What a week it was in Web-based real-time communications (WebRTC)! A positively astonishing amount of news came out into the field, and with a slew of new products and services comes the need to take a step back and consider just what all happened in the week. A weekend is the perfect time to do that, and that's what gives rise to our Week in Review coverage!
First we had a look at BroadSoft, which introduced a new level of WebRTC compatibility to its UC-One platform. Adding WebRTC to UC-One offers a way for users to go past the larger enterprise and offer communications capabilities from a single user to other users with WebRTC-enabled browsers. UC-One was originally offered as a way to simplify unified communications deployments, but with the addition of WebRTC capability, the whole thing got even simpler than was available previously. Along with the simplification come several new services like rich media communications embedded directly in the website itself.
Next came another development from one of the biggest names in WebRTC, Mozilla. Though the launch date of the new service, Talkilla, is as yet undefined, the service itself will likely prove useful for those planning to use WebRTC services through Mozilla's popular Firefox browser. Talkilla is designed to make the WebRTC platform more readily usable by offering what appear to be controls for WebRTC functions integrated directly into the browser. Availability icons and a one-touch chat button both appear to be in the works so far.
Bolder Thinking then brought in the next bit of news as its webRTC Connect system was introduced. A plug-and-play communication platform, webRTC Connect allows any browser that works with WebRTC to also offer click-to-call functionality. Done without plug-ins or a native app, Bolder Thinking's system basically puts click-to-call directly into consumer hands, which allows for rapid answers to questions about products and services, or potentially, a way to make orders for same just as rapidly.
Then, news from Quobis arrived, as WebRTC World and Iago Sato—the chief marketing officer for Quobis—had a discussion on the impact that WebRTC was likely to have on the larger world of telecommunications. The discussion revealed several exciting new possibilities in terms of both the future with WebRTC and Quobis' own connections to the platform, including IdentityCall, a service that allows for a two-factor authentication system to confirm an incoming caller's identity. WebRTC allows Quobis, in turn, to bring the service to new platforms it may not ordinarily have been able to access.
Finally, Sonus Networks' vice president and general manager also stepped in to have a discussion with WebRTC World, this time focusing on how Sonus was getting its clients more involved in WebRTC. Sonus already has several tools in place to make WebRTC more accessible to the end user, including a new set of applications powered by REST APIs, but Sonus is also looking to get WebRTC more involved in the enterprise-level user's purview as well thanks to new bridges between the standard IP PBX and UC infrastructure and WebRTC.
A huge week in news for WebRTC meant a whole lot of ground to cover, and this was just a rundown of the biggest news of the week. Our global online community regularly brings back all the biggest news in the field, so you'll want to be back here next week for all the latest news in WebRTC, not to mention every weekend for our Week in Review!
