This is Jabra’s first partnership around their PanaCast 180 degree panoramic camera solution, and the goal is to extend the collaboration partnership with HP, which will include letting HP leverage the data capabilities from PanaCast.
Jabra has announced a new bundle for end customers which combines their PanaCast intelligent 180 degree Panoramic video solution with the HP Elite Slice integrated conferencing solution. The Jabra x HP Elite Slice bundle is certified for both Microsoft Teams Rooms [MTR] and Zoom Rooms, and will ensure customers do not have to manage multiple hardware and software components for collaboration needs.
“Jabra’s partnership with HP goes back many years, starting with co-branded headsets for Skype for Business,” said Mauro Caule, Senior Business Development Manager at Jabra. “HP is one of our best partners historically. They have a business model which matches very well with ours, including selling through the channel. They also have a very well matched vision around the collaboration space with us.”
Jabra introduced PanaCast last year. It has three 13 megapixel cameras, which provides a panoramic 180 degree view that zooms in on the person talking in a small meeting room.
“It’s a unique camera for the enterprise market,” Caule said. “The panoramic view is what makes it unique, and is even more important now because it allows social distancing within the meeting room.”
This bundle with the HP Elite Slice G2 will go to market through both the HP and Jabra channels.
The bundle is aimed at conference rooms in traditional work environments, not home offices. Some vendors have emphasized the home office environment in the short term, but Caule said that’s not Jabra’s strategy here, because much of the world has already returned to the office to some degree.
“If you look at it globally, the whole world is not working from home,” he said. “Most are in a hybrid type of environment. The trend in much of the world is two days in the office and three days at home, so the market for office meeting rooms is still there. It did flatten in the late spring when COVID was really expanding, but then the MTR market and Zoom Rooms market picked back up again. We think that there is a big business for this type of market.”
Jabra is a Danish company, whose head offices are in Denmark, and Caule said that they fit this pattern.
“Denmark was completely opened up back again in the summer time,” he said. “Now, with COVID picking up again, they are at 50% capacity.”
Caule noted that the channel will benefit both from the uniqueness of this solution in the market, as well as from future extensions of the Jabra-HP partnership.
“Finally, in the MTR landscape of solutions there is one kit with a panoramic camera, where everyone that is in the room is heard and seen,” he said. “But the PanaCast feature set is not limited to Panorama. There are exciting capabilities around data. In the near future, HP MTR will be able to leverage these data capabilities from PanaCast in many ways and provide a more immersive experience for the meeting room.”
