New AI Features Coming to Google Workspace
Google has been using machine learning in the cloud-based Workspace platform for a few years now, with the main aim of making the work day more productive and impactful. Now these latest AI innovations are designed to help employees bring focus to the things that matter and to collaborate securely, as well as improve human connections across the variety of places where work happens these days.
Google Reducing ‘Information Overload’
Google say they have been listening to their customers to discover the biggest cloud-based challenges facing businesses, as well as noticing many of the same issues in their own teams. For example, one of the biggest challenges cited by Google’s business-owning customers is staying on top of the vast amount of information flowing across desks and devices.
Google customers have reported that hybrid work has increased the sheer volume of emails, chats and meetings for their organizations, leading to information overload for many employees. Some of the new AI innovations are focused on solving this problem, though there are other useful additions too.
Video Quality Enhancements and Interactivity
Google explained that they are using machine learning to improve the meeting experience in Google Meet. A statement on the Google cloud website says: “To make it easier for people to connect and share rich content in Google Meet, we are delivering enhancements to image, sound, and content sharing capabilities later this year. Portrait restore uses Google’s AI to help improve your video quality by addressing issues caused by low light, low quality webcams, or poor network connectivity. This processing automatically happens in the cloud to enhance video quality without impacting device performance.”
Google also address the issue of poor lighting, adding a new AI feature called ‘Portrait light’ which simulates studio-quality lighting in a video feed, allowing users to adjust the light position and brightness of their on-screen appearance.
Another new feature is ‘Live sharing’ which aims to make hybrid meetings in Google Meet more interactive by synchronizing media and content across participants. Google says: “Users will be able to share controls and interact directly within the meeting, whether it is watching an icebreaker video from YouTube or sharing a playlist. Our partners and developers can use our live sharing APIs today to start integrating Meet into their apps.”
Extended Summaries and Zero-Trust Security
Google Docs has received new and improved automated summaries which allow workers to catch-up quickly and easily on conversations they missed. Google Workspace has also been built with a zero-trust approach to security, coming equipped with enterprise-grade access management, data protection, encryption and endpoint protections.
