Managed.IT - issue 57

BULLETIN MANAGED.IT 11 www.managedITmag.co.uk The best time to schedule a call As businesses and employees adopt video conferencing, many for the first time, Meetupcall, which saw a 500% increase in usage of its conferencing services in the first two weeks of March, offers the following tips for call scheduling. 1 Don’t start your calls on the hour Most conference calls are arranged to start on the hour. As a result, millions of people around the country all use their mobile phones at the same time. Try arranging calls for 15, 30 or 45 minutes past the hour or at a random time like 12:37. With fewer people using their phones when your call starts, there will be less chance of something going wrong due to an overloaded network. 2 Choose a quieter time to hold your call Meetupcall data shows that the busiest times to host a conference call are 9am, 10am, 2pm and 3pm. The quietest times (during working hours) are 12pm, 1pm and 4pm. Where possible, schedule your calls for lunchtime or late afternoon. 3 Use a landline or dial in via the internet Where possible, use a landline rather than your mobile, or a VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) call over the internet. WhatsApp is great for one-to- one calls, while services like Meetupcall and Zoom allow you to hold conference calls via VoIP. To try Meetupcall for free register at www.meetupcall. com/remote-work-trial. UK monitor sales up Context’s findings are backed up by retail sales figures produced by Gfk for the week to March 14. These show a big increase in UK retail sales of computer monitors, up 133.9% in volume and 132.3% in value compared to the same period last year. Other big sellers were keyboards (+68.8% year-on-year); pointing devices e.g mouse, track ball, stylus pen (+29.7%); and communication devices, driven by sales of routers, repeaters, port replicators and docking stations (+29.4%). Kelly Whitwick, UK Retail Lead for Market Insights at GfK, said: “Following the Government instruction to stay at home and avoid crowded places, IT is not the only area we’re tracking that shows increased sales. Sales of freezers, fridges, hair clippers and deep fryers all showed significant year on year growth during that week.” www.gfk.com Huge uptake of Lifesize free conferencing offer Lifesize, which like some other conferencing companies has reacted to the coronavirus crisis by offering its services free of charge (see page 27), has reported a massive increase in new subscribers as a result. In a blog post, How Lifesize Maintains Reliability Through the Coronavirus Crisis , Lifesize Chief Operating Officer Michael Helmbrecht wrote: “Since making Lifesize video collaboration free and unlimited for anyone over the next six months, we’ve seen a significant increase in new users across all geographies. As of March 25, daily new user registrations for Lifesize month-to-date have increased more than 5,000% compared to prior months.” The company has also experienced a 500% surge in call volumes and an 800% increase in concurrent call volume. Because the Lifesize network and architecture are based on scalable Amazon Web Services (AWS), it has been able to accommodate these increases with no degradation of quality. www.lifesize.com Zoho brings out remote working suite Zoho has introduced the Remotely virtual collaboration platform to help companies operate during the coronavirus epidemic. Available for free until July 1 2020, the suite of 11 integrated applications and productivity tools covers communication (Cliq, Meeting, Showtime), collaboration (WorkDrive, Projects, Sprints), remote assistance (Assist and Lens) and productivity (Writer, Sheet, Show). www.zoho.com/remotely No going back In the last three months, FreeConferenceCall.com has seen a massive boost in new account openings of 3,442% in Italy, 393% in Japan, 121% in Spain, 94% in Germany, 83% in South Korea, 68% in France and 42% in the UK. FreeConferenceCall.com President, CEO and Founder Dave Erickson believes changes in communications habits brought about by coronavirus will be long- lasting. He said: “If we are to fight climate change and tackle the climate emergency then remote working will be a key part of that. Now that businesses all over the world have had to embrace it for their workers, we think there will be no going back.” FreeConferenceCall. com provides free audio conference services online and via its Android, iPhone and iPad mobile apps. www.freeconferencecall.com Home working sales surge as lockdown begins The switch to homeworking brought about by COVID-19 has had a big impact on business equipment sales across Europe, with strong growth in audio video systems (up 57%) and desktop computing (up 21%), according to market intelligence company CONTEXT. IT distribution figures for the eight weeks to March 15 show significant revenue growth from sales of headsets/headphones and microphones — essential kit for home workers wishing to join conference calls — with triple digit increases in Italy (292%), Portugal (252%), Finland (163%), Austria (144%), Switzerland (136%), Germany (125%), Spain (114%) and Belgium (108%). Both desktops (22%) and desktop workstations (16%) recorded impressive year-on- year revenue growth across Western Europe. Other categories with a link to home working that have seen strong sales growth include solid state drives (16%); telephony and conference systems (17%); VoIP accessories (16%); uninterruptable power supplies (15%); and smart watches (21%). The top performing categories in the UK were telephony and conference systems (49%), desktops (27%), monitors (23%), desktop workstations (22%), headsets/headphones and microphones (23%), docking stations (23%) and large format displays (16%). www.contextworld.com