the agents — that was wrong. Certainly, it will be Operator AI that replaces your agents? Nope. Coming soon, Representative AI.

Operator will be available first to US users on ChatGPT’s $200 Pro subscription plan and eventually rolled out to other tiers. The initial preview is accessible through operator.chatgpt.com, but OpenAI plans to integrate it into all ChatGPT clients. 

Operator can automate tasks like making reservations or shopping online. Operator uses a Computer-Using Agent model, or CUA, trained to interact with the front-end of websites — just like humans interact with websites (buttons and menus) instead of APIs. This approach accelerates experimentation, but since Operator hallucinates, OpenAI suggests it be supervised. Also, Operator doesn’t collect data, so intervention is required for things like credit card processing. Its bizarre rate limits will make it difficult to manage. It’s also a little amusing that Operator can’t get past most CAPTCHA checks, so quite literally, human agents need to be on standby to help Operator replace them. Like Happy Fun Ball, do not taunt Operator. 

UC and Messaging

Zoom Update: Zoom’s Workspace client has been updated (to version 6.3.6), which introduces a sidebar enhancement to Zoom Team Chat. It integrates AI Companion to assist users in drafting messages and summarizing chat threads.

Teams SMS: Microsoft Teams is getting native SMS for US and Canada Calling Plan users. It will be enabled by default, but admins must configure 10DLC (10-digit long code). More details will follow before its February release.

Wildix Summit: Wildix hosted its virtual annual UC&C Summit this month, where it unveiled its next-generation UC&C platform, WMS 7. The newest release offers several AI enhancements, including summarization tools, real-time transcription, and chat enhancements. Wildix also announced new sales education programs (with plans to allocate more than $1M toward partner enablement). The company strengthened key value proposition pillars, including sales training for its channel-first GTM and improvements for X-bees (sales intelligence) such as real-time sentiment analysis, and X-Hoppers (frontline) such as, AI-driven theft detection, line management, and safety alerts. 

RC Events: RingCentral has introduced RingCentral Events Studio (formerly Hopin), an all-in-one platform for producing professional, fully branded event streams without additional software or costs. The update enhances the speaker experience by eliminating tab clutter, ensuring real-time streaming without delays, and providing full production control with backstage chat and pre-loaded content. It also includes tools for branded high-quality broadcasts and audience engagement features like live Q&A, polls, and emoji reactions.

8x8 UC: 8x8 has been busy. The provider announced recent enhancements to its integrated platform that spans CC, UC, and CPaaS. UC updates include a voice-powered directory, 8x8 meeting assets sharing, Mobile Device Management support for retail, and desk phone multicast paging. The updates are intended to better empower businesses to connect, collaborate, and deliver exceptional customer and employee experience. 

The Business Section

Gamma Acquires Starface: Gamma Communications PLC agreed to buy German business communication software company SF Technologies Holding GmbH, trading as Starface, for EUR196M. Starface employs around 260 people and serves SME businesses in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Gamma said the acquisition was funded with its cash plus GBP40M in its revolving credit facility. Starface is expected to deliver group revenue of around EUR44M.

Infobip and Deutsche Telecom: Infobip and Telekom Business Europe partnered to help businesses across Europe establish an omnichannel presence. Telekom Business Europe’s cloud-based and AI-enabled communication platform, powered by Infobip, enables companies to engage with customers from any location, at any time, through their preferred communication channels, including SMS, RCS, WhatsApp, Viber, Apple Messages, and social media. 

ServiceNow and Cuein: ServiceNow has signed an agreement to acquire Cuein to advance the effectiveness of ServiceNow AI Agents. Backed by Lightspeed Venture Partners, Khosla Ventures, and Webb Investment Network, Cuein was founded in 2021. Few details are known about Cuein, but the acquisition has to do with agentic AI. ServiceNow expects to finalize its acquisition of Cuein in the first quarter of 2025. 

AV Industry Consolidation Continues: Just about monthly, we post an update about AV integrators in this section like the two below, in this case about AVI Systems and then Conference Technologies, Inc. (CTI). Danto feels it’s important to point out (as he has for years) that traditional AV integration is shrinking/consolidating. There are multiple reasons for this — the simpler gear of today can be self-installed, more IT companies are taking on AV work, lower margins are pushing smaller companies to sell to larger ones, etc. We will continue to list these major transactions, but they are part of a repetitive story of consolidation. 

