On-line conferences was a lot the identical as their bodily world counterparts.
With the introduction of generative AI, on-line assembly platforms started so as to add new insights, together with voice transcription providers. Platform distributors, together with Microsoft Groups, Google Meet and Cisco WebEx, have steadily built-in capabilities that transcend what in-person bodily conferences can present.
Now within the rising period of agentic AI, on-line conferences are poised to diverge even additional with a brand new wave of improvements. Zoom lately introduced its agentic AI efforts which goals to create the paradigm shift from conferences to milestones. Microsoft has added copilot actions which may combine with its Microsoft Groups service serving to customers inside conferences to get perception and join with different Microsoft providers. Cisco has been steadily increasing its AI capabilities in Webex, and introduced a Webex AI agent on the finish of 2024 that helps with contact heart deployments.
One other agency that has been significantly lively within the house is Otter AI, which is considerably differentiated in that it isn’t straight tethered to any particular on-line assembly vendor platform. Whereas Otter first made its mark as an AI-powered voice transcription service, it has added an AI assistant known as Otter Pilot, an AI chat assistant, and a sequence of assembly capabilities often called Assembly GenAI.
At this time, Otter goes a step additional, with its foray into agentic AI. Whereas among the agentic AI options that Otter is including should not distinctive, it’s doing a minimum of one factor that isn’t but a part of each agentic AI assembly expertise. Otter AI is now being built-in as an entity inside a gathering that may really reply by voice to queries.
Now not is the AI an exterior participant accessible simply by way of a chat window; AI is now a stay entity that’s actually a part of the assembly.
The rise of AI assembly brokers: Past silent observers
For the final a number of years, AI assembly assistants have been passive observers—transcribing conversations, creating summaries and permitting post-meeting queries. Otter is now altering this dynamic with its AI Assembly Agent, which may actively take part in conversations when summoned.
“The new AI meeting agent we’re building will be able to help you with voice in real-time meetings,” Sam Liang, CEO of Otter AI advised VentureBeat. “During the meeting, you can say, ‘Hey Otter,’ and ask it questions.”
In a stay demonstration with VentureBeat, Liang confirmed how the agent might reply factual questions, present assembly summaries and even schedule follow-up conferences—all by means of voice instructions throughout an lively dialog.
What makes this significantly highly effective is the agent’s capability to hook up with an organization’s data ecosystem.
“This agent can become a domain expert,” Liang famous. “When you’re having a meeting, it has almost infinite knowledge from the internet, but this agent also has knowledge about your enterprise.”
Autonomous brokers: When AI runs the assembly
Taking agentic functionality a step additional, Otter can be launching an autonomous SDR (Gross sales Growth Consultant) agent that may independently conduct total conferences with out human intervention. This agent greets web site guests, conducts product demonstrations and schedules follow-up conferences with human gross sales representatives.
“We cannot hire a million human agents to answer questions, but we built this Otter SDR agent that functions like a sales development representative who can greet every single visitor and give them a live demo,” Liang mentioned.
Using chatbots and avatar-based programs is just not new. Liang argued that what distinguishes his firm’s expertise from present avatar-based options is its capability to conduct multimedia product demonstrations in actual time. The autonomous agent can share screens, show product options and reply to particular questions on performance and pricing.
The technical structure of agentic AI for conferences
Agentic AI is an overloaded and considerably overhyped time period within the business in the present day general.
Functionally agentic AI is about enabling actions, which might be finished by combining a number of fashions with a instrument like LangChain or by utilizing the function-calling capabilities current in lots of fashions.
Liang has an much more nuanced definition for agentic AI.
“Agents in general are a more sophisticated AI system that can break down a large and complicated task into smaller tasks,” he mentioned. “It can do reasoning and it can do some planning to perform a task.”
Otter is just not utilizing LangChain however has developed its personal customized expertise particularly designed for the challenges of multi-speaker voice environments. The technical structure combines each public data retrieval and proprietary enterprise data by means of a customized RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Technology) implementation. This permits the agent to grasp company-specific data like worker names, challenge terminology and inner acronyms.
The way forward for assembly intelligence isn’t simply agentic AI
What agentic AI is bringing to on-line assembly platforms represents a robust new set of capabilities for organizational effectivity.
For many years, organizational effectivity consultants have warned concerning the dangers of wasted time in conferences. Fashionable AI-powered platforms are altering that threat. Final week Zoom’s CTO advised me that his purpose was to maneuver the expertise from conferences to milestones, the place the output of a gathering isn’t simply one other assembly however actionable issues that may profit the group.
Whereas agentic AI can create workflows, there’s nonetheless additionally profit in common AI assistants that aren’t really agentic. There’ll nonetheless be standalone AI assistants and absolutely agentic ones and that’s factor, in line with Anurag Dhingra, SVP & GM, Enterprise Connectivity and Collaboration at Cisco.
“While AI agents act as autonomous do-ers and AI assistants serve as prompted helpers, both offer benefits in boosting productivity and enhancing overall collaboration,” Dhingra advised VentureBeat. “It’s not a matter of choosing one over the other but rather leveraging their combined strengths to create environments where teams can focus on innovation and strategic decision-making.”
What can be beginning to occur is extra interoperability throughout completely different platforms. For instance, Cisco’s AI Assistant will work with workflow functions reminiscent of Salesforce, ServiceNow and Outlook.
Strategic implications of Agentic AI for enterprise conferences
For enterprises evaluating their AI adoption roadmap, Otter’s strategy to assembly brokers represents a strategic inflection level.
Moderately than implementing general-purpose AI and hoping for ROI, organizations ought to contemplate how domain-specific assembly brokers can tackle concrete ache factors with measurable impacts.
As AI continues to evolve from instruments we use, to colleagues we work with, the differentiation will more and more be discovered not within the underlying fashions however in how successfully they’re skilled to grasp particular enterprise contexts and area data.
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