Interactive whiteboards for corporate users launched

AV distributor Steljes and interactive whiteboard vendor Smart Technologies have launched a range of displays and data-conferencing solutions targeting business users.

Canada-based Smart, mainly known for its interactive whiteboards for the education sector, has developed three new display products -- the Smart Meeting Pro advanced digital whiteboarding software, Hub SE collaboration appliance and Hub PE appliance plus Meeting Pro software.

The products work with any Smart interactive whiteboard or display and support live, interactive conferencing from multiple locations.

Smart chairman David Martin said the new range can be understood as a cutdown version of its education products.

He said corporate customers often want displays that are easier to use – as well as being sans the farm animal animations and so forth that tend to endear such applications to schoolchildren.

“This is a whole new paradigm of manageable multiple smart boards,” Martin claimed.

While 20 or 30 companies in the UK offered interactive whiteboard technology, none other provided the degree of manageability over multiple locations alongside that functionality, according to Martin.

Users can make touchscreen commands or write in digital ink on top of various applications, such as Microsoft Word or Excel. They can also generate and integrate data and information, which can be viewed, shared and saved by team members from other locations.

There is a time lag of about a second but, according to Steljes product manager David Scott, it is barely noticeable and does not affect the ability to write, draw and collaborate in near real-time.

“You can file to USB stick or secure desktop,” Scott said. “And it’s not the pen itself that interacts with the board – it’s the pen-tray. So it doesn’t matter if you lose a pen.”

The solutions are also scaleable and can be integrated into backoffice and IP networking as part of a unified communications setup.

Smart is working with Steljes to put together some reseller programs to help the channel take these new business-focused interactive boards to the end user, he said.

According to a statement released by Smart, its share of the interactive whiteboard product category in the UK is about 60 per cent.