TalkingPointz Research #WebexOne Conference 2020

December 17, 2020 by Dave Michels

Cisco WebexOne and the Magic of We

[This Research Note is available to TalkingPointz Premium subscribers or separate purchase. It is 12.5 pages long. Section 5, Dave's Thought's, has 110 TalkingPointz.]

Overview

1. Cisco hosted its first WebexOne global conference, a two-day virtual event focused on the new Webex. It included executive keynotes, 40 general sessions, and 60 training sessions. Presentations included new partners and 40 customers, as well as special guest segments with Amal Clooney and RuPaul.
2. Cisco believes there are 3B digital workers globally, of which 1B are knowledge workers, and 2B are frontline and field workers. Cisco wants them to be equal participants in the digital economy. 
3. In 2020, the pandemic accelerated adoption of cloud-delivered services and redistributed teams. A disruptive year, leadership changes, product developments, and new investments set the stage for Cisco to reveal its progress and updates to Webex. 
4. Though still clearly dominant in meetings, calling, and customer engagement, Cisco has slipped in brand recognition and leadership. The competitive pressures have been increasing in cloud collaboration, recently the CEO of Zoom was recognized as Time’s Businessperson of the Year. Slack was acquired for $27B, and Microsoft Teams hit the milestone of 115M daily active users. 
5. Cisco identified three pillars that drove the new Webex: empowering remote work experiences, providing a safe return to the office, and delighting customers. “Our mission is to build inclusive opportunity for all. The new Webex is built to break down barriers and bring people together to do exceptional work, anywhere in the world.” 

Notable Announcements

There were a lot of announcements at WebexOne. Featured below is a partial list. 

General

1. Single app for calling, messaging, meetings, whiteboard, and more. App also facilitates pairing with Cisco hardware devices. GA
2. Noise cancellation and speech enhancement: Impressive technology from the recent acquisition of BabbleLabs. The technology is embedded in Cisco (hard and soft) endpoints. GA
3. Presence: Real-time rich awareness across all modalities and hard and soft endpoints. GA
4. Two acquisitions were announced at WebexOne: IMImobile and Slido. See Acquisitions below. 
5. Ethical Walls: Cisco allows administrators to disable or block communications between certain individuals or departments. Feature applies to compliance matters. Previously announced. GA 
6. Conversational artifacts: Video recordings, documents, other shared content are saved in Webex 1:1 or group messaging and can be easily shared. GA 2/21
7. Expanded VDI support: Webex VDI support extended to Chromebook and Linux devices. Webex also runs in a browser. GA 
8. Expanded People Insights: Now powered by the Webex Graph, Webex People Insights delivers personalized visual insights of communication patterns with actionable recommendations to individuals and teams.
9. Encryption and Identity: End-to-end encryption, previously supported between Webex clients, now extends to Webex devices. The encryption includes meeting recordings and transcriptions. 
10. Integrated calling plans (from Cisco): Cisco has simp. . .