https://apple.news/ATv2UggNKRr6YnsndXIGBRg
This article talks about ZM only using their new security software for paid users.
This could be a huge increase in their earnings.
I’m convinced they will keep coming up with ways to monetize more of the user base
I’m convinced they will keep coming up with ways to monetize more of the user base
I agree that is essential since they have only the one product. Yes?
I have no position (long or short), but I see Zoom as vulnerable because the bigger players are giving away much of the functionality that Zoom offers. Google is giving away Meet (as of April). Just this week Google announced noise reduction (i.e. reduces the noise of keyboards, dogs barking, etc).
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/06/google-meet-takes-on…
Microsoft Teams apparently is offering something similar.
And they’re adding presentations:
https://www.engadget.com/google-meets-tiled-layout-now-suppo…
I cannot argue with the success ZM investors have had thus far. But when competitors are giving away the equivalent of your product for free, I don’t know that it can be sustained. There could be some niches for them, for example in tele-med visits (which I believe require HIPPA compliance). Though even there competitors are already in-place offering specialty features for medical (like the virtual waiting room).
I’m not saying Zoom will fail. But I don’t see a competitive advantage if other companies are giving away the functionality for free, and paid apps are tailored for their clientele (e.g. medical). I’ve used DUO, Teams, Zoom, and doxy.me. doxy.me specialized in medical application, and I think is better for that specific application than any of the others. The company mandates we use Teams, and I saw no advantage or disadvantage compared to using DUO or Zoom. All pretty much the same. Haven’t used Google Meet yet, but it sounds like it is fully-featured.
What is the path going forward? How can they monetize something that is available for free? That’s what killed Netscape.
1poorguy (I also have no position in GOOGL or MSFT)
fwiw, HIPAA. “Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act”
https://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3…
The company mandates we use Teams, and I saw no advantage or disadvantage compared to using DUO or Zoom. All pretty much the same. Haven’t used Google Meet yet, but it sounds like it is fully-featured.
If you are on good internet and the size of the meeting is limited, there will be no noticeable different in quality between video conferencing apps.
There are tons of significant competitive advantages that Zoom has, and this is why enterprises are overwhelming choosing Zoom over the competitors.
The Zoom application works on all devices flawlessly. That includes Linux devices, phones, Macs, Windows. Whereas Teams does not perform well outside of Windows.
Quality on Zoom is significantly better when having a poor internet connection compared to the other apps.
Zoom can accommodate thousands of participants, whereas most of the competition has degraded performance at ten users.
Teams is “free” until you need enterprise features. Want to send a file? You cannot do that unless you have an Office 365 license, even if the meeting host has an Office 365 license.
Zoom wins on price as well in the enterprise. Are you going to sign up the entire company for G-Suite/Facebook/Office 365, or pick the better app for a better cost?
The number one thing is: How accessible is the Video Call to users without the software already?
• do you need to register or setup a profile? Zoom does not require that. Send someone a text message, with a link that opens Zoom to the correct meeting. (Zoom does require a login if you want to use the web client.)
• the software install is fast and easy, you can actually do it ‘on the fly’ the first time.
Google Meets requires both users to have Google accounts.
MS Teams allows “Guests” but there’s setup to allow guests and then guests need to onboard? (That seems like it has to be outdated, but I haven’t used Teams.)
Only one of these is ideal for a “Sales” call. You call someone, talk them to the point where you invite them to let you show them more and start a video conference, on the fly.
I’m not saying Zoom will fail. But I don’t see a competitive advantage if other companies are giving away the functionality for free, and paid apps are tailored for their clientele (e.g. medical). I’ve used DUO, Teams, Zoom, and doxy.me. doxy.me specialized in medical application, and I think is better for that specific application than any of the others. The company mandates we use Teams, and I saw no advantage or disadvantage compared to using DUO or Zoom. All pretty much the same. Haven’t used Google Meet yet, but it sounds like it is fully-featured.
This has been the argument/concern as long as people on here have been talking about Zoom. Yet it was ZOOM, not Teams, Google, or anyone else, that skyrocketed in usage on the OKTA report. It is ZM that is being used in over 30% of companies (a number that has been growing significantly YoY for several years now) that use Office365 and therefore have Teams for FREE! Not Logmein, Bluejeans, or the plethora of other companies that ZM has competed with all along.
