Embracing the Decoupling: Microsoft shift sparks BYOD revolution
Posted 16 April 2024
In a recent article, the BBC covered the long-expected news that Microsoft would decouple Microsoft Teams from Microsoft 365. This means that when subscribing to Microsoft 365 as your cloud-based productivity platform, you must now subscribe to Microsoft Teams user licences separately.
This measure is a result of European Commission inquiry, and the result is that this could broaden options for unified communication technology in meeting spaces as well as the desktop. We believe this will result in greater adoption of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) video conferencing meeting spaces.
Increased hybrid working has caused global growth in the use of video conferencing platforms as organisations continue to run meetings including home workers, suppliers, customers and remote offices. There are plenty of platforms available for this practice. Zoom, Microsoft and Google have experienced most of the platform adoption and usage.
Microsoft has been winning this race, partly because of its economic viability and convenience due to its inclusion in Microsoft 365.
Simultaneously many notable businesses have started to insist that workers return to the office, at least in some capacity, as they wrestle with perceived (or real) cultural and productivity challenges.
Because hybrid working is seen as a benefit to many, the return to the office has generally been partial, with staff being asked to come to the office 2-3 days per week. Outside of this, they can continue to work from home.
This partial return is likely to drive more demand for meeting spaces, and with it, meeting space video conferencing systems. As a result, many companies are researching ways to offer economically viable and simple-to-use video collaboration tools in meeting rooms that don’t already have them.
While it is logical that boardrooms contain Microsoft Teams Room systems, this can be expensive if broadened out to other meeting rooms/areas; the cost of a Microsoft Teams Room Pro Licence is approx. £33.00 per room, per month.
Support of the hardware can also be tricky. Whilst the simple one-touch-to-join feature is user-friendly, and usually works well, if there was a hardware issue, a standard room user will not know what steps to take to fix it. Even a reboot (which room users may not know how to do) can be time consuming, delaying the start of your meeting.
For these reasons, many organisations are deploying simple BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) solutions, which leverage user’s laptops.
Effective deployments of these should feature:
- A simple, one cable or wireless connection to the room display, camera and audio
- Wide angle room camera(s) with auto-framing and zooming to capture all room participants
- Speakers and microphones suitable for the room size, composition and occupancy.
BYOD solutions are cost-effective, owing to the fact,
- You can leverage the Microsoft Teams user licence instead of requiring an additional room licence
- They are often deployed in smaller rooms, so the demands on hardware performance is reduced.
Finally, BYOD solutions are easy to use because the workflow is the same as joining a video call from home or your desk. They also have the added benefit of facilitating joining calls on other UC platforms, such as Zoom or Google.
BYOD is not new though. However, perhaps because of the decoupling of Teams from Microsoft 365, Microsoft now openly supports the use of BYOD conferencing in meeting spaces.
Today, UC hardware manufacturers offer a much wider range of cost-effective BYOD options than were previously available and Presentation Media are specialist installers of room video conferencing systems. We can help you define what is most suitable for your business based on budget, room type, size and user experience.
Get in touch to learn about how we can facilitate your meeting room video conferencing deployments. Don’t forget to ask us about our range of low-cost BYOD solutions for small meeting rooms too.