Covering Disruptive Technology Powering Business in The Digital Age

Since governments started implementing lockdowns all over the world, many companies have had to move their operations off-premises. Employees could no longer work in their offices unless they’re of essential services. They had to work from home now. Thankfully, technology today allows everyone to work from home using various communication tools to communicate with their superiors.

Be it meetings, presentations or even just simple hang out sessions, there is a myriad of conferencing tools available in the market today. Yet, there are major concerns when it comes to using such tools as some of these tools have been prone to breaches. If you’ve been following the news, you would know which ones we are talking about.

As such, to meet the growing demand for remote office conferencing tools, Tencent Cloud, the cloud computing arm of Tencent, launched its cloud conferencing tool, VooV Meeting. It is the international version of Tencent Meeting, providing enterprises in over 100 countries and regions around the world with a high-definition, ultra-smooth and secure multi-person cloud conferencing solution.

Furthermore, during the novel coronavirus outbreak, Tencent Cloud will provide global users with special complimentary access of VooV Meeting to connect with up to 300 participants simultaneously, so that users can seamlessly connect with their partners under different business occasions via smooth HD conferencing solutions while maintaining normal business operations at this critical period.

According to Poshu Yeung, Vice President of Tencent International Business Group, there are three key differentiators that make VooV meeting stand out from the rest:

• Extensive network across the globe with exceptional system stability like nobody else does: Stability and network connectivity are definitely the key priorities for enterprises when choosing a suitable online conferencing service provider. Leveraging Tencent Cloud’s cutting-edge technology combined with Tencent’s experience, VooV Meeting can provide ultra-smooth HD cloud conferencing services with exceptionally stable coverage, around the world and especially in China, compared to other industry players.
• Integration with WeChat’s ecosystem: Leveraging WeChat’s comprehensive ecosystem, VooV Meeting allows users to share the meeting link through WeChat, and to join meetings via WeChat’s mini-program without the need to download any application. Attendees can also join the meetings by direct dialling.
• Encrypted network with multiple layers of protection powered by Tencent Cloud: The underlying technology architecture of VooV Meeting is supported by the secure and reliable Tencent Cloud, which has multiple layers of protection in terms of business data, management protocols, network equipment and so forth. Its security measures have been verified by a number of independent third-party assessments, including international certificates such as ISO27001, ISO 27017, ISO 27018 and CSA STAR.

“Tencent Cloud will never access customer data and content during the conference without users’ authorisation, ensuring that enterprises can use all the useful features of VooV Meeting with peace of mind.”

Since China’s video conferencing market surged 36.2% year on year to RMB 3.1 billion in 2018, as reported by research institute CCW Research, Tencent Meeting was made available for China users and enterprises at the end of December 2019. It exceeded 10 million DAUs within two months since its launch in late December 2019, by far the most-used dedicated video conferencing app in China.

Providing an extra option for online conferences

At the end of January, when COVID-19 broke out, Tencent Meeting made available the feature allowing online conferencing with up to 300 attendees at one time free of charge, to help fight the epidemic. During this period, a tremendous amount of organisations used Tencent Meeting as a tool for telecommuting when they work from home, while educational institutions used the platform to handle their online remote teaching and training programs.

As COVID-19 continues to spread across the world, Tencent Cloud has recently made the international version of Tencent Meeting, aka VooV Meeting, available online in over 100 countries and regions around the world allowing businesses to seamlessly connect with their partners under different business occasions via smooth HD conferencing solutions while maintaining normal business operations at this critical period.

VooV Meeting is equipped with a number of practical and convenient features to help businesses improve efficiency for online conferences. This include:

• Flexible ways to join a meeting – VooV Meeting allows attendees to join meetings quickly on mobile phones, PCs, tablets, and webpages for a seamless conferencing experience across platforms, and even direct dialling by phone.
• Applications of artificial intelligence technology – Video conferencing is equipped with facial beautification function, and a feature to blur the background for users.
• Seamless HD without interruption – HD image and high-fidelity processing algorithms are utilised to enhance the video quality as well as minimise ambient noise and sounds of clacking keyboards while the participant speaks, with an instant text messaging feature available to facilitate discussions without disrupting meetings.
• Encrypted network with multiple layers of protection – To protect the privacy of users and enterprises, the conference will be protected with encryption. Users can also set up meeting passwords and add a watermark during screen-sharing to prevent image theft.

Ensuring stable services throughout

Many businesses would now want to try this tool, looking at scenario around the world. Also, with other solutions facing more security issues, Tencent Meeting ensures that they are able to meet the surge in demand.

“To cater to the rapid growth in demand by users during the pandemic, we have expanded our computing resources daily and used the added resources to scale up capacity by adding over 1 million CPU cores to the network, with a total addition of more than 100,000 CVM within eight days, setting a new record in China’s cloud computing sector,” said Poshu.

He added that in mid-March, the pace at which production is resuming and some employees returning to work has accelerated a bit, with tens of thousands of companies and government agencies making VooV meeting part and parcel of their new work ethic. These include signing in, bidding, conducting an interview, running a training class and other collaborative practices are all taking place in the cloud, signalling the emergence and strengthening of a new trend in how the workplace will function.

In order to meet the growing needs of users in the cloud office, VooV Meeting is continuously upgrading key functionalities and services, launching 14 updates within 40 days. VooV Meeting will also be continuously optimised to provide users worldwide with smooth, secure, and reliable cloud-based HD conferencing services that enable users to host or join meetings with ease.

“The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the utility of remote working services, and we are seeking to play our part in helping people cope with the new challenge. Looking forward, we believe enterprises will be increasingly keen to adopt cloud-based solutions over the longer term, in order to facilitate remote working and remote interactions with their customers.”

With that said, VooV Meeting’s feature of group meetings of up to 300 participants without a time limit will be available for free worldwide during the outbreak, until further notice when the situation becomes more manageable.

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