I recently had the privilege of taking my family to see Hamilton, an American Musical. It blew me away. It was the best play I’ve ever seen. For three hours, we were held captive by the pure energy of the music and lyrics, recounting the history of America’s founding fathers. The song, “My Shot,” which introduces the show’s refrain to “rise up,” hit me instantly with its urgency and optimism. I couldn’t help but find inspiration from it for the revolution we are undergoing in collaboration.
New ways to work, new ways to buy
We are in the midst of a huge shift in the way we work, moving from the industrial age of predictable and static work routines to the modern age of agility, teamwork, and rapid response. At Cisco, we are executing on our vision to bring seamless meeting experiences to billions of people across every room, desktop, pocket, and application. It’s not just the technology we use to get our work done that is changing, but also the way you buy our technology. It is all part of a simple, unified experience we are on a mission to bring about.
As the global collaboration sales team, we’re focused on simplifying the way you buy collaboration. Last August, we launched the Cisco Spark Flex Plan to meet demand for bundled buying options purchased on a subscription basis. It was an industry first, providing a single plan to buy messaging, meeting, and calling, and to deploy it any way you like – on premises, hybrid, or cloud.
Rise up and simplify
Doing anything revolutionary takes time and it’s rarely easy. As a big company with a large installed base of customers, we have encountered our share of challenges in moving from single-purchase licensing to a subscription model. But we have a shot at bringing magical collaboration to a billion people, so it’s our duty to rise up and make buying simple!
We have made a lot of progress in the Flex Plan over the last year. Today, I’m delighted to highlight two additions to our subscription model that make buying even more flexible:
Active user: Purchasing is based on usage. Anyone can host a meeting, and you only pay for those who use the service. A meetings subscription is less than $4 per user per month for the first year.- Hardware add-ons: Now you can buy our award-winning endpoints on a monthly subscription, including Cisco Spark Board; Cisco Spark Room Kits; Business Edition; and the SX, MX, and DX Series devices. You pay a reduced up-front price for the device along with a monthly rate that includes application software, upgrades, cloud registration, and 24/7 support.
A subscription to the Cisco Spark Flex Plan is the best way to put your organization on the path to the world’s best meeting experience with complete investment protection. These steps toward simplicity and flexibility in purchasing are taking the market closer and closer to a complete revolution in the way the world works.
Last week while I was at Cisco Live US, my family came out to join me in Las Vegas to see David Copperfield. We were all blown away again, but who doesn’t love magic? And our Cisco Collaboration team is bringing our own dose of magic to the buying experience!
Learn more about how Cisco Spark Flex Plan can simplify your purchasing experience.
Where can we find data on head-to-head costs and technology for competitors like Take 5 and Cisco’s arch nemesis, ZOOM?
You’ll find analyst reports for comparison on Cisco.com. In particular, check out the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Web Conferencing, which evaluates both Cisco and Zoom.