Cisco Webex aims to deliver 10x better meeting experience

By the end of this month, technology from BabbleLabs acquisition will both quash the whirr of the vacuum and enhance the speaker's voice so you can hear clearly, Cisco said on Tuesday.

San Francisco: Leading enterprise video conferencing solution Cisco Webex is aiming to make meeting experience on the platform 10x better than in-person interactions by introducing new tools following the acquisition of BabbleLabs to deliver noise removal and speech enhancement technology.

By the end of this month, technology from BabbleLabs acquisition will both quash the whirr of the vacuum and enhance the speaker’s voice so you can hear clearly, Cisco said on Tuesday.

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Powered by Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, BabbleLabs’ technology distinguishes human speech from unwanted noise resulting in enhanced speech quality in communications and conferencing applications.

Cisco has introduced several other innovations to make meeting experience on Webex better.

For example, it has enlarged the view so that users can clearly see how their background will appear — or select a virtual background.

Cisco said that its new design puts controls in the most logical place without covering shared content or your video — and even adapts to your screen size.

So if you want to chat with someone, you just need to hover over them. A similar simple action can help you change your audio.

And if you hate it when your screen fills with a big gray box because the person who is talking is not sharing video, now you can tell Webex to hide non-video participants.

Cisco said that this is just one of many new customisable options on Webex.

“The future of work will be hybrid: people will work in the home and corporate office to varying degrees depending on the nature of their jobs. Our mission is to make the Webex experience 10x better than in-person interactions,” Jeetu Patel, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Security & Applications Group, Cisco

“And when people do have in-person interactions, we want Webex to make those experiences 10x better than before, with our deeply integrated collaboration devices and software stack.”

According to a new global survey by Cisco, 95 per cent of workers are uncomfortable about returning to the office given the current health crisis and 98 per cent expect future meetings will have participants joining from home.

The findings showed that 53 per cent of companies are planning to optimise their office footprint, and 96 per cent want intelligent technology to improve work environments.