Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Hub

An AVI-SPL White Paper

www.avispl.com1 Group Collaboration in the (+01).866.559.8197 Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com Table of Contents Executive Summary The ability to collaborate with dispersed team members is an increasingly important 2 Executive Summary requirement in the modern workplace. Therefore, businesses that implement the appropriate technology to enable collaboration with a more mobile workforce are also 4 Understanding ROI in a Modern IT Environment seeing significant increases in their business performance. In this paper, AVI-SPL makes a strong business case for deploying the Microsoft Surface 4 Quantifying the Cost Benefit Hub to meet the business requirements for an intuitive, full-featured group collaboration 5 Evaluating Business Process solution. The paper focuses on how the Surface Hub delivers a higher ROI in both hard and Employee Productivity benefits, such as cost, as well in soft benefits, such as improving meeting efficiency and Gains employee productivity than other solutions on the market.

7 Achieving Strategic Benefits Key Takeaways 7 AVI-SPL Can Help Maximize ROI • Cost benefits. Compares the costs of similar technology solutions and their features, showing the Microsoft Hub not only delivers the best price value, but 8 Conclusion offers capabilities other solutions can’t. • Business process benefits. Takes a close look at the features and capabilities 9 About AVI-SPL of the Surface Hub compared to other similar technologies, and how it provides additional business process value. • Strategic benefits. Looks at how the Surface Hub helps organizations support other organizational strategic goals, like BYOD or a more mobile workforce.

of meeting rooms have collaborative technologies such as; video 31% conferencing or PC solutions. But survey respondents noted that 63% 56% 47% would use more would use more would use more audio video conferencing content sharing conferencing tools

Source: Wainhouse Research, 2015: The Collaborative Enterprise: How enterprises are adapting to support the modern meeting

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2 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com Companies that identified business collaboration as their top business goal saw significant increase in business performance compared to organizations that did not prioritize collaboration.4

Successful group collaboration in today’s workplace requires more than a meeting room and a white board. With 79 percent of workers saying they always or frequently work in dispersed teams1 and a 30 percent increase in telecommuting over the past decade,2 companies must find ways to allow employees to collaborate no matter where they are working. Improving collaboration also improves business performance and employee productivity. According to the Aberdeen Next-Generation Communications study, companies that identified business collaboration as their top business goal saw a significant increase in business performance compared to organizations that did not prioritize collaboration.3 As businesses work to better facilitate collaboration between dispersed teams, enable higher levels of employee efficiency and productivity, and improve the user’s collaborative experience, decision makers are tasked with finding solutions that are effective and can deliver a strong enough ROI to justify the investment. This paper makes the business case that the Microsoft Surface Hub is a group collaboration solution that not only meets the business requirements for an intuitive, full-featured group collaboration solution, but also delivers an exceptional return on investment.

3 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com Understanding ROI in a Modern IT Environment Like the modern workplace, the IT environment is also undergoing significant changes. According to Gartner’s annual Portals, Content, and Collaboration Summit, IT department goals via collaboration technology and platforms now include: • Anticipating problems • Increasing workforce effectiveness • Transforming business processes so they become agile • Helping colleagues and “business” people embrace the technologies, methodologies, and systems that IT and tech people already work with.5 To achieve these goals, IT must be more agile—shortening planning and budgeting horizons and becoming more iterative. As a result, IT also needs a more flexible approach to developing business cases in order to keep up with changing technology and consumerization trends. With soft benefits such as efficiency and productivity in high demand by employees, hard dollar business cases are becoming more difficult to make. To justify investment in these situations, IT must rely on use cases and quantifiable measurements to calculate ROI. To make the business case for the Surface Hub, this paper evaluates quantifiable ROI, such as cost savings, as well as less tangible ROI, such as user adoption, improved business processes, and better strategic alignment with organizational goals.

Quantifying the Cost Benefits Effective group collaboration requires more than a simple video or audio conference call. It requires the ability to collaborate with remote participants; to share content from multiple participants, devices, and applications; and to share ideas as a group. What’s more, these tasks need to be accomplished in a way that, is simple and intuitive, and increases the efficiency of the process and hence the productivity of participants and their adoption of the technology. It’s a tall order. To meet those expectations, there are numerous technology solutions on the market that address different aspects of the required capabilities. For example, in one meeting space there may be an in-room video conferencing solution, an interactive digital display or whiteboard, a presentation and control system, and more. Then, it’s IT’s job to cobble all these solutions together in a manner that is simple and intuitive to use and integrates with the business’s unified communications solution as well as other systems, such as room scheduling software. The cost of IT’s time and the difficulty of gaining high a level of user adoption in a multi- vendor environment should not be overlooked. Additionally, there remains the total cost to purchase all the necessary technology and implement a technology refresh. In both respects, the Surface Hub offers a clear advantage.

