You can now have 1:1 calls on Microsoft Teams Rooms. But how is that possible?

My first interaction with video interoperability was between H.323 and SIP endpoints. I still remember when we had to append sip: to make the video endpoint understand that it is a sip call from a H.323 endpoint. Then we had SIP to Skype for business interop supported by Cisco Meeting Server and Pexip.

Now with more than 300 million monthly active users, Microsoft Teams is the leading collaboration platform and most of the organizations have already enabled Microsoft Teams Meeting as their preferred platform. Teams rooms are replacing legacy meeting room systems which are end of support.

Organizations still have lot of video footprint which is still supported by OEMs and are SIP based, however after adopting Microsoft Teams, there has always been challenge to use these existing meeting rooms. Few organizations also have mix of Teams rooms and H.323/SIP video endpoints. That's where Cloud Video Interop providers like Cisco, Pexip, Poly and BlueJeans have solutions to provide video conferencing between Microsoft Teams and H.323/SIP based endpoints.

So how does CVI calls work?

The user, first have to schedule a Microsoft Teams meeting and invite H.323/SIP based endpoint into the meeting. CVI providers then push the meeting invite to H.323/SIP endpoints so that the endpoints can have a join button with relevant meeting details to join the meeting. Few minutes before the meeting, the user can press the join button on H.323/SIP endpoint and it joins a Microsoft Teams meeting.

For Microsoft Teams Rooms, CVI provider is not required as it can join the meeting by just being invited into Teams meeting.

Source: Pexip

What's the issue with current CVI calls?

With the current CVI structure, every time a Teams meeting have to be scheduled if Teams rooms endpoints want to connect over video with a H.323/SIP endpoint. It somehow loses the sense of true interoperability where any video endpoint using any meeting provider can just make ad-hoc video call to another video endpoint directly, without adding an extra layer of scheduling a meeting first.

How Pexip is resolving this issue?

As per the Microsoft Blog, Pexip has announced an offering for Microsoft Teams Rooms Pro licensed customer through which one-to-one calls between Teams rooms for Windows and H.323/SIP endpoints is made possible. These devices will now be able to place ad-hoc calls with audio, video and content sharing capabilities, all without scheduling a Teams meeting.

Conclusion:

This was a much needed feature that was released by Microsoft to the CVI partners. This feature can help enhance user experience and increase collaboration specially in organization where there is mix of both Teams rooms and H.323/SIP endpoints.

How soon other CVI providers enable this feature for their customers?

Will direct "true" interop between Teams Rooms and other endpoints ever work without CVI providers?

What are your thoughts on this feature?

I would love to hear your opinions on this. Thank You!

Reference:

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-teams-blog/what-s-new-for-microsoft-teams-rooms-and-teams-meetings-at/ba-p/3843949

https://www.pexip.com/blog/direct-calling-teams-rooms?utm_campaign=Newsletters_Products_spotlight&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=265140104&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9TwIRYLw7lW1Pqha6z7-0_3-3PGt1VwyPUJcJoPF_RUPAKvnaTJb5Od4RHey0SBYHxzPr6LpGJDNSs80u0VRMQVcSKSQ&utm_content=265140104&utm_source=hs_email