EPOS launches collaborative speakerphone with automatic transcribing

EPOS' EXPAND Capture 5 draws upon the company's audio expertise but also offers automatic transcription - overcoming the inherent difficulties when minute-talking virtual meetings. With more and more client meetings occurring remotely, the need for a professional meeting room audio solution has never been more important.

A new smart audio solution for Microsoft Teams Rooms, the Expand Capture 5 levels the playing field and empowers professionals whether they're working remotely or from the office. Now, meeting participants joining from an onsite meeting room can have a high-quality speaker that automates live transcriptions, allowing remote participants to follow what is being said and by whom - for optimal collaboration and communication.

As the latest addition to the collaborative Microsoft Teams Rooms experience, the Expand Capture 5 combines advanced audio with communication, AI, and collaboration technology. The speaker features a speaker driver and a seven-microphone array that all together enable audio and voice recognition to ensure a natural lifelike conversation as if all meeting participants were in the same room.

The intelligent speaker is designed for meeting rooms for up to 8-10 people, and identifies in-room participants by their voice, attributing their remarks to their name in the automatically-generated meeting transcript.

Epos vice president of product management, Theis Moerk, comments, "We are thrilled to launch the Expand Capture 5 together with Microsoft. Being one of the first of its kind on the market, the Expand Capture 5 rethinks the modern meeting room at a crucial time where we all adapt to a more hybrid way of work and ensure that our joint customers can be productive as never before regardless of their location.

Microsoft Corp's Microsoft Teams Devices general manager, Ilya Bukshteyn adds, "Microsoft Teams is helping our customers to adopt remote and hybrid work models across different meeting rooms and meeting spaces, and the Expand Capture 5 will enable our joint customers to deliver even richer experiences for remote and in-room meeting participants.

"We are grateful to Epos for their collaboration in bringing the Expand Capture 5 to the Microsoft Teams Rooms ecosystem, and look forward to seeing how customers will use Teams rooms with the Expand Capture 5 to connect and collaborate in a rapidly changing world.

Building on Epos' Expand product line, Expand Capture 5 is a true audio tool for collaboration specially designed to address the varying needs of professionals working together across workspaces, locations, and time zones.

Certified for Microsoft Teams Rooms and suitable for up to 8-10 in-room participants, the Expand Capture 5's core focus is on medium-sized meeting rooms to empower businesses to better communicate and collaborate between customers and colleagues.

The Expand Capture 5 will be available throughout North America as of April 2021 through Epos sales channels and a newly established relationship between Epos and Lenovo. The speaker is expected to launch in EMEA and APAC during 2021.