Key Takeaways
- Crestron Control now supports in-platform control interfaces for major UC platforms, including Microsoft Teams Rooms, Zoom Rooms, Cisco Webex, and Google Meet.
- The integration simplifies meeting management by combining UC and room controls into a single interface, eliminating the need for separate devices.
- Crestron Control is now accessible from any hardware vendor, providing greater flexibility for organizations using different UC solutions.
- The control GUI can be customized to match each UC platform’s interface, creating a familiar and seamless user experience.
- This expansion allows more users to access Crestron Control’s features, regardless of the UC platform or hardware provider they use.
Topic Summary
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Crestron Electronics has announced a significant expansion of its Crestron Control platform, making it accessible natively from major unified communications (UC) platforms including Microsoft Teams Rooms, Zoom Rooms, Cisco Webex, and Google Meet. This integration allows users to access Crestron’s room control features directly from these UC platforms, simplifying meeting management and enhancing user experience.
The new integration enables organizations to leverage Crestron Control across a wider range of UC solutions, regardless of the hardware vendor. This expansion includes Microsoft Teams Rooms on Windows OS with page flip integration, in addition to previously supported platforms like Zoom Rooms, Cisco Webex, and Google Meet. The control interface is designed to blend seamlessly with each UC platform, creating a familiar and user-friendly experience.
Crestron’s Construct configuration software allows the control GUI to match the standard platform interface, ensuring a consistent user experience. This integration eliminates the need for separate devices to manage meetings and room controls, streamlining the process and removing barriers to access Crestron’s advanced room control features.
The expansion of Crestron Control to various UC platforms offers greater flexibility and choice for organizations. It allows users to access Crestron’s control capabilities even if they have selected another provider for UC hardware. This versatility extends Crestron’s legacy of managing spaces from small huddle rooms to complex, mission-critical environments.
The announcement was made at InfoComm 2024, where attendees can visit Crestron’s booth to learn more about the expanded offerings. This development reinforces Crestron’s commitment to creating simpler solutions for improved communication and collaboration in various work environments worldwide.
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Thoughts and Commentary
Integration has always been the lifeblood of the professional AV industry. However, many meeting rooms still have two touch panels – one to control the video call (Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Webex, or Google Meet), and one to control the meeting room itself. Imagine that.
To be fair, this issue was basically unavoidable. Early on, the calling providers (Microsoft, Zoom, Cisco, and Google) locked their UI’s up pretty tight to ensure a consistent experience. Unfortunately, this left no room for control functionality.
Over the years, we’ve seen a few MacGyvered approaches for jamming control functions into the UI. We’ve seen scripts. We’ve seen clever HTML5 coding. Etc. But these approaches felt like what they were — hacks.
Fortunately, those days are gone. The leading providers have finally granted meeting room control vendors (like Crestron) a seat at the touch panel table.
This announcement from Crestron is obvious, evolutionary, and extremely important at the same time. The fact that Crestron’s UI can be customized to match the UC platform’s look and feel is a nice bonus.
Not every video conferencing room needs AV control capabilities. But for those that do, the native approach, like that offered here from Crestron, makes perfect sense.