There is always logic as to why a company should fail, or concern, and then there is reality. And the reality is in the numbers. Nobody is coming close to Zoom.
I have no position (long or short), but I see Zoom as vulnerable because the bigger players are giving away much of the functionality that Zoom offers.
But when competitors are giving away the equivalent of your product for free
1poorguy
When I google Team pricing and Meets pricing they all charge. Please expand on “giving away the equivalent of your product for free” in regards to Zoom. If true, as a zoom owner it would be information i would like to dig a little deeper into
Kindest Regards,
Steve
1poorguy said:
“…they have only the one product. Yes?”
Nope. Check out those circles on their homepage at www.zoom.us
Here is a post where I talk about some of their other offerings (I made it to reference in posts just like this one ;)): https://discussion.fool.com/beyond-zoom-video-integrate-apps-pho…
I couldn’t disagree more with your post. It is very surface-level thinking. Rather than take the time to pick at each sentence I will only say there is a reason investors have done well and it will continue. Dive in and I think you’ll find counters to all your arguments or, such as in the case of medicine, you’ll find they already have tailers solutions. Many of the options you mention aren’t really competition at the enterprise level as well.
I hope you don’t read any tone in to this reply! This was not meant to be rude. I wanted to say all of this so you may challenge your thinking and read through past posts to get a real sense of why Zoom’s future is so bright!
For those worried about Zoom moat I recommend listening to Zoom Deep Dive and recent Earnings Review done by Tim Beyers. Here are the links https://www.fool.com/premium/coverage/4056/coverage/2020/05/… and https://www.fool.com/premium/coverage/4056/coverage/2020/06/….
I‘ve been adding to my position recently, I think that there is definitely a moat and the moat is getting deeper and deeper every day or week. I agree with Tim that Zoom could become default communication mean in IP/internet world.
The people who worry about the moat and bring those big companies with deep pockets forget about the same worries when Google had with allegedly „very easily replicable“ search engine. Or when people were saying that Iphone will be copied and out-competed by Nokia, Samsung or zillions of other cheap phone providers. Today we are in 2020 and Google is still the best search engine, Iphone is the best smart phone and for video communication program - the one with least friction, most easiest to use aka customer friendly will win. And who has this product now? We know the answer.
I think that in 5 years to reach 250-300b market cap is not out of the range of possibilities for Zoom.
I hope you don’t read any tone in to this reply! This was not meant to be rude. I wanted to say all of this so you may challenge your thinking and read through past posts to get a real sense of why Zoom’s future is so bright!
Not at all. I am here on TMF to learn things. You weren’t rude, you offered counter-points. And I appreciate that. If I thought I knew everything I wouldn’t be on TMF at all, I’d do something else with my time.
I have to admit I wasn’t aware they were offering ‘phone’. But I knew about the meetings/conferences.
It is true that to get Microsoft Teams full support you have to pay. They have different tiers. But the basic Teams is free and supports (so they claim) 500K users. But, yes, the limitation is that you have to have a Windows environment (which most offices do). I’m now curious what level of Teams we have at work. If I know my company, it’s the free one. But I’ll have to ask (as much as I can…still work from home here).
Google also is free (we don’t use that) for up to 100 users, but limits duration to 1 hour per meeting. The next tier is 300 hours and 150 participants for $10 per active user. Zoom’s next tier is $15 per host for 100 participants. So they structure the criteria differently (e.g. users versus hosts).
I will reserve further comment until I can talk to the guy at my company that negotiates this sort of thing. He used to sit across from me, and I would hear him lodging complaints and negotiating terms all the time.
1poorguy
I will reserve further comment until I can talk to the guy at my company that negotiates this sort of thing. He used to sit across from me, and I would hear him lodging complaints and negotiating terms all the time.
1poorguy You will find all the information you are looking for if you check out the following post by muji. Check out all the posts that he references also. Then post any questions that you may still have.
https://discussion.fool.com/4056/zoom-q121-recap-34529505.aspx
Take a week.
Cheers
Spain’s Inland Revenue (Tax Office) has started using Zoom:
https://www.euroweeklynews.com/2020/06/10/spains-inland-reve…
Good news for ZM holders as taxes are such a sensitive issue.
jcb
Just to close the loop on this, I connected with my coworker who does this sort of thing. TEAMS is included with the Office 365 that everyone has (at my company). So it is, for all intents and purposes, free. If there were no TEAMS we would still have Office 365 because we have been a Microsoft Office customer for almost as long as I’ve worked there (more than 25 years). Shortly after I was hired they standardized software, and hardware. Windows PCs and MS Office.
