AWS delivers effortless communication for Amazon Chime customers

Delivering flexible options that you and your colleagues can use to stay connected and get work done.

In 2017, Amazon Web Services (AWS) launched Amazon Chime on Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android devices. Customers raved about the ability to instantly join meetings and engage in chat conversations from any device that happened to be the most connected or available. No longer did their colleagues have to decide which app to use to communicate at various times of the day. Amazon Chime helped colleagues, partners, customers, and prospects stay connected and get work done.

We are happy to report that our customers’ flexibility and freedom continues to be the top priority as we roll out new features. In this post, we want to give you a brief recap of some of the changes delivered in the past few weeks to improve your meeting experience.

Just this week, AWS announced Amazon Chime Business Calling and Amazon Chime Voice Connector expanding business communications to and from the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Business Calling enables calling to and from PSTN directly from your Chime mobile, desktop, and web applications. Voice Connector lets you keep your existing on-premises phone system, and simplifies your voice network administration by letting you use the Internet or AWS Direct Connect to connect to the PSTN. For more information, see the blog post Announcing Amazon Chime Business Calling and Amazon Chime Voice Connector.

With the addition of video for Android, you can now participate in productive and engaging meetings from your desktop, the web, or your mobile devices. Take advantage of the portable “in-room video device” in your pocket, purse, or messenger bag and enjoy the same insight and depth of communication that you would get if you were meeting in the same room.

Hosts and attendees can share their screen from a Chrome web browser using the new Amazon Chime Screen Share Chrome extension. No downloads are needed. Attendees can quickly access video, audio, screen viewing, and screen sharing when they join the meeting from Chrome. For more information, see the blog post Use the Amazon Chime web application for meetings with audio, video, and screen sharing.

Poly, as the newly rebranded Plantronics-Polycom merged company is now known, and AWS have teamed up to provide a one-tap connect experience for users with Poly Trio devices joining Amazon Chime meetings. Set up your Trio device to recognize meeting instructions from Amazon Chime. The device then provides an on-screen prompt several minutes before the meeting begins. Tap the screen to join the meeting with the Poly Trio’s audio and video. No PINs, delays, or additional information is needed.

Poly has also embedded Alexa for Business into it’s Trio devices. Now, with a firmware update, Trio users that have deployed Amazon’s Alexa for Business can join Amazon Chime meetings using voice commands such as, “Alexa, start the meeting.” and “Alexa, join my meeting”. For more information, see the announcement in the blog post Alexa for Business at Enterprise Connect.

The Amazon Chime iOS app now lets you choose to answer incoming calls and meetings directly from your lock screen instead of using the Amazon Chime notifications. This setting must be enabled on each device. When it is, “road warriors” can connect quickly using Apple CarPlay and other Bluetooth technology to answer and join incoming calls.

Amazon Chime now provides an add-in to schedule Amazon Chime meetings from Outlook for Windows, Outlook for Mac, and Outlook on the web. Use the Outlook app of your choice to schedule meetings, invite attendees, and set recurrence. Then use the Amazon Chime add-in to include dial-in information and meeting instructions. Rescheduling, updating, and inviting new attendees or canceling meetings is efficient. Use your existing calendar features and include meet@chime.aws to stay in sync.

There can be times when Amazon Chime doesn’t receive the necessary information to delete recurring meetings. As a result, attendees may continue to get called for meetings that no longer display on their calendar. With Upcoming meeting management, hosts and attendees can view meetings that are in progress or starting in the next 30 minutes on the Home page from the web or desktop clients. They can now also delete or remove themselves from an Amazon Chime meetings series.

Conclusion

This blog post provided you with the new features in Amazon Chime to improve your meeting experience and business communications. There are more options with inbound and outbound calling, video, screen sharing, joining, scheduling, and managing meetings — in the last month alone.

There is much more coming from AWS and Amazon Chime. Download the app on all of your devices. Then create an Amazon Chime account to connect and get things done, no matter where you are. Download Amazon Chime.