Cisco has announced their plans to soon tie WebEx bidirectionally to Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet. This will come in the next version of their Room Operating System software, which includes the management consoles for the conferencing devices. They aren’t the first – HP last week introduced their Presence systems, with native support for Zoom and Teams.
Why do we care?
Cisco is going open ecosystem on their devices. That shows the power of those work tools, and also a clear signal they aren’t winning against communications rivals. We didn’t WebEx through the pandemic, and only Zoom became a verb.
I’m a believer in open ecosystems, and Cisco’s embrace of the approach is a signal to the importance of the “work layer” for companies. It’s smart. They want their hardware in that space, and don’t want to be left out. Neither should you.