IMCCA’s Collaboration Week New York 2020 A Huge Success

New York, NY (February 26, 2020) – The IMCCA, a leading voice for the UCC (Unified Conferencing and Collaboration) industry for more than 20 years, just wrapped-up their Collaboration Week New York 2020 event. During February 23rd - 26th, industry professionals and end-users attended events at BlackRock, Poly, Google, Gateway (a subsidiary of the Swedish American Chamber of Commerce) and Planar, as well as joining the industry in honoring Crestron’s Randy Klein and Zoom’s Eric Yuan with Emerging Technology Fellow awards at a gala dinner celebration. 

Highlights of the presenters and topics include:

·         The IMCCA’s / Poly’s David Danto provided a state of the UC&C industry with an overview of the hot topics that would be discussed at the event.  These included the battle lines between various providers, the team chat hypestorm, interoperability, security, the importance and expansion of AI driven metrics, the new look of office plans, and the new Millennial and Gen Z workers .

·         Vyopta’s Mark Haimsohn explained how collaboration metrics provide more actionable insights than ever before.

·         Poly’s Sam Kennedy explained how organizations are evaluating switching from general purpose compute and BYOD in DIY rooms to a new class of appliance endpoint that is inexpensive and runs native collaboration platform apps.

·         Dr. S. Ann Earon detailed the war for collaboration users’ mindshare, and compared many of the biggest industry platforms’ talking points and cautions.

·         Google’s Sandy Jones explained the vision of Google’s GSuite and how it supports very rich collaboration.

·         Nemertes Research’s’ Irwin Lazar detailed trends in the collaboration space, with highlights including many more organizations moving to the cloud and moving to “video first” cultures.

·         Harpervision’s Greg Harper opened the eyes of attendees to the exploding world of emerging technologies such as AI, graphical compute engines, and 5G – and made the point that AV and collaboration professionals need to expand their vision to include awareness of these new technologies that may not be core to their space (today.)

·         Shen, Milsom & Wilke’s Mark Peterson detailed how remote workers and societal transformations are changing how office facilities are designed and built.

·         Rutgers’ Mark Beal and a panel of young students and employees provided an eye-opening glimpse of how Millennials and Gen Z individuals view life, technology and the workplace.

·         Planar’s Lainie Mataras explained the value of collaboration through digital signage solutions.

·         CDA’s Michael Goldman stepped the attendees through the world of Team Chat platforms, comparing them and showing how to evaluate their value.

·         A final Locknote discussion with Legrand’s Jerry Berger, SynergySky’s Sean Lessman, Dr. S. Ann Earon and Michael Goldman discussed and debated the event’s topics.  One highlight of the discussion – which included many of the audience participants – was a rousing debate of the health of the AV and Collaboration industries.  It was clear that most believed that “traditional hang and bang AV” is contracting, while the opportunities for integration and service organizations to move into the lucrative and growing collaboration space is huge.  Many of those in attendance stressed the urgency for traditional AV firms to pivot, with hopes that industry messaging would move from its current ‘look at us’ themes and instead begin to focus on the urgency to evolve.

During many of the sessions, panel discussions featuring end users from Citi, American Express, BlackRock, Ford Foundation, Disney, Bessemer Trust and others lead to lively discussions about such topics as platform selection, user adoption, security and identifying future directions.

Additionally, at a Tuesday evening Gala dinner, Crestron’s CEO Randy Klein was presented with an Emerging Technology Fellow – Lifetime Achievement Award, and Zoom’s founder and CEO Eric Yuan was recognized with an Emerging Technology Fellow – Industry Impact Award.  Eric, who could not attend the dinner in person, refused to pre-record a video acceptance, but instead sent a team of his employees to the restaurant to rewire their internet service so he could accept the award live over his Zoom service.

Presentations and some photos from the event are available on the event website at https://www.collaborationweekny.org/presentations.   In addition, Sound and Communications recorded the presentations and discussions and posted them so that those that could not attend in person can gain from the information discussed. They can be viewed here: https://www.soundandcommunications.com/imcca-collaboration-week-ny-2020/ .

The list of sponsors and organizations that participated in CWNY20 included Intel, Crestron, Pexip, Poly, Shure, Vyopta, Yorktel, Zoom, Mersive, Planar, Barco, Aver, AVI-SPL, Compunetix, EPOS/ Senheiser, LegrandAV, Omnivex, QSC, SynergySky, Shen Milsom & Wilke,Verrex, BlackRock, Google, Gateway, AVNation-TV, Audio Incorporated, Communications Design Associates, Nemertes Research and Sound and Communications.

“Our Collaboration Week events are an important industry initiative that offers the opportunity for organizations and other interested parties to learn more about our industry and how the technology is being used to craft intelligent and cost-efficient UC and collaborative solutions,” said Carol Zelkin, Executive Director, IMCCA. “We were honored to facilitate important and educational discussions and dialog amongst industry participants at this – our third Collaboration Week event – and we’re looking forward to continuing and expanding these local events to other regions.  We’re especially appreciative of the team from Sound & Communications for stepping-up to provide this content on-line to everyone who could not attend.”

David Danto, Poly’s Director of Strategy and Research and The IMCCA’s Director of Emerging Technology was the Event Chair.  He explained that “it was an honor to coordinate expert curated collaboration industry information and discussions.  Too many of the larger industry conferences today have abandoned track chairs and just present manufacturer submitted content that are nothing more than glorified sales-pitches.  The IMCCA events bring all industry players – providers and users – together under a single tent to share valuable content and thoughtful discussions.  Everyone who attended left with new perspectives, new network contacts and a great view of what is happening in our industry.  Each of our sponsors and participating organizations should be commended for supporting agnostic education for our industry, and, in my opinion, should be the first considered as preferred partners by industry users.  Not supporting these kinds of educational events under a single impartial tent says more about the firms that didn’t join than any of their competitors ever could.”

Over two hundred people attended some or all of the presentations that took place at multiple venues around the city.  Both end-user and industry individuals attend Collaboration Week for free, with the sponsors stepping-up to cover the costs of putting-on the events.  In addition, on the Sunday before the event kicked-off, AVNationTV produced a live on-line conversation and twitter chat so that individuals from around the world could discuss the collaboration topics and be sure their voices were heard during the week. 

Carol Zelkin, Dr. S. Ann Earon and David Danto are available for follow-up interviews should you wish to receive exclusive commentary and/or quotes.

To learn more about Collaboration Week Silicon Valley and Collaboration Week New York, the various sponsorship and membership opportunities, and/or to arrange follow-up interviews, contact Carol Zelkin, Executive Director at 516-818-8184 or email at czelkin@imcca.org.