AVI Systems and AVCON: AVI Systems announced it will acquire AVCON, a systems integration firm based in Cary, North Carolina, expanding its presence in the southeastern United States. All AVCON employees will transition to AVI Systems, and the AVCON office will continue serving customers in North and South Carolina and Southern Virginia.

CTI Expands Again: CTI has acquired Delta AV, a Gresham, Oregon-based company with nearly 30 years of experience in AV design, integration, and service, expanding CTI’s coverage in the Pacific Northwest and the Portland Metro Area. This acquisition marks CTI’s 39th US location and follows previous expansions, including the acquisitions of Vistacom in Allentown, Pennsylvania; Advanced Systems Integration in Minneapolis; and Digital Technology Solutions in San Antonio, Texas, over the past 12 months.

Leadership Changes

8x8 named Joel Neeb as its Chief Transformation and Business Operations Officer (CTBO?), responsible for aligning CX transformation and strategic initiatives with operational outcomes. Talkdesk named Doug Dopita as Executive Sales Leader, Area VP NA. Sprinklr announced Joy Corso as its Chief Administrative Officer. Joy will report to CEO Rory Read, as she did at Vonage and two other firms. Niall Carter has joined Cognigy as an Area VP for UK and Ireland. Mitel announced Marco Landi as Group VP of International Sales and Ken Evans as its VP of Revenue Marketing. Landi has experience from Sensormatic Solutions, and Evans served time at Fuze. Callan Schebella, EVP of Product Management at Five9, has left the company. He arrived at Five9 when it acquired his company, Inference Solutions, in 2020.

Ericsson created a new venture called Aduna and named Anthony Bartolo its CEO. Bartolo recently started at Vonage, likely as a placeholder until Aduna was launched. He previously worked at Bandwidth and Avaya. Aduna is derived from Latin and means many entities uniting as one. We wonder why they didn’t use the name Poly? 

Barak Eilam has joined Cvent as Board Chair. This should be interesting. TalkingPointz has been documenting how UCaaS and events are converging, especially at Cisco, RingCentral, and Zoom. Eilam joined the boards of Similarweb last September and FactSet last December. 

Goodreads

1. ​​DeepSeek’s AI model proves easy to jailbreak — and worse The luster begins to tarnish as security issues are found.
2. Evaluating Security Risk in DeepSeek and Other Frontier Reasoning Models Cisco examines the risks with DeepSeek.
3. Exposed VW Data Revealed Info Like Locations, Owner Names for Over 800,000 Vehicles Someone at VW left detailed location histories for 800k cars in an unlocked AWS storage bucket.
4. Wired: The 31 Best Gadgets From CES 2025 You Can Buy Right Now and 11 More of the Most Fun Things We’ve Seen at CES.
5. Candy Crush, Tinder, MyFitnessPal: See the Thousands of Apps Hijacked to Spy on Your Location A hack of Gravy Analytics has revealed which apps are collecting your information behind the scenes. 
6. Ericsson and Nokia warn Europe is dying, but don’t expect action Europe already has “one foot in the morgue,” says Nokia’s CEO, as he is joined at a Brussels event by his Ericsson counterpart.
7. FBI Warned Agents It Believes Phone Logs Hacked Last Year Remember that Chinese hack of telecom data? What can metadata possibly reveal of importance? Informants! 
8. Meta’s New AI Translates Speech in Real Time Across More Than 100 Languages Meta released a new AI that can almost instantaneously translate speech in 101 languages as soon as the words tumble out of your mouth.
9. Justice Department and FBI Conduct International Operation to Delete Malware Used by China-Backed Hackers Hacker news stories are rarely good news. 
10. Is private cloud having a moment? Faced with mounting hyperscaler bills, proliferating data, and compute-hungry generative AI, enterprises are weighing alternatives to public cloud. 
11. Tech salaries barely inched up in 2024 Compensation for IT workers failed to keep up with inflation last year, increasing 1.2% last year, according to Dice data. 
12. Mark Zuckerberg Turns His Back on the Media The Meta CEO is abandoning his commitment to the truth in favor of a Trump-style playbook. 
13. You are an absolute moron for believing in the hype of “AI Agents” Self-explanatory. 
14. Trump Antitrust Division Challenges Major Tech Merger The Trump Antitrust Division, led by Acting Assistant Attorney General Omeed A. Assefi, sued to block a $14B merger between HPE and Juniper.
15. How Helpful Is Operator, OpenAI’s New AI Agent? Operator, a new computer-using tool from OpenAI, is brittle and occasionally erratic, but it points to a future of powerful AI agents.

