
As hybrid work becomes the norm, organizations are re-evaluating their AV strategies. In this Executive Q&A, Shure’s Rob Smith discusses why seamless integration, premium audio, and scalable simplicity are essential to meet evolving expectations and support the future of collaboration.
What are the common challenges that organizations face in today’s working environment?
The main challenge organizations face today is meeting user expectations for performance and ease of use in modern collaboration spaces.
Currently, most companies have a hybrid model with teams coming to the office two or three days a week, and this arrangement is not going anywhere. However, most organizations are realizing that their meeting rooms aren’t equipped with the right technology to sustain this type of working format. The devices are too complicated to use, and the audio and video experience aren’t good either.
Most of these organizations are now revamping their real estate and adapting their technology to suit new hybrid models.
They are creating a lot of flexible-use meeting rooms and for these, they need certified collaboration solutions that deliver the highest levels of audio and video performance, that are easy to deploy and use, and that are scalable across their campus, ensuring that employees can communicate and work efficiently and have a consistent and intuitive experience.
How has the widespread adoption of platforms like Microsoft Teams reshaped the working environment?
All of us have got used to using either Microsoft Teams or Zoom, or Tencent in Asia, because these comprehensive UC platforms simply work. They are very well integrated in everything we do today, are secure and continuously add new features, including AI tools, to help teams to collaborate more efficiently from anywhere.
Organizations are standardizing on these platforms to streamline communication, enhance productivity, and support hybrid work environments with integrated tools and centralized workflows. This also applies across meeting rooms, and platform standardization is now a key consideration for enterprises that are adapting their working spaces.
In terms of installation, what are the key obstacles encountered with traditional, professional conferencing devices?
In one word: complexity. The traditional AV system is a multi-box solution with lots of different components, frequently from different manufacturers, that AV professionals have to integrate and make work well together. Such best-of-breed collaboration solutions are very effective in terms of providing premium meeting experiences for complex ad demanding spaces, but sometimes they don’t meet the customer needs or simplicity that the majority of standard rooms require.
As we move into a new working setup where we’ve got lots of spaces for various meeting formats and types of collaboration, organizations are trying to standardize their rooms with a solution that is quick to roll out and support. This can lead to people opting for a simple, often “good enough” solution that ticks most of the boxes. The challenge comes when these solutions don’t perform consistently and don’t provide the user experience that users expect and require to be productive.
What steps can be taken to simplify the installation process of conferencing setups for users?
What we are trying to do at Shure is take that high capability, high-end audio performance that we’re known for and deliver it through solutions that can be very simple to deploy. You don’t have to be an AV specialist to make it work.
We want to provide premium audio quality in a format and package that can be effortlessly installed, managed, and scaled by almost anyone.
What is Shure doing to help and support organizations in installation, ease of use and management?
We are leading the collaboration revolution by simplifying premium AV setups with easy to install and ready to use solutions. We recently launched the IntelliMix Room Kits that are a great example of that.
The kits provide all the required elements of the meeting room system, preconfigured and in a single package for different-sized meeting rooms. These kits have been designed so that both AV professionals and IT teams can easily deploy and manage them at scale, while ensuring an exceptional video and audio experience for the end user.
How do the IntelliMix Room Kits support IT teams and organizations?
The IntelliMix Room Kits are complete meeting room systems that are certified for Microsoft Teams and feature class-leading audio and video performance. They are designed for effortless deployment and can be scaled from small, medium, to large collaboration spaces. Because of a zero-touch provisioning experience, IT teams don’t need to worry about complex configuration processes and can handle the install without an external AV professional.
For organizations the simplicity and scalability of this solution fundamentally means that employees can have the same experience and AV performance in any space, regardless of if its only a few people are meeting in a smaller room, or if it’s an all-hands meeting in a large conference room. Having effective, consistent, and standardized technology across all spaces helps with user experience and avoids disruptions in their workflows and productivity.
What specific market opportunities lie ahead for vendors who can provide this type of solutions?
While Shure partners and rigorously tests solutions with other brands to solve for the more challenging and complex spaces, we also provide a comprehensive portfolio of solutions which can go from an auditorium, large multifunction spaces and boardrooms, all the way down to small meeting rooms. We can even support the home office setup with, for example, the MV7+ USB microphone and AONIC 50 Wireless Headphones.
Shure is the only provider who can support the full spectrum of hybrid work. It simplifies the whole AV chain, making the ROI more efficient for enterprises. At the same time, for channel partners, it creates enormous potential for market growth by filling gaps in their offering with superior solutions that are tailored to their business model and technical capabilities.
What measures is Shure taking to help channel partners maximize their potential with UC platforms integration like Microsoft Teams and Zoom?
We have a variety of flexible and reliable solutions certified for Microsoft Teams and Zoom Rooms. This ensures that channel partners can offer products that deliver the highest levels of performance, security, and compliance, while providing simple scalability and standardization across all meeting rooms. It streamlines processes in a secure and cost-effective way.
Can you share the impact of Shure’s solutions for collaboration?
We are seeing an exponential growth on integration with AI tools like Microsoft 365 Copilot daily. They are becoming an integral part of our meeting environments and help teams to collaborate more efficiently. However, the success of these AI tools in meetings depends on the accuracy of the transcription. This can only be achieved when exceptional audio is in place, with solutions like the IntelliMix Room Kits.
As AI tools evolve and get more sophisticated, companies will need superior microphones to ensure fidelity, clarity, and even more accuracy. Shure provides these exceptional solutions, from an auditorium to your bedroom, offering the same level of great audio to support transcriptions and enhance collaboration.
Rob Smith is Senior Director, Strategic Market Development at Shure