4 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com The table below compares the cost of the Surface Hub with the cost of integrating a meeting room with a similar solution to the Microsoft Hub: Cost Comparison of Outfitting a Medium-Sized Collaboration Room (4-7 person)

Feature Integrated for Surface Hub 84" Business System Display Size 80” Diagonal 84” Diagonal Display Resolution 1080p 3849 X 2160 PC With OS External Only Integrated Touch Screen Technology Capacitive Capacitive MultiTouch Capability 10 Points 100 Points Pen Enabled Yes Yes White Board Yes Yes Interactive Control of External Laptop No Yes Third Party Control Capable Yes Yes Number of Cameras 1 2 Presenter Viewed by Camera No Yes Camera Field of View 90 Degrees 100 Degrees Each Microphone Array No 4 Element Front Facing Speakers Yes Yes Dual Display Capable Yes No Wireless Video Presentation - Miracast Additional Equip. Required Integrated Wireless Video Presentation - Airplay Yes Apple TV Required Mirroring to Larger Display or Projector Yes Yes Centralized Remote Management Yes Yes Convenient Content Management No Yes Data Flush at End of Session No Yes Estimated System Cost Less Installation $32,135.00 $21,999.00 and Configuration (MSRP)

As shown in the cost comparison table, the cost of an integrated room with feature similar to those of the Surface is approximately 38 percent more expensive. Additionally, while this paper does not attempt to quantify the cost of IT’s time, it’s reasonable to expect that there would be higher installation, support, and maintenance costs associated with a multi-technology solution versus an all-in-one collaboration solution such as the Surface Hub.

Evaluating Business Process and Employee Productivity Gains As discussed, ROI is also driven by implementing a solution that improves efficiency and productivity while driving a better overall collaborative experience for the user. Here’s a look at how the Surface Hub improves business process and employee productivity:

5 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com Feature/Capability Standard Scenario How the Surface Hub Does It Better Value

Meeting start time • Meetings are typically 5-8 minutes • Starts instantaneously—whether Improved efficiency and employee late starting due to tech-related scheduled or ad hoc. Intuitively knows that productivity. delays. someone has entered the room and starts • Time is required to connect devices, • A single tap allows users to join the turn on and log into the system, and meeting—no need to log in or connect any troubleshoot any connectivity or equipment. technical issues.

Connecting with • Remote participants are no longer • Remote users have an on-screen presence Improved user experience and remote users visible when content is shared. at all times and are not hidden behind engagement. • Lack of visibility encourages remote content. users to disengage with the meeting • Added visibility keeps users engaged and start multi-tasking. throughout.

Screen sharing • In most VTC sessions, remote users • The screen is automatically shared so Improved user experience capabilities can’t see the whiteboard. remote users see the same content as in- and engagement, drives more • Remote participants often lack the room participants. collaboration and innovation. ability to annotate. • Remote users are able to ink and participate actively in brainstorming.

Content sharing • Content sharing may require a cable • Easily share content wirelessly (enabled Improved efficiency, employee or a dongle. If wireless, it’s typically via Miracast) or wired from any device or productivity, and user experience. not a native feature of the solution. platform. • Multiple items can be shared side- • Multiple items can be shared side-by-side. by-side. • Touchback feature allows user to control • There is often a need to control content from the Surface Hub. content from separate device, • Inkback also allows user to annotate on requiring users to go back and forth content, even though the content lives on a between interactive screen and the connected device. device where content is stored. • When user disconnects they can take annotations with them.

Ideation • Remote users don’t have inking • Allows multiple people to collaborate Improved business processes, capabilities. simultaneously. efficiency, and employee • Annotated content may save only • Has natural, fluid inking capabilities with productivity. to certain applications or may not virtually no latency. save at all. • Has 100 touch points and can detect the • Touch and inking capabilities may difference between a pen and a hand. not feel fluid or completely natural. • When user clicks end session, content is automatically sent to meeting attendees.

Application access • Requires connectivity with another • Can run any Windows 10 Universal App Improved business processes device to access applications. If the natively from without authenticating or and employee productivity. device is a mobile device, there may needing any other device in the room. not be access to MS Office software • Users can also share any Windows such as Excel, Word, or PowerPoint. application including desktop apps such as MS Office from a personal device to the Surface Hub. • Integrated with , Outlook 365 and MS Exchange. • Ability to use native apps as well as custom created apps

Room scheduling • Can integrate with third-party • Integrated with Microsoft Exchange, Improved business processes solutions, but not natively integrated Outlook, and Outlook 365. Can also and employee productivity. with the solution. integrate with other room scheduling software.

