SaaS has become a common delivery model for many business applications because of its numerous benefits in terms of cost and performance. Highfive, which combines software and hardware into a singular service, is one of the best performing solution providers putting its own spin on the SaaS playbook. Joe Manuele is the Chief Executive Officer at Highfive. Joe joined the company earlier this year amid a period of rapid growth for the company, which was recently recognized by Fast Company as one of the “World’s Most Innovative Companies in Enterprise Software”.
Highfive’s Inception
While enterprises were struggling to figure out how to make conferencing work for businesses on a broad scale, Highfive founder Shan Sinha, formerly of Google, saw the simplicity and reliability of consumer products, and knew there had to be a better way to make video conferencing just as easy for the business world. Thus, Highfive was born.
Highfive was founded with a simple mission: meetings reimagined. Shan foresaw the open-source technology WebRTC as the future of communications and shared content, and made a concerted effort to build a conferencing system that could be powered on that protocol. WebRTC is the perfect tool for team collaboration solutions, since it enables seamless browser-based audio and video calls and content sharing. CEO Joe Manuele shares this vision. Together, Shan and Joe have formed a powerful partnership aimed at making video conferencing ubiquitous in every meeting room. Improving collaboration through video communications is now viewed as a must-have for the business; however, more than 80% of meeting rooms still do not have video capabilities, and that number rises to 90% when adding small and medium-size huddle rooms.
Reducing IT Headaches
Highfive built the first WebRTC-based conferencing solution on the market. Highfive’s integrated platform marries dedicated video conferencing hardware and bornin- the-cloud software in order to provide a seamless experience for workers, while also making enterprise-wide deployment simple for IT administrators. The powerful, all-in-one solution delivers a consumer-simple experience with superior video (4k cameras) and high-fidelity audio that reduces IT headaches and meets the challenges of today’s most demanding virtual meetings and collaboration workspaces. From large enterprises with offices all over the globe, to startups seeking a better way to communicate internally, Highfive enables instant collaboration for every worker at every organization, no matter their size or location.
Highfive is hosted on Amazon’s AWS hyperscale cloud to ensure the best quality service and leverages WebRTC to enable the industry’s first true download-free and one-clickto- join experience that connects participants from any combination of physical meeting rooms, devices and locations.
With this, Highfive is leading the charge as the only end-toend WebRTC-powered solution on the market. The versatile technology is fully integrated and built into every aspect of Highfive’s hardware, and by pioneering the shift to WebRTC, the company has rewritten the playbook for how cloud-based visual and audio communication is built and deployed.
Cost Effective Solutions
With WebRTC, Highfive calls are crisper and more reliable than competitors, and consume fewer network resources, battery, and bandwidth. The browser-friendly framework means no software downloads are necessary for workers, and that Highfive can run on any type of operating system for incredible flexibility. Best of all for IT administrators, WebRTC’s browser-based functionality and updates over the cloud eliminates the need for hardware maintenance and management with zero compromises to the user-experience. With WebRTC, Highfive is also able to provide a comprehensive dial-out experience that eliminates the need for conference phones, landlines, and VoIP providers.
Pushing the Limits for Larger Impact
For years, the collaboration equipment needed to enable distributed meetings has been clunky, complicated and difficult for users and administrators. Highfive puts an end to that with an easy-to-setup, affordable platform that can serve as the go-to form of office communication for every conference room, every employee, and every organization.
Highfive’s signature software also combines with helpful productivity tools because the best work tools are the ones that play nicely together. This includes integrations with popular apps like Google Calendar, Outlook, and Slack, making scheduling or starting a virtual meeting intuitive and easy no matter what platform users are on.
With innovations like WebRTC and these partnerships with industry leaders including Dolby, Slack, and Microsoft, Highfive has pushed the boundaries of what’s possible with a video conferencing platform. Highfive’s modern solution allows users to join a video meeting or conference call the way they want, from the location they want.
Exceptional Audio and Video Quality
Highfive has focused on providing top-tier enterprise solutions, developing deep partnerships with notable channel distributors, including Dimension Data, Ingram Micro, and Best Buy for Business, and PC Mall. Channel partners are a key part of the company’s strategy to deliver Highfive on a global scale.
Highfive also recently launched its powerful new Premium meeting room offer, which includes advanced features such as whiteboard view, intelligent scene framing, dual-screen support, and digital PTZ (point-to-zoom) with an intuitive touchscreen control. Highfive has a full partnership with Dolby Laboratories, the world leader in audio, which has enabled Highfive to fully integrate Dolby Voice into Highfive’s conferencing technology. This leads to exceptional visual and audio call quality, and an unparalleled user-experience typically reserved for consumer platforms such as Apple TV.
What they’re saying…
Here’s what some of Highfive’s enterprise customers have to say about their experience with the conferencing platform:
“We now have a singular, uncompromised experience no matter the conference room or user. Highfive is everything a video conferencing service needs to be right now.” – Naren Santayana, Sr. Manager, IT at Paperless Post
“Realistically people are usually joining video conferencing calls remotely, from the airport, from their cell phones, so we want to make sure that everyone can actively participate no matter where they’re calling from. Highfive lets us do that.” – Dave Engberg, CTO, Livongo
Here’s what some industry analysts have to say about Highfive:
“Highfive checks all the boxes as a truly innovative conferencing solution that makes it easy for teams at any type of business to collaborate together, no matter where they are located. The company has shown significant growth, and is well positioned in the competitive collaboration market.” – Blair Pleasant, President and Principal Analyst, BC Strategies.
Source: The 10 Best Performing SaaS Solution Providers 2018
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