Just FYI. We’re one company, so it’s a dataset of one (enterprise level). But we don’t pay extra for TEAMS. Why would we pay extra for Zoom (which we would have to being enterprise level)? TEAMS offers 250 participants in a meeting. Most of our meetings are fewer than 20.
I still can’t argue with the success to-date. But for a new investor just coming in, it’s the future that matters. Not the past.
1poorguy (with the usual faulty crystal ball disclaimer)
Just FYI. We’re one company, so it’s a dataset of one (enterprise level). But we don’t pay extra for TEAMS. Why would we pay extra for Zoom (which we would have to being enterprise level)? TEAMS offers 250 participants in a meeting. Most of our meetings are fewer than 20.
I still can’t argue with the success to-date. But for a new investor just coming in, it’s the future that matters. Not the past.
You can’t expect Zoom to grab 100% of the market, more likely it will be between 50 and 70% leaving the rest be fought over by Microsoft, Cisco, Google, Facebook, and other smaller players. If this assessment is correct, if Zoom is the leader in this technology, in this product category, them not only can’t you argue with the success to-date but the success will more than likely continue until someone invents some disruptive technology to displace Zoom.
Not only for new investors but for ALL investors, it’s the future that matters. Not the past.
Denny Schlesinger
Where is your company on the TALC, early adapter, main street , or laggard? Because that matters in who will use new products.
I too have questions about Zoom competing with a free product.
Why would we pay extra for Zoom (which we would have to being enterprise level)? TEAMS offers 250 participants in a meeting. Most of our meetings are fewer than 20.
This argument keeps coming up but assumes that Zoom functionality is merely a subset of Office 365 functionality.
Zoom is moving into PBX, so a company may decide to get a unified phone/VC solution even though they already have the VC part covered by 365.
Also, as has been noted before, Zoom works on all platforms whereas Teams does not. With WFH now mainstream, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) becoming common, and external customers who want to VC you on their own device, a company may not have the luxury of supporting only one platform.
This argument keeps coming up but assumes that Zoom functionality is merely a subset of Office 365 functionality.
No, it is an observation that an 80% solution that’s free often wins over a 95% solution that costs money and has to be integrated and managed separately.
It’s a fact of the corporate world that IT departments make decisions not solely based on what is best for their users, but on a combination of factors involving price, workload on IT, corporate relationships (MOUs, LOIs, etc.), and frankly just IT people’s personal preferences.
I think it’s fair to say that Microsoft 360 isn’t best of breed in any category or application, but the all-inclusive suite of good-enough functionality, combined with an actually good Azure cloud offering makes it hard for corporations to resist. To update an old expression: “No-one gets fired for choosing Microsoft.”
My previous company used WebEx, probably because they also employed Cisco networking. We all complained about WebEx to no avail. One guy told me I should be glad they hadn’t switched to MS Skype.
This Microsoft playbook is donkeys years old. Give away the inferior product for free and hope to gain some market share so that you can charge for it later. It doesn’t work.
They tried it with Hyper-V against VMware and look where that has got them in market share.
They tried it with Office Communications Server, Windows Mobile, Windows Phone to name a few.
They give away Azure credits with Office365 just to get people to use their stuff and more people are still buying Amazon and Google than adopt Azure as their primary platform because they have products that are better.
They even bought the best product on the market at the time (Skype), continued to allow people to use it for free and it became the worst.
Some CFOs will certainly look for good enough and choose Microsoft but many companies will see more value from the output of the better product and that justifies the investment.
It’s not just limited to Microsoft. The IT industry is littered with examples where best of breed has outdone the conglomerate that tries to do it all and bundle their weaker components in for free, disguised as ‘good enough’. When best of breed is really good and provides true value that’s realisable, they win.
Bobby
Long ZM, MSFT
Now it really is good news, as Zoom makes a u-turn and will give end-to-end encryption option to ALL users. The change should keep some users from switching to videoconferencing services from competitors, such as Microsoft, Cisco and Google. The feature will become available next month.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/17/zoom-will-give-end-to-end-en…