RingCentral Adds AI Features to Video, Enhances MessagingRingCentral Adds AI Features to Video, Enhances Messaging
RingCentral adds overlays and backgrounds to its videoconferencing tool, while providing more data and admin controls for its team messaging app.
April 21, 2021
As the cloud video market continues to heat up, RingCentral this week revealed a host of updates to its videoconferencing app. But don't consider RingCentral Video a "Johnny-come-lately, " Prasad Raje, senior VP of product management for RingCentral, told No Jitter during a briefing.
Several of the video updates announced were made possible with AI technology, Raje said. For instance, the virtual background feature was created with AI models that learned to identify the boundaries of faces from headshots. So, when the AI model is fed a video steam, it can create a silhouette of a person, which is then mixed with the foreground and background to create the virtual background effect, Raje explained.
Other features that were part of yesterday's announcement include:
Presentation video overlay — Presenters can now overlay their video on top of presentation content.
Picture-in-picture — With the picture-in-picture feature, meeting participants can reference conversations in team messaging through a separate window on their screen, while partaking in live video meetings.
Breakout Rooms — Meeting moderators can split up participants into smaller groups with a breakout room feature, which will be available by end of this quarter, ending June 30.
Updates for team messaging are:
Export message data — Admins can now export historical messages, which can be useful for compliance purposes, Raje said.
External guest controls — Admins can select which users can invite external guests to a team chat and can choose whether external guests can start conversations with internal users.
Personal folders — Users can now group relevant teams and conversations inside personal folders.
Mobile app resource center — Users now have access to a mobile app resource center for troubleshooting and to learn about new recommended features, Raje said.
