Category: Collaboration and workplace (Page 13 of 95)

Appfire, a provider of apps that help teams solve challenges with digital solutions, announced the acquisition of Spartez Software. The acquisition includes the Whiteboards collaboration toolset, built to enable in-context visual communication for distributed teams. Spartez’s product portfolio also includes apps for IT Service Management, Agile, DevOps. Based in Gdańsk, Poland, Spartez was founded in 2007 and is an Atlassian Platinum Marketplace Partner with nearly 9,000 installations worldwide. Spartez’s full 35-person team will join Appfire with all four founders continuing their involvement in various roles.

Whiteboards provides a collaborative workspace for running remote creative brainstorming sessions, planning and retros, project management, stakeholder updates, within the collaboration tools that globally distributed teams already use. The Whiteboards product set includes apps for Jira and Confluence and a GitHub integration. Another of its apps, Agile Poker, facilitates backlog estimations for teams. Also part of the acquired product line is Spartez Software’s TFS4JIRA. It offers an Azure DevOps (previously known as Team Foundation Server, or TFS) integration and migration app for Jira to connect the two solutions and link relevant tasks and projects. Additionally, Spartez adds both live Chat and Canned Responses apps to Appfire’s IT Service Management offerings.

https://appfire.com ▪︎ https://spartez.com

Google announced updates to deliver a single, integrated communication and collaboration solution to everyone via Google Workspace. Now, all of the company’s three billion-plus existing users across consumer, enterprise, and education have access to the full Google Workspace experience, including Gmail, Chat, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, and Meet. In addition to offering Google Workspace to everyone, the company announced new features that address specific challenges and opportunities of the hybrid work world:

• The evolution of Rooms in Google Chat to Spaces
• A new individual subscription offer: Google Workspace Individual
• New enhancements to Google Meet that enable collaboration equity
• New security and privacy capabilities across Google Workspace

With the introduction of Spaces, the Rooms experience in Google Chat will evolve into a dedicated place for organizing people, topics, and projects in Google Workspace. Google Workspace is also launching Workspace Individual, built to help individual business owners grow, run, and protect their business. This new subscription offering includes smart booking services, professional video meetings and personalized email marketing. Companion Mode in Google Meet gives every meeting participant access to interactive features and controls like polls, in-meeting chat, hand raising, Q&A, live captions, and more.

https://blog.google/products/workspace/google-workspace-everyone

Asana, Inc. announced a suite of features to eliminate distributed work distractions and help employees find their focus. The new productivity offerings enable people to reduce meetings with Video Messaging, prioritize their work with intelligent My Tasks, create time for focus with Clockwise’s smart calendar assistant, and quiet notifications with the Asana desktop app.

Video Messaging: In partnership with Vimeo, a video platform, Asana now offers Video Messaging, giving teams the ability to record short videos of themselves and/or their screen directly in Asana, and show work to teammates. Automated video transcripts become an accountable part of the plan of record housed in Asana’s Work Graph data model.

My Tasks: With the personal prioritization system, customers can now organize their work in Kanban, list, and calendar versions of their tasks.

Smart Calendar Assistant Integration: By entering the amount of time needed and when you want to work, Clockwise will automatically reserve time on your calendar to complete the task. Once scheduled, customers will see the task calendar event in their Google Calendar.

Asana Desktop App: Available on Mac and Windows, Asana’s desktop app has been purpose-built to block out noise and help focus.

https://asana.com ▪︎ https://vimeo.com

SocialChorus and Dynamic Signal, two high-growth SaaS companies in the digital employee experience (DEX) space, announced that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement. Sumeru Equity Partners (SEP) will make a significant new growth investment in SocialChorus and subsequently fund the combination with Dynamic Signal. In addition, senior management and existing investors of both companies will invest a meaningful stake into the transaction.

SocialChorus and Dynamic Signal are on a mission to transform how companies connect every worker with the right information at the right time. This combination will accelerate the move away from destination site delivery models to an orchestrated digital employee experience that fosters employee productivity and well-being.

SocialChorus and Dynamic Signal will unite under Gary Nakamura, CEO of SocialChorus, and an executive team comprised of Dynamic Signal and SocialChorus team members. Three representatives from the Dynamic Signal board of directors, including Eric Brown, CEO of Dynamic Signal, will join the current SocialChorus board of directors to form the board of the combined company.

https://dynamicsignal.com ▪︎ https://socialchorus.com