Microsoft to add new webinar and 'meeting intelligence' capabilities to Teams via Teams Pro
Microsoft is adding what it's calling a new "service plan" to Microsoft 365 and Office 365 education and business subscriptions in mid-March. The plan, called Teams Pro, will bring webinar and "meeting intelligence" capabilities to Teams.
Microsoft made available a bit of information about the coming Teams Pro plan via a posting to its Office Message Center in message 238782, as noted by Petri.com, earlier this week. The message doesn't include many details but does say Teams Pro will be rolling out at the tenant level starting mid-March. It also notes that by default, the new Teams Pro capabilities will be available to all users with M365/O365 E3, E5, A3, A5, Business Standard, and Business Basic licenses.
The message doesn't stipulate whether the webinar and meeting insights capabilities will be free or paid add-ons. I've asked Microsoft; no word back so far.
Update (February 15): Microsoft has updated the wording in its message center to clarify the original post. It looks like the new Teams Pro capabilities will be added free-of-charge. Here's the updated Message Center wording (thanks, Alex Niehaus):
"On Feb. 9, we published an MC post regarding a new Teams Pro service plan. To clarify, there is no change to existing product licenses with the addition of this new service plan. Rather, the service plan will be added automatically to Microsoft 365 and Office 365 E5/E3/A5/A3, and Microsoft 365 Business Standard/Business Premium licenses, and will enable users who are licensed for these SKUs to automatically receive capabilities rolling out to Teams in the near future. There is no action required by admins, and no additional purchase is necessary for Microsoft 365 and Office 365 E5/E3/A5/A3 and Microsoft 365 Business Standard/Business Premium licensed users to acquire the new Teams capabilities that will be part of the Teams Pro service plan."
Original post resumes:
Microsoft MVP Vesa Nopanen, who tweeted about the new Teams Pro plan on February 9, said he thought Teams Pro might add features like dynamic views and other meeting-related options. He wondered whether Teams Pro might be available as an add-on t other Microsoft business subscriptions.
Microsoft does enable users to use Teams as an online meeting provider in a webinar-like fashion today, but this doesn't seem to be a simple or user-friendly option.
Meeting Insights is not the same as MyAnalytics or Workplace Analytics (other "insights" technologies that Microsoft has inside M365/O365 and Teams). Meeting Insights is Microsoft-Research-developed technology that is meant to provide AI capabilities to help users find information before, during, and after meetings "as easily as if you had your own assistant to support you," according to Microsoft's own description.
Meeting Insights is available for commercial M365 and O365 customers in Outlook Mobile on iOS and Android, as well as in Outlook on the Web. Meeting Insights helps users preop for meetings by offering them content before a meeting; accessing relevant content during meetings and retrieving information about the completed meetings via content like meeting notes.
Microsoft first went public with its plans for Meeting Insights for Outlook around March 2019, I believe.