Microsoft is discontinuing its Surface Hub Teams app. It is releasing a new experience for Surface Hub via Teams Rooms, along with a slew of feature enhancements to improve collaboration in hybrid work environments.
Microsoft Teams integration has become a necessity since remote jobs are taking over office-based jobs. Microsoft has begun rolling out the new Teams experience for Surface Hub, the intuitive whiteboard for conference rooms designed to work nicely with Teams. Surface Hub 2S will soon be accessible with a 50-inch and 85-inch display, as well as built-in Windows 10 and Teams.
As per Microsoft, the new Teams Rooms for Surface Hub will overcome the Surface Hub Teams application around the world within a month of its release. It’s accessible to clients in Commercial, GCC, and GCC High arrangements.
Microsoft aims to let people experience the most enhanced features in Teams rooms by bringing integrating capabilities from desktop and Teams rooms into the meeting area for Surface Hub. It has a redesigned meeting stage, enhanced meeting controls, and Teams features such as Together mode scenarios, a huge gallery, and interactive functionalities like chat bubbles, quick live reactions, PowerPoint Live, and Whiteboard.
For some business users who need to collaborate with colleagues in the office and at home, a whiteboard has become indispensable. A new whiteboard brainstorming software is introduced in Teams earlier this month that gives Teams a more organized and cleaner look.
Microsoft claims that Teams Rooms on Surface Hub will increase productivity in a workplace as it gives convenient access to Microsoft Office 365 files and presenting features. The arrangement of Teams Rooms in Surface Hub with Teams on the work area means to make consistency for clients who use the collaboration platform on many devices, including mobile, desktop, and the Surface Hub. A revamped agenda page allows for easy moving between agenda items by providing quick access to meetings, Meet Now, and a Dial-Pad for firing up PSTN calls.
According to Microsoft “Teams Admin Center” will soon be launched which is a self-managed portal that will let users remotely monitor and administer the Teams Rooms experience on Teams devices. In addition to this, Microsoft will also roll out a Microsoft Teams Rooms managed service, which the company describes as an “AI-driven, cloud-based IT management and monitoring solution that keeps Microsoft Teams Rooms devices up to date and proactively checked for business support.”
Admins must ensure that the Surface Hub is running Windows Version 19042.1202 to get the enhanced experience. Then, according to Microsoft, Teams Rooms on Surface Hub (KB5004196) would install Teams Version 1.4.00.14501 and “will automatically upgrade to the latest available version during regular maintenance hours.” Customers having a Microsoft Teams Rooms Premium license can access the managed service.
