Verizon Improves In-Office Engagement with BlueJeans Gateway for Microsoft Teams

What you need to know:

• New BlueJeans Gateway for Microsoft Teams enhancements designed to simplify meeting access and participation for hybrid collaboration
• The Microsoft Certified Cloud Video Interop (CVI) solution connects legacy H.323 & SIP-based conference room systems to Microsoft Team Meetings
• Direct Guest Join support creates seamless meeting-to-meeting join experiences
• Verizon named one of first U.S. partners for Microsoft Teams Phone Mobile

NEW YORK, N.Y. - Verizon Business today announced new usability, customization, and analytics features have been added to its BlueJeans Gateway cloud video interop (CVI) solution for Microsoft Teams to deliver a new level of consistency for hybrid workers that are joining Teams meetings from an office location. As organizations look for ways to create collaboration equity across work modes in today’s post-pandemic workplace, the latest updates to the BlueJeans Gateway were designed to drive Teams engagement without needing to replace existing hardware investments.

Additionally, to make the in-office meeting experience one that is simple and fluid across services, BlueJeans Rooms and Microsoft Teams Rooms customers will soon be able to take advantage of Microsoft’s Direct Guest Join one-touch capability to connect to alternative meeting services by leveraging the web application on the latest conference room systems.

“For more than three years, BlueJeans has successfully accompanied us and helped our employee base of more 100k collaborators connect their Teams meeting using our classic videoconferencing hardware,” said Vincent PAGOT, Product Owner, IT Visioconference & Digital Event, TGITS - EUS. “Our partnership continues to grow, but BlueJeans was the first CVI solution to connect all users throughout the world—at our offices, or at home—in order to work together. These seamless join experiences will help us continue driving growth in our Microsoft Teams ecosystem in a way that supports employee well-being and productivity.”

Turbocharging Legacy Endpoints for the Hybrid Workplace

With ‘high cost of technology solutions’ (28%) cited by IT decision makers globally as the number one issue preventing them from achieving successful outcomes, according to a recent study by Verizon and Omdia, organizations are exploring new cost effective ways to improve employee experiences and boost productivity. With new features to optimize legacy room hardware endpoints for users, the BlueJeans Gateway helps to create meeting parity for those in the office with their remote participants:

• Ability to show participant names on screen while content is being shared through the room system
• ‘Lobby Notifications’ on Teams-enabled room systems to allow moderators to accept those in the meeting waiting room from their Teams desktop/mobile client
• ‘Presentation Rights’ feature, which prevents in-room attendees from presenting/sharing during a Teams Meeting, unless permitted
• ‘Raised Hand’ notifications viewable in the meeting room in the top right corner
• ‘Locked Meeting’ status prevents unwanted endpoints from joining a meeting
• Ability to self-mute room video from the device’s dual-tone multi-frequency signaling (DTMF) menu
• ‘Static Images’ for video muted participants, giving actual representation of participants in the meeting when not on video
• Enhancements to fix audio/video (AV) quality of service and enable superior in-meeting experience

Customizations for Better Meeting Experiences

To empower dispersed teams to do their best work, BlueJeans has added new customizations to the BlueJeans Gateway to drive seamless collaboration. These include:

• Custom background color options for meeting banners and notifications
• ‘China Premium Access’ general availability (GA) for China user access into a Teams meeting through a fully-qualified domain name (FQDN)
• ‘DTMF Menu Customization’ means enterprise administrators have more control on the display of menu options
• ‘Trusted Rooms’ support for Teams Live Events ensures only whitelisted IPs/domains can join Live Events
• Enterprise ‘Domain Name Whitelisting’ enables trusted room systems to bypass the lobby and connect directly into the meeting

Furthermore, with new additions to the BlueJeans Command Center for Gateway, administrators can now get a more holistic overview of Teams Meeting performance from Teams Gateway-enabled room systems. Support includes ‘Call Quality Scores’ for live and past Meetings, as well as the ability to search meeting room names and in the History Tab, to perform diagnostics and get real-time insight into room system health.

As a certified gold Microsoft partner, Verizon provides a comprehensive portfolio of communications solutions for enhanced Teams connectivity. In addition to Direct Guest Join support and the BlueJeans Gateway, Verizon recently launched Verizon VoIP for Microsoft Teams and Verizon Mobile for Microsoft Teams. As one of the first U.S. providers for Microsoft Teams Phone Mobile, Verizon Mobile for Microsoft Teams allows enterprise customers to experience the full power of Teams calling using a mobile device’s native dialer.

Verizon Mobile for Microsoft Teams will be available in Q1. Direct Guest Join general availability will start in Q1 2023 with the Poly Studio X30 and X50 devices with BlueJeans Rooms-as-a-Service (RaaS) and will be enabled on Yealink and other BlueJeans RaaS devices shortly thereafter. For more information, visit the BlueJeans Gateway product page.