What is Spontania?
Spontania is a software-based video collaboration solution which allows companies of any industry to hold virtual meetings and distance training courses with a simple, rich and easy-to-use application. It offers a substantial competitive advantage by enabling immediate internal and external collaboration in an efficient, secure and easy-to-use manner.
It can speed up the completion of many business and operational processes thanks to their unified real-time communication and collaboration services which employees and collaborating companies gain to make quicker and better decisions.
Do I need any special equipments to start using Spontania?
No, you don´t. Your PC or Mac system is far enough, with a built-in or external regular webcam and headsets, and with an Internet connectivity. That's all you need to join Spontania and enjoy a nice user experience.
How many video participants are supported?
Spontania supports an unlimited number of participants per session, where ten video images can be displayed at the same time. Besides this, there are both manual and automatic video rotation options to select what participants are shown in the user interface of Spontania.
How do external companies access into a Spontania session? Do they have to fulfil any special requirements?
No, they don´t. There are no special steps which have to be executed by third companies which your organization works with in order to join a Spontania session. By just clicking on the URL they would have been sent in an email invitation, the connection process would start as if they were another employee in your company.
What´s more, Spontania is a firewall & proxy friendly solution which does not require any specific security settings regarding ports, QoS or bandwidth. This helps new users join the session in a quick and simple way.
Can I join the meeting by dialing a phone number?
Yes, you can. Spontania supports both dial-in and dial-out capabilities to join the session with a fix or cellular phone. If a 3G mobile phone were used, not only audio but video would also be transmitted both ways from/to that handheld device.
What types of applications or files can I share in a Spontania session?
There are not any limitations on the types of applications, documents or files which can be shared in a session. In fact, not only a single application but the full desktop could be selected for sharing.
In addition to this, Spontania includes a special functionality for sharing video files.
Can I turn on and turn off different communication and collaboration services to all the users?
Moderators can. You as a user have the chance to select and modify which communication and collaboration services are switched on and off in the session for yourself. The participant with the moderator role can select and modify the same for everyone, if required.
Can the Spontania sessions be recorded?
Yes, they can. There are two available recording formats: 1) Spontania proprietary one, recording the full content of the session (video, audio, chat, sharing, file transfer…); and 2) the Windows Media Video format when video and audio services are just needed.
The recording is stored at the moderator's computer or at the server-side.
Can I use my legacy hardware video conferencing equipment in Spontania (e.g. Tandberg, Polycom ...)?
Yes, you can. Spontania supports interoperability with video conferencing systems of any manufacturer, both MCUs and end-points, through the standard H.323 and SIP protocols.
This is one of the existing advanced capabilities in Spontania.
Apart from my personal computer, can I use Spontania in a meeting room so that several people in my office can go there and join the session altogether?
Yes, you can. A wide-angle camera and an audio conference device plugged in a computer is everything you need to turn a meeting room into a video collaboration room. By projecting the video output of the computer into a TV screen or similar, the experience of the attendees in the meeting room will be enhanced.
Can a Spontania session be broadcast?
Yes, it can. Spontania includes some advance functionalities to broadcast online events to large audiences. Among the different possibilities to deliver live events, Spontania can interoperate with webcasting hardware equipments and also the sessions can be streamed through webcasting services such as Akamai. When more interaction is required by the audience, an Ajax web interface can be added to offer them a real-time chat window for comments and questions with the speakers.
If there were one Instant Messaging and Presence application already running in my computer, could I use Spontania?
Yes, you can. Although Spontania includes its own IM solution (Spontania UIM) within the off-the-shelf solution, some advanced capabilities could be aggregated for the interoperability with third party messaging solutions such as for example Microsoft Live Communications Server (Lync, nowadays) and IBM Lotus Sametime.
Is Spontania ready for mobility?
Yes, it is. On one side, users do not have to connect at their own offices, but outside as well provided that they have one mobile connection (e.g. a 3G card) since Spontania is optimized for transmission through non managed networks such as the Internet.
On the other hand, Spontania has extended the video collaboration experience to the mobile devices. You can join a session with your iPhone or iPad by downloading the Spontania Mobile application for free from Apple Store.
What is actually unique in Spontania?
Spontania is a complete software solution offering high-quality multi-party IP audio and video conferencing, presence detection, instant messaging, file sharing, whiteboard and more collaboration tools, and also full support to end users if required. All of these functionalities are unified in a simple and intuitive user interface, ready to be used by a great number of simultaneous users, in different devices and networks.
The difference of Spontania lays on its highest-ranked performance and its outstanding accomplishments to fulfil the end-users' needs when holding a group video conferencing session.
How can video offer value to our current mix of audio and web conferencing?
The possibility to use a solution with high-quality video such as Spontania helps:
• Establish a close relationship among the participants at the beginning of a meeting;
• Minimize distractions;
• Realize about body language to enrich overall communication;
• Boost trust among attendees.
• Accelerate decision-making processes.
• Overcome distance, cultural and language barriers.
What is the commercial model of Spontania?
Spontania can be acquired in any of the following ways: by purchasing software licenses, in a SaaS subscription model, or in PaaS subscription model.
The procurement model consists of different scalable software packages depending on the capacity (number of concurrent users) which is to be supported by the customer's platform. There is also a support and maintenance agreement (SLA) which offers the resolution of technical incidents and the delivery of new product releases without any extra cost.
The subscription model is available with carriers and service providers in two main options: 1) SaaS (Software as a Service), mainly aimed at Small and Medium Enterprises which do not need any integration or customization options but use the solution; and PaaS (Platform as a Service) when the customer needs a dedicated platform of Spontania being hosted in an externally outsourced datacenter under a managed service basis, with the chance to add own customizations and integrations.
What does a concurrent user mean?
The capacity of Spontania is measured in a concurrent user figure. It shows the maximum number of participants who can be connected at the same time among all the available sessions in the customer's Spontania platform.
No matter if the users join with a mobile device, a PC or a Mac system, or if they are employees or work for an external collaborator, or what are the exact locations where they connect; a user license is utilized by each participant who is online in a session. When someone disconnects, the user license is available again for its usage by other person or in other sessions. This means, Spontania is not measured in named licensing figures but in concurrent ones, which allows a much better sharing of the resources within the customer organization.
Note: Should there be several people attending a Spontania session at the same meeting room space, one user license would be utilized by these people (a license per connected device in a session).
How much does it cost?
Licensing model: please contact your reliable Value-Added Reseller for more information.
SaaS model: please contact your local carrier or service provider for more information.
PaaS model: please contact Dialcom for clarification about your customized setup.
Would there be any additional costs to be taken into account?
No, there wouldn't. The commercial model of Spontania avoids customers facing hidden costs after they acquire Spontania. There will not be any deviation between the price quoted in the proposal and the money paid for the solution.
Why should I choose Spontania?
Spontania has been developed in close collaboration with key corporate organizations, service providers and institutions worldwide which have been using the solution in their daily basis to carry out several heterogeneous activities and processes.
Organizations of different sizes, industries and countries have noticed the significant cost savings and return on investment which they have gained as a matter of:
• An easy setup;
• Zero dependency of other software components during installation;
• Easy-to-use application without needing extensive training or advanced IT knowledge;
• Low cost of operation and support tasks;
• The lowest technical requirements in terms of communications and computing resources;
• Compliant with regular user devices (PCs, mobile devices, webcams, headsets…);
• A single and simple user interface which unifies all the UCC capabilities;
• An independent solution not tightened to a specific manufacturer or vendor;
• An opportunity to leverage capabilities available in their existing systems;
• Meeting the expectations of organizations highly concerned about security;
• Scalability and high availability.
