Gartner has released its Meeting Solutions Magic Quadrant report with LogMeIn, Zoom, Microsoft and Cisco all named in the upper-right 'Leaders' quadrant for the market.
Adobe and Google both made it into the upper-left 'Challengers' quadrant, meaning they have a high ability to execute but lack the completeness of vision to be named a Leader.
Conversely, BlueJeans and Vidyo have been placed in the bottom-right 'Visionaries' category.
The 'Niche Players' in the bottom-left are Lifesize and StarLeaf, who are both newly added to the quadrant; Arkadin; PGI; and Huawei, who came close to reaching Challenger status.
Zoom
Zoom's ease of use, continued innovation in conference room environments, market expansion rate, quality of video, and service consistency and reliability were all noted as strengths for the cloud-only vendor.
Gartner hands it cautions for its management dashboard for lack of visibility and control of its conference room solutions.
Its direct sales model can conflict with buyers who prefer to use a third-party reseller, and its limited global presence was also noted.
LogMeIn
LogMein's strengths are its impressive scale, focus on innovation, and the quality and responsiveness of its customer service.
On the other hand, LogMeIn's meeting solutions are horizontal and not tailored for particular vertical industries, and there is concern about its reporting and management of conference room endpoints.
It has also broadened its portfolio into Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) with the Jive Communications acquisition, and into on-demand video with GoToStage.
Gartner says, "As these are newer developments, buyers must assess the complexity of their application scenarios and determine whether LogMeIn's offerings have the maturity, integration, interoperability and depth of capability to satisfy their business needs.
Microsoft
Microsoft's inclusion of Skype for Business Online and Microsoft Teams in Office 365, its strategy and reach, and ease of deployment and maintenance are positives for the company.
It's model requiring that all licenses must be consumed by named users or rooms, lack of integration with consumer-oriented smart devices that can take verbal commands, and limited integration with other software applications and services are all noted as cautions for those considering Microsoft's solutions.
Cisco
Cisco's strengths are its wide range of meeting solution features, extensive channel ecosystem for sales, delivery and support, and service consistency and reliability.
As cautions, Gartner notes that the continued evolution of licensing plans could potentially slow decisions on meeting solution purchases, the lack of advanced capabilities such as real-time co-authoring and automated transcription, and concerns about limited choices offered for integration with other software applications and services.
