By Mehryn Corrigan, Sharp – The display industry was already going through considerable changes when COVID-19 hit. Now, the pandemic has accelerated that innovation. The following are five key trends based on our new environment that companies in the display space should keep in mind:

Businesspeople in the office video conferencing with coworker during covid-19 pandemic
  1. Mobility. A remote workforce means assuring anywhere, any time and “any device” access to information. Those who have embraced this have been the most successful with their coronavirus business continuity plans. Sharp’s Synappx™ Go is a great example of mobility technology, allowing users to share content to Sharp displays directly from a mobile app.
  2. Collaboration. Smart businesses need to make sure that no meeting room is harder to use than a laptop – or true collaboration will suffer. They need to facilitate video collaboration, equipping conference rooms with simple connectivity and a quality camera/audio experience like we’ve been used to at home, including solutions, such as the Windows collaboration display from Sharp.
  3. IoT/AI. As we prepare for a return to the office, think about how you can leverage Internet of Things to collect data on comfort factors in your conference rooms. You can then use artificial intelligence and sensor technology on your displays to review temperature and humidity levels, processing the data in the cloud to make healthier and more productive workspaces.
  4. As-a-Service. Many organizations are starting to consider whether we can procure devices and software technology via subscriptions rather than purchases. In the display world, companies that are moving to this cloud-like usage model demonstrate greater flexibility to meet shifting user needs. Amazingly enough, you may have already bought your last piece of hardware.
  5. AV meets IT. We are seeing an acceleration of the convergence of AV and IT. Soon, there won’t be successful AV people that don’t understand IT and vice versa. As digital walls begin to come down, we are finding new ways to provide full-stack solutions that end users demand and that improve productivity.

With the pandemic galvanizing innovation in the display industry, we need to start thinking more about these trends and adjust our core capabilities to serve clients according to their future needs.

Interactive Whiteboards Create Collaborative Classrooms