Press Release - Recording Large Meetings

Global video collaboration leader unveils new large meetings and recording capabilities to extend the power of every meeting

National survey shows one meeting tool is better than many with video-centric meetings trumping stand-alone audio and web conferencing

May 14, 2014—Mountain View, Calif.—Blue Jeans Network, the global leader in interoperable video collaboration services, today announced it has expanded its award-winning service with the ability to host larger meetings with up to 100 participants, and new record-and-share features. The new enhancements further Blue Jeans' mission to provide one consolidated service for every business meeting, providing the best of video, audio, and web conferencing under one easy to use platform.

“There is a fundamental shift happening in the marketplace with increasing demand for a single tool to manage all kinds of business collaboration cohesively. Businesses are clamoring for an easy way to connect and collaborate over audio and video, and share multi-media content across all their platforms from mobile devices, to desktops and laptops, to conference rooms," said Stu Aaron, CCO of Blue Jeans Network. "The legacy presentation-centric web conferencing tools just aren't cutting it any more as people are developing a preference for face-to-face, video-centric collaboration. That's been our strength all along. And now, with our new recording and large meetings capabilities, we've made the all-in-one experience even better for our customers.”

Bringing your best face forward
Blue Jeans also revealed today national survey data demonstrating the power of video-centric meetings. According to the survey, the majority of professionals prefer all of their online or remote meetings to include face-to-face video of meeting participants.

Additional notable findings include:

• Looking for the ONE: The vast majority (85%) of business decision makers want one, unified service for all remote and online meetings rather than separate tools for video conferencing, web conferencing and audio conferencing.
• Caught in a Web of Distraction: Most professionals (76%) feel attendees are less likely to pay attention during a presentation-centric Web conferencing meeting than on a video-centric all-in-one meeting. Other top frustrations with presentation-centric Web conferencing include difficulty understanding what is being said (46%) or who is talking (60%) and the difficulty of knowing who is joining and leaving the meeting (62%).
• “Date-dreaming” During Meetings: With Web conferencing, 10% of professionals admit they have checked online dating sites while 30% admit to preparing or eating food and 28% have gone to the bathroom.
• Caught on Tape: 98% of professionals would record select meetings if given the option and 27% would opt to record every meeting, which would be helpful in resolving disputes as a whopping 88% report disagreeing with a colleague on what actually happened during a meeting.
• Video for VIP Moments: Professionals are ready to face up to important communications: 73% prefer to discuss sensitive HR issues using face-to-face video versus without a video connection, 87% want to connect with their manager with video, and 80% of would rather speak with a customer using face-to-face over video versus without video.

Setting a New Collaboration Standard
The new recording feature in Blue Jeans allows participants to record video, audio and Web meetings and easily share recordings with colleagues, partners and customers. Because the recording capability is built in the cloud, recipients do not have to download large files to access recordings, unless they want to. The recording feature is particularly advantageous to education and human resources sectors to extend the reach and impact of important trainings and lectures.

“As a university with thousands of staff and students, we need one platform for collaboration that is simple but offers a sophisticated set of capabilities to connect everyone inside and outside of the classroom,” said Eli Jacobson, Brandeis University's media technology administrator. “Blue Jeans allows professors to create live webinars and lecture remotely. We are able to give our students access to guest lecturers from around the world and the new recording feature extends the reach of our most popular sessions.”

To help every business extend the power and reach of business collaboration, Blue Jeans meetings can now support up to 100 fully interactive participants, up from 25. All attendees are able to participate via audio and video with up to the nine most recent speakers featured on the screen. Understanding that the dynamics of a large meeting are vastly different than a small one, Blue Jeans has also rolled out several audio-enhancements and moderator controls to accompany these larger meetings, including an auto-mute feature which places any participant who join a meeting into muted state initially so as not to disturb the rest of the meeting.

“We started using Blue Jeans to enable face-to-face collaboration between our employees in US-based and international offices; including Poland, Germany and the UK. We are extremely pleased with the quality of the service and its impact on our company culture,” said Zack Blum, IT Manager at Wikia, Inc. “Recently Wikia started using the large-capacity meetings feature for all hands meetings which includes more than 175 employees and over 60 connection points. Employees join at different hours all over the world and it just works.”

In celebration of the new meeting recording feature, Blue Jeans is launching a "Meeting Moment" video contest. To participate, check out the contest here: bluejeans.com/recording-contest and don't forget to record, share and vote for your favorite meeting moments with the chance to win cash and other prizes.

About Blue Jeans Network's survey
Instant.ly™ by uSamp™ was commissioned by Blue Jeans Network to conduct an online survey of 400 business decision makers in the U.S. The survey was conducted between April 29 and May 2, 2014.

About Blue Jeans Network
At Blue Jeans Network, our mission is to make video communications as easy and pervasive as audio communications, enabling more effective collaboration at work, at home, and on the road. Our cloud-based conferencing service makes this possible by enabling customers to connect with each other seamlessly anytime, anywhere, and from practically any device. The Blue Jeans Network extends high quality video communications beyond the traditional boundaries of specialized conference rooms and into the mainstream, allowing individuals and employees throughout an enterprise to interact more effectively with each other, and with their customers, partners, suppliers, family, and friends. Blue Jeans Network is a private company headquartered in Mountain View, California. For more information go to: https://www.bluejeans.com or follow the company @BlueJeansNet

Media Contact:

Morgan Mathis
Highwire for Blue Jeans Network
415-963-4174 x37
morgan@highwirepr.com