Corona was a blessing, but what will happen when the vaccine spreads?

"Zoom" company has benefited from the Coronavirus pandemic in 2020;

To achieve great success at the global level, however, its ambitions may dissipate in 2021.

In a report published by the American "VOX" website, writer Rani Mola said that the "Zoom" company began trading in the stock market in April 2019, and was known at that time as a modern general technology company that made real profits.

One year later, the world announced closures due to the Corona pandemic, transforming the "Zoom" application from a popular program among technology companies to an application that people depend on in all their communications.

For many, the "Zoom" application has become a main lifeline for communicating with the outside world, with the provision of free calls, of up to 40 minutes, and the option of unlimited calls with a paid subscription, allowing people to perform many of the tasks that they used to do face to face. .

The author indicated that the "Zoom" application was one of the many video conferencing options already available;

But it captured the public's imagination and the largest market share compared to the rest of the apps.

The Zoom app has gained years of experience in just months.

At this time last year, Zoom had about 10 million meeting participants daily, but now it has 350 million, and Zoom was one of the most downloaded apps on the iPhone and iPad this year, beating other applications;

Like Instagram and YouTube.

The company's profits this year have quadrupled compared to the previous year.

At the moment, a number of factors are likely to contribute to jeopardizing the company's future.

Software giants such as Microsoft, Cisco and Google have seized most of their video chat technology by offering much better products than they were before Zoom was on the scene.

And companies that cut costs during a downturn are less willing to spend extra on programs when they can count on contracts they've already entered into.

The "Microsoft Teams" system is free for companies that pay for "Microsoft Office" (social networking sites)

The author explained that the Microsoft Teams system, with the advantage of video conferencing such as Zoom, is basically free for companies that pay for the Microsoft Office group.

In addition, one of the best business applications provided by Salesforce is Slack, and it comes with similar features as necessary.

With the possibility of starting the distribution of Corona virus vaccines, we may not need to conduct many video chats next year, and perhaps this explains the decline in the shares of "Zoom" by about 20% in the month of November, after receiving news that the vaccine belongs to the Pfizer was very effective in the final stages of clinical trials.

However, Zoom's sales are still almost 500% higher compared to the same period last year, as the company's sales more than quadrupled over the course of the year.

For its part, the "Zoom" company said it welcomes the vaccine, despite the decline in the value of its shares.

"I hope we provide a good enough service that people want to use, whether there is a crisis or not," the company’s executive director, Aparna Bawa, told Recode.

The Zoom customer base is in transition

Just 9 years ago, engineer Eric Yuan left Cisco to found Zoom.

And it is not just "Zoom" that is now more popular than "Webex" - the video conferencing service that has been in existence since the 1990s -;

It is more popular than all of its competitors, but the enthusiasm among users has not translated into sales of the same size.

In October, the monthly visits to the app "Zoom" were 3 times higher than that of "Google Meet" and "Google Hangouts" together.

The "Zoom" application achieved 4 times the number of downloads of Microsoft Teams or Google Dead.

But the app download rate has slowed down compared to the first period of the pandemic.

The author indicated that Zoom may have reached the stage of market saturation, given the number of people who have accounts on this platform.

The largest part of Zoom's revenues (62%) comes from companies with more than 10 employees, while customers, who have 10 or fewer employees, now make up 38% of the company's revenues, compared to 20% recorded at the end of last year. .

In fact, this segment of customers has grown as more individuals adopt the paid service;

But it is also the most volatile segment, since younger customers can switch to a service offered by one of Zoom's competitors more easily.

The monthly visits to the "Zoom" app were 3 times higher compared to the visits of "Google Mate" and "Google Hangouts" together (Anadolu Agency)

Video conferencing feature war

While Zoom has gained popularity due to its reliability and ease of use, its competitors have improved a lot by simplifying their services and increasing the quality of their video calls.

Today, the primary service offered by Zoom and its competitors is largely the same;

Therefore, all of these companies are currently striving to distinguish themselves from others by introducing new and better products.

This year, Zoom had to find a solution to the security flaws following a series of security incidents, including, "Zoombombing", a security flaw that allows websites to use computer cameras and direct "Zoom" calls across China.

In addition to these reforms, Zoom hired former Facebook chief of security Alex Stamos as an outside consultant, and began using full encryption in October.

The competition between video conferencing programs is currently revolving around new features. Microsoft and Cisco's WebEx have added at least 100 new features since the start of the pandemic, including a noise cancellation program while working from home. Microsoft added the "presence together" feature that puts Conference attendees have a common digital background to give them the feeling of being in the same room.

To serve its government clients, WebEx has added a new feature that allows lawmakers to simulate voting on laws.

And at the start of the pandemic, Facebook realized that people were using the app's video chat service more for group conversations than for individual conversations.

So she made things easy by sharing links and scheduling calls.

What will happen after discovering the vaccine?

The end of the epidemic does not mean the end of video calls, but rather less use of video;

But video is likely to become a permanent component of meetings, if not a necessity.

After the pandemic ends, the vast majority of employers plan to use a mixed business model, with a number of employees working remotely for at least some time.

The value of the video conferencing market this year was $ 7.9 billion;

But next year this value is expected to rise to nearly $ 9.7 billion.

All videoconferencing companies are looking to return to normal meetings, as they will have to facilitate communication between people already present and their remote counterparts, without anyone feeling deprived.

This will include using augmented reality technologies to make meetings more popular, displaying data to everyone at the same time, and it will also require improving video calls to become simpler and smoother than they are now.

Going forward, Microsoft is investing heavily in features that ensure employee well-being, as its research shows that working during the pandemic has had adverse effects on employees, including an increase in the number of meetings and long working hours.

In addition, Cisco will soon launch a feature aimed at ensuring the participation of all those in the meeting, by allocating time for each participant to speak so that others are muted.

And Facebook expects the video to become an element of normal life.

Today, with legacy software companies paying close attention to video conferencing, it will be difficult for Zoom to keep up with it and continue to stand out from the crowd.

Bawa said that the founder of "Zoom" believes that the application is able to be the center of a more humane communication system, and he wants to make the application able to enable people to shake hands and hug each other.

"We see ourselves as a medium of communication between humans in any context, in a very personal and intimate way," she added.