The communications industry is filled with vendors that once dominated one aspect of the “stack” but have been focused on building a unified platform that includes voice, video, meetings, contact center and much more. But the most interesting vendor in the market is Zoom Communications Inc.
Zoom Communications Inc. is a fascinating company in that it’s one of the few corporate technology brands that resonates with end users as well as information technology pros. I’m aware of many instances where the IT organization was considering an alternate communications product but the demand from the user community was so strong that Zoom was purchased. Zoom’s ease of use made it the product of choice during the stay-at-home period of the pandemic and user loyalty grew from there.
Zoom Communications Inc. has a variety of products, including meetings, contact center, front-line worker applications and others, but this week there’s a single theme that cut across the fully virtual Zoomtopia event: artificial intelligence. In fact, with that emphasis on how AI is expanding and enhancing Zoom’s conferencing and related services, they could have called the event ZoomtopAI.
Recently Zoom Video Communications Inc. held its annual industry analyst event, Perspectives, at its headquarters in San Jose, and it revealed much about the ongoing evolution of the videoconferencing company. The company’s first act was built on video and given a massive steroid shot during the COVID era, which turned a company few had heard of into a household name. Since then, the company has added a boatload of new features, added enterprise clients, reduced the churn in its online business, and moved into adjacent markets, most notably contact center.
Last week all eyes were on Nvidia Corp.’s GTC, also known as the artificial intelligence show. But there was another event going on across the country as Enterprise Connect, the communications industry’s largest event was going on in Orlando, Florida. AI was the theme at EC as the technology is changing the way we interact with each other and with customers and that’s where Zoom Communications Inc. unloaded a salvo of 45 agentic AI skills and agent enhancements for its Zoom AI Companion.