Zoom has evolved into the latest productivity app with expanded use of artificial intelligence. The company recently announced its partnership with OpenAI in a blog post. As a result, the Zoom IQ AI-powered assistant will now be able to create summaries, draft messages, and other content within the video conferencing app.
While Zoom IQ already has the ability to create chapters and highlights for meeting recordings, the company is now adding more functionality to the assistant. This includes being able to catch up on meetings you might have missed. This means that you’ll be able to “ask more questions” as well as ask the tool to summarize what you’ve been missing.
In addition, Zoom IQ is able to create whiteboards from text prompts, provide meeting summaries, and summarize conversations in Zoom Team Chat. Similar to the ChatGPT feature that will soon be available on Slack, Zoom IQ also allows users to create responses for their co-workers using AI. According to the company, AI-powered message and email drafts will be made available by invitation only in April, but “selected” Zoom IQ meeting summary capabilities will be made available “on a larger scale.”
Zoom’s intentions in developing its AI capabilities may be a response to new features that its main competitors, Google and Microsoft, have incorporated into their productivity apps. Microsoft 365 has begun testing an AI assistant called Copilot for Office documents, using existing business or organization data to train it and determine what’s important. This is unlike Google, which offers the ability to create text, images, and summaries in Docs, Gmail, Sheets, and Slides.
In addition to competing with Google and Microsoft in the AI market, the company has also included a host of features that turn the service into a more comprehensive productivity application. Access your schedule and emails directly from Zoom with the new calendar and mail apps.
According to Zoom, you can connect your Gmail or Microsoft 365 account to the new Mail app, and the new calendar connection lets you access third-party calendars directly from Zoom. Both functions can be accessed from a sidebar that says company, and the user can perform tasks such as checking important information about upcoming meetings or emailing the meeting host to let them know you’ll be late.
Zoom introduces another powerful feature called Huddles, and this brand new feature is described as a “virtual video-enabled co-working space.” In the same way that Huddles on Slack lets you make short video calls to ask questions or talk with a colleague, the Zoom version of the functionality does the same. Users can request early access to this functionality anywhere in the world, the company says.