6 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com Individual organizations will have to look at the value of each of these capabilities to their own use cases and determine the ROI. The Surface Hub is most appealing for those looking for a standardized solution that serves multiple functions while being easy to deploy, manage, and use.

Achieving Strategic Benefits Another aspect of ROI that IT should evaluate is how a solution helps the organization achieve its strategic goals. The Surface Hub can provide businesses with several benefits that help them reach their strategic goals, including: • Enabling businesses to further drive adoption of their unified communications (UC) solution. The Surface Hub natively supports Microsoft’s highly popular UC solution, Skype for Business. • Supporting BYOD policies. The Surface Hub offers connectivity to multiple devices on multiple platforms, either wired or wirelessly. • Enabling businesses to better support distributed teams and a more mobile workforce. By providing a highly engaging and intuitive collaboration solution, the Surface Hub helps distributed teams and remote workers be more productive and engaged. • Driving innovation. By facilitating an overall better collaboration experience, the Surface Hub enhances a team’s ability to brainstorm and innovate, developing new ideas more quickly. The value of each of these benefits will depend on the organization’s specific strategic goals. Weighing the value of these strategic drivers should be included in any ROI analysis.

AVI-SPL Can Help Maximize ROI Every IT infrastructure and business environment is unique, and determining the best solution for a given situation can be difficult. As one of the world’s largest providers of audiovisual (AV) collaboration solutions, AVI-SPL is well-positioned to help organizations determine the right solution and become their trusted collaboration adviser. Taking a consultative approach, AVI-SPL helps IT departments determine what their needs are and where the Surface Hub is an appropriate use case. Additionally, AVI-SPL can help IT increase its ROI by extending the Surface Hubs capabilities with middle-of-the-table controls and integrating it with existing IT environments. AVI-SPL can also remotely monitor, manage, and upgrade customers’ Surface Hub deployments, ensuring that the platform will always be up to date when customers need it.

7 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com Conclusion AVI-SPL looks forward to offering the new Surface Hub, which will integrate with customers’ existing IT solutions, give workers access to familiar tools during meetings and brainstorming sessions, and simplify technology deployment in a wider variety of meeting and huddle spaces. With the Surface Hub, users can engage in an immersive and productive collaboration experience—using video, content sharing, white boarding, ink, and touch in a way that is intuitive, efficient, productive, and highly collaborative. Additionally, because the Surface Hub is standardized and easy to set up and use, it will further enable the transition to huddle rooms and more open spaces, by products of the rapidly growing mobile work environment.

Learn more The best way to understand the true value of the Microsoft Surface Hub to your organization is to see it in action. To request a demo contact AVI-SPL at 866-708-5034, email [email protected], or visit www.avispl.com.

8 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com About AVI-SPL AVI-SPL is the world’s leading AV and video communications partner. AVI-SPL designs, builds, and supports the systems and environments that enable communication and collaboration. With highly trained and certified system engineers throughout 34 offices across North America and an international network of solution providers in 30 countries, we’ve built the infrastructure and partnerships to help any business realize and meet its communication goals. (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com

About Microsoft Founded in 1975, Microsoft is the worldwide leader in software, services, devices, and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential. Its best-in-class platforms and productivity services for a mobile-first, cloud-first world are reinventing productivity and business processes to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.

Resources: 1. Ferrazzi, Keith. “Getting Virtual Teams Right.” Harvard Business Review. Dec. 2014. https://hbr.org/2014/12/getting-virtual-teams-right. 2. Jones, Jeffery M. “In U.S. Telecommuting for Work Climbs 37 Percent.” Gallup. August 19, 2015. http://www.gallup.com/poll/184649/telecommuting-work-climbs.aspx. 3. “Harnessing the Power of Next Generation Communications.” Aberdeen Research. November 2013. http://www.aberdeen.com/research/8745/ai-next-generation- communication/content.aspx. 4. “Harnessing the Power of Next Generation Communications.” Aberdeen Research. November 2013. http://www.aberdeen.com/research/8745/ai-next-generation- communication/content.aspx. 5. Schoenbaum, Dan. “Top Trends from The Gartner Group’s Annual Portals, Content & Collaboration Summit.” Gartner. October 22, 2014. https://redbooth.com/blog/top- trends-gartner-summit-london.

9 Group Collaboration in the Modern Workplace: Building the Business Case for Microsoft Surface Hub (+01).866.559.8197 www.avispl.com