Norwegian-based Neat, available exclusively through D&H in North America, has some interesting capabilities that stand out, and also has relatively fewer partners here, meaning that partners can make larger margins.
Chris Ralston, Executive Director of Vendor Management at D&H
Neat, which is based in Oslo, Norway and is relatively new to the North American market, has signed a distribution agreement with D&H Canada, which parallels a similar one they also just signed with D&H in the U.S. Neat considers themselves to be akin to Apple in the video collaboration space, being both easy to use and feature-rich. They also have fairly few resellers in North America, so their margins are higher as a result.
“NEAT is relatively new to the North American market,” said Chris Ralston, Executive Director of Vendor Management at D&H. “We have their exclusive distribution rights in North America.”
While some video vendors are not well known to the IT channel because their historical focus has been on the PRO/AV channel, NEAT is not one of those vendors.
“They are strongly focused on traditional IT resellers,” Ralston said. “Their focus is on companies like CDW and Insight, and building out from there into smaller partners.” Neat’s solutions are designed to integrate smoothly with both Microsoft Teams and Zoom, to create easy collaboration with advanced features, and in streamlined formats.
Ralston said that Neat differentiates themselves against the other companies that make hardware for video collaboration because of their extreme ease of use.
“They think of themselves as the Apple of their space, with that extreme ease of capability,” he indicated. “They also have very innovative technology, through which they use AI to develop software that creates a unique framing technology, in which everyone in the room has an equal size frame.”
Ralston said that another major benefit to partners from Neat is that they can make more money selling them.
“Neat doesn’t have a lot of partners in North America, so that the ones that it does have are more profitable as a result,” he indicated.
The Neat videoconferencing portfolio includes devices which cover the span between small huddle areas to large-scale conference rooms. Neat Bar, a compact videoconferencing bar, is a simple-to-use and compact device which provides superior audio and video for meeting rooms, huddle rooms, and focus rooms of up to 10 users.
The larger version is Neat Bar Pro, a large room videoconferencing device that can drive three large screens, which lets users simultaneously see both people and content more clearly. It incorporates an advanced 16x microphone array for audio fidelity, plus fast image processing for more lifelike interactions.
Neat Pad is a touch-screen controller that can be used within meeting rooms or as a scheduling display outside those rooms.
Neat Board is a 65-inch, all-in-one touch-screen display that incorporates powerful audio and an AI-driven camera for collaboration, with features like wireless content sharing, annotation, and whiteboards.
Finally, Neat Frame is a 15.6-inch portrait screen personal meeting device, providing an optimal layout balance for more direct conversations in larger meetings.
Ralston indicated that Neat sells to all types of customers.
“They cover all verticals, from the single user all the way up to large scale conference rooms,” he said.
This agreement enhances the distributor’s growing ProAV portfolio, which Ralston said includes all the major vendors, and includes commercial interactive displays, unified communications solutions, large-scale videowalls, and videoconferencing products. D&H Canada also offers their own field experts to assist partners with solution design and installation of these solutions.
