Verizon Partners with Zoom for Future of Work

One major difference between communications today and the end of last century is an increased amount of collaboration technology – video, chat, etc.

To further this evolution of communications, Verizon Business Group announced that it has joined forces with Zoom Video Communications to offer its global customers a new, unified communications solution that aims to improve organizational collaboration.

We see this as the acknowledgment – by Verizon that collaboration is work. It is part of the multichannel way we communicate. An evolution of the phone. The future of work. The next areas of integration have to be Slack and the respective Teams products from Microsoft and Cisco.

Zoom has really focused on expansion lately – we broke the news of their Marketplace and Theta Lake partnership a few months ago. Earlier this month, we broke the news of their Sennheiser relationship.

The details of today’s news are, Zoom’s video-first unified communications platform is now available to all Verizon business customers as a cloud service – the latest addition to Verizon’s business communications portfolio.

All Verizon customers will have access to over 50 countries using either Call-In Toll/Toll Free or Call-me numbers. In addition, users may join Zoom meetings from a Verizon Wireless phone or Verizon VoIP or just the audio portion of a Zoom meeting via Verizon VoIP, for no additional charge. With Verizon managing the service, customers can use Zoom without the need for dedicated staff or time to look after it themselves. Verizon’s experts will also be available for training, user adoption and any technical support.

“Businesses around the world are growing increasingly dependent on tools and solutions that are agile, intuitive and reliable. Ease-of-use and performance are critical qualities of video collaboration; encouraging employee engagement and driving greater productivity across the enterprise. Our mission is to offer each and every business the solutions suite that helps ensure these results,” comments Shawn Hakl, SVP Business Products for Verizon. “The addition of Zoom to our collaboration partner portfolio enables our business customers get access to technology that hits both marks – ease of use and performance.”

“This agreement with Verizon is the epitome of our strategy to work with the top global service providers to extend the reach of Zoom around the world. It will allow Verizon customers from SMB to enterprise to enjoy our reliable and innovative video communications platform on Verizon’s best-in-class network,” said Eric S. Yuan, chief executive officer of Zoom.

Our take – communications service providers would do well to have as many partnerships like this as possible. Collaboration companies too need to focus on expanding these partnerships. While this is a positive step for open communications as it brings together two vendors, we still have far too many islands which need connecting.

The is the quickest way to the future of work.