The future of video conferencing according to Robb Woods, director of Business Value and Solution Strategy at BlueJeans
How is Artificial Intelligence going to shape our future? A field where AI could be heavily applied is exactly video conferencing. Robb Woods, director at BlueJeans, has little, if no doubt. He describes a future when AI will help us in a way that is hardly imaginable today. And this future is near, not far: we are going to see the first AI applications to video conferences in a couple of years only.
Robb gives an interesting example of how AI could become helpful for a busy manager like him. He receives a lot of invitations to many video conferences a day, too many to attend each of them. A computer with AI could select the right invitations for Robb and discard the less interesting. More, AI could wear an avatar and act in behalf of Robb by answering questions, taking notes and placing kind calls of refuse to any unwanted invitation or of request for further information. Brilliant, isn’t it?
Another interesting trend that could disrupt video conferencing industry is downsizing. AI propels even more the trend of the last decades towards miniaturization of devices. This is possible through the combination of enhanced software services and more powerful hardware. We have already passed from dedicated conference rooms to small devices like R-HUB`s video conferencing servers (http://www.rhubcom.com) which have been downsized to the dimensions of a book and can be placed on a shelf of your bookcase. In future, devices will get even smaller: they could be placed on a finger ring or mounted in a pair of glasses.
Cloud computing could be also enhanced by AI, according to Robb. The race to cloud has already started in video conferencing industry, but AI could speed up a lot the process and bring about new disruptive technologies and scenarios. It is not a case that big companies are more and more involved on line. For instance, Microsoft has grown in the cloud market up to the point to become a leader. Amazon is going to follow Microsoft’s example by purchasing Biba, a mobile business conferencing app.
In conclusion, AI seems to be a powerful and strategic resource for video conferencing. It is going to highly disrupt this industry as a whole and particularly video conferencing services and tools, in order to offer new and more advanced solutions to users. AI revolution is not a remote, far perspective: it will happen and affect our daily tasks very soon.