Microsoft Surface Hub: New Collaborative Technology

Collaboration is increasingly being recognised as a powerful agent of productivity. We are told to have a laugh with coworkers and to help coworkers integrate into company culture to better retain staff. This is great because it's better for everyone: we get to have fun and the company gets more productive employees.

Image: Microsoft

This week Microsoft announced the launch of the Surface Hub, a collaborative tool to increase productivity for business meetings. While we at nsquared have been going on about the benefits of collaboration since 2008 (in fact, our whole organisation is built on the power of collaboration), this announcement shows the power of multi-user technology is beginning to be recognised, and on such a huge scale too. 

Microsoft is said to have billed it as a "large-screen collaboration device" which will automatically sync with OneNote, have an endless whiteboard for team brainstorming, as well as a number of large-screen apps. The device will be available in either a 55- or enormous 84-inch screen, and will be mounted vertically like a television. With Microsoft starting to take orders in just three weeks from 24 markets around the world, Microsoft's vision for the collaborative meeting space is truly at our doorsteps.

It is exciting to see steps forward in the collaborative sphere as the technology nsquared has been pioneering gets recognised as forerunners in this field. While a wall-mounted touch screen is great, there are of course limitations: Standing and arm fatigue means the meeting times would have a short life span. Only one or two people can interact with the screen at one time (in one physical location) means that annotating and brainstorming is limited to those at the front. nsquared technology specifically addresses these problems with our 360 degree immersive and inclusive DIGITABLE range. The DIGITABLE already has potential to share from tabletop to screen to create an immersive environment. Imagine the potential of the engaging conference capabilities of Microsoft Hub in combination with the collaborative interactivity of the DIGITABLE.

Users interact on an nsquared DIGITABLE

The future of meetings has arrived. While Microsoft may have taken a while to get here, we embrace new, intelligent technology that has real potential to improve peoples lives. If you would like to learn more about our collaborative DIGITABLES, or other intelligent business solutions, click on the respective links or follow us on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. Have a collaborative week!

#RTV2015

This week is the annual  "Realizing the Vision of a Connected World" symposium, hosted by American material innovation company Corning. The event itself is focussed on understanding and projecting the future of technology by bringing together some of the world's juiciest brains to ignite and inspire discussion ; asking us the questions that most of us would find so difficult. Where are we going? Why? And significantly, how?

Amongst a host of distinguished speakers such as Dr Genevieve Bell, Vice President of Intel, and Dr Bill Buxton, principal researcher at Microsoft, will be our founder and director Dr Neil Roodyn - see him here on stage at a talk earlier this week. Having been involved in the software development industry since the 1980s, Neil will be shedding some insight into where he sees the future, and how he is realising his vision.

Corning's "Realizing the Vision" symposium is a landmark event on the calendar for any tech-head and the event itself will highlight the exciting possibilities technology has to offer, and will give us a glimpse into the near and not-too-near future. Corning is perhaps best known for their viral "A Day Made of Glass" video series, a snapshot of the future where every surface is interactive and technology is seamless.

The event itself, hosted in Mountain View California, will contain some select cutting-edge technologies depicted in Corning's "A Day Made of Glass" series such as mirrored interactive displays and other exciting visionary technology.

Glass is such an important part of our modern technologies that we need to consider how our world would look without modern glass. We are living in the Age of Glass, check out the latest videos by our friends the Mythbusters.