Other Recent Stuff

Effective 2025, we moved the Insider Lite to Substack. You can view it here. This is free content, and Substack makes things easier for everyone. The bad news is it’s a separate subscription. A paid subscription does not mean a free subscription.  You can subscribe here. Insider Lites typically publish about once a month. Also, Dave Michels has started putting some content on Medium. Head over here and check out his book review on Nexus — a book that takes a hard look at the dangerous confluence of AI and social networks. 

• The New Insider Lite for 2025
• AI is Calling UC (NoJitter)
• AV & Collab VARS chat about ISE and being a channel partner (Video)
• Check out our New Channel Series: Episode 1 and Episode 2. 
• AudioCodes: The Clark Kent of Collaboration 
• UcaaS Is Stupid (NoJitter)
• Scott Russell, CEO of NICE, Speaks
• Intermedia Musing 
• Barco ClickShare, Microsoft Teams, and the Future of Collaboration
• SP Voice is the New Old Thing
• CES 2025 Wrap-up Thoughts (Video)
• CES Video Playlist
• Updates From CES 2025 (blogs and videos)
• Dave and David review the big UC news of 2024 (Video)
• Another New Beginning for Poly Two years ago, HP acquired Poly. 
• Agentic AI Represents an IVR Revolution The promise of AI tools with the agency to make decisions has potential — but adopters would be wise to understand what AI agents can do well.
• The Leader in Wireless Conferencing Meets the Leader in Collaboration
• A chat with Five9 CTR JDR on the Future of agents (Video)
• Tom Arbuthnot joins Dave and David to analyze MS Ignite News (Video)
• TalkingPointz Research: Analysis of the 2024 CCaaS Magic Quadrant
• TalkingPointz Research: UCaaS Firms Move Into Hybrid Office Space Management
• David Joins AVWeek to discuss MS Ignite (Video)
• Unpacking the Relationship Between Customer Satisfaction Scores and Shareholder Value 
• rAVe webcast on audio advances in hybrid workspaces (Danto discusses ML)
• ClueCon Weekly Podcast on UC
• Discussion on Amazon’s RTO Mandate (Danto, Michels, and Irwin Lazar) 
• UCaaS is a Teams Sport We traded our Bell monopoly for MS Teams dominance.
• An Interview with Barry Cooper on AI and more (video). 
• Cisco WebexOne Keynote Excerpts, Summary, and Discussions (UC Weekly News Video)
• TalkingPointz Research: Gartner 2024 UCaaS Magic Quadrant analysis

Recent Insider Reports (only new Insider Reports are behind the paywall) 

1. Insider Jan 2024
2. Insider Lite Feb 2024
3. Insider Feb 2024
4. Insider Lite Mar 2024
5. Insider March 2024
6. Insider April 20, 2024
7. Insider Lite May 2024
8. Insider May 2024
9. Insider June 2024 
10. Insider Lite July 2024
11. Insider July 2024
12. Insider Lite August 2024
13. Insider August 2024
14. Insider Lite September 2024
15. Insider September 2024
16. Insider Lite October 2024
17. Insider October 2024

 

TalkingPointz Insider Reports are available through a subscription service at TalkingPointz.com.

Any Questions?

Your paid enterprise subscription entitles you to a conversation on any of the topics covered above. 

About

Insider Reports offer timely, curated, and opinionated news. The Insider Report is published the first week of every month. Enterprise subscriptions also include TalkingPointz research notes. These reports are geared toward the industry itself, though some enterprises subscribe, too. Core subscribers are vendors, providers, consultants, and (financial and industry) analysts. TalkingPointz offers Enterprise-vendor, channel, consultant, and personal subscriptions. 

Meet Us

Dave Michels is Founder and Chief Protagonist at TalkingPointz and Editor in Chief of the Insider Report. [email protected]. David Danto is AV Aficionado at TalkingPointz. [email protected].