Sam Kennedy.

Simon J Dudley (00:24:49) Hello everyone, Simon Dudley, the before it was obvious podcast yet again this week. This week we have a man who I have worked the other side of the fence with, so in other words, he was my competition for most of this century, which sounds like a very long time and and I suppose actually is. So ⁓ welcome to the show, Mr Sam Kennedy. Sam (00:25:10) Thank you. Thank you for having me. Simon J Dudley (00:25:12) Now, my friend, why don't you tell the ladies and gentlemen what you're actually doing today? And then once we're doing once we've done that, we can go back in the way back machine and work out how you got to where you are today. Sam (00:25:23) Awesome. Absolutely. So ⁓ so I ⁓ I've spent the last two years at a startup called NetSpeak. I run the go-to-market side of the business, and we are a startup that ⁓ is an AI platform focusing on the administrative side of A V U C digital signage. Ultimately, what we're building is an orchestration platform that finds problems in the conference rooms, in digital signage spaces, finds problems, fix problems before the end users even realize that there is a problem. Simon J Dudley (00:25:54) Right. Now management is becoming a very important part of the whole A V space. ⁓ I think the speeds and feeds race is I don't want to say it's over because there's still more to be done. But what you're doing today is really interesting. And we're gonna talk about that more later. And links to all of Sam's activities will be in the description, the notes and wherever it is they put things in whichever format you're watching this in. But Sam, you didn't come out of the egg, I'm gonna guess, thinking, I know I'm gonna do management applications with AI. ⁓ Sam (00:25:57) Absolutely. ⁓ Simon J Dudley (00:26:23) So let's start at the beginning. Where did you begin this journey on S planet and ⁓ how did you get here? Sam (00:26:31) ⁓ on the planet, I mean it's so all if I go all the way back, ⁓ I grew up ⁓ in Connecticut ⁓ with a big Italian family around me. ⁓ lived next door to my Italian immigrant grandparents ⁓ and ⁓ lived the full Italian American ⁓ lifestyle, which was really awesome. ⁓ I think it's one of the reasons I I talk a lot. I talk loud a lot because it, you know, my family, if you didn't, if you if you didn't, if you weren't the loudest, you weren't gonna get heard. And you know, we had the big, long, stereotypical table, and it was really great. And ⁓ but that's I think where I got a lot of my voice. ⁓ and then you went to school in Connecticut ⁓ and you had no real idea. ⁓ Yeah, I went, you know, went to college, got my degree. ⁓ Didn't know what I wanted to do when I grew up. I mean, I I still kind of joke. I don't exactly know what I want to do when I grow up, even now. ⁓ but somehow I knew I had some technical aptitude and I, you know, I grew up at a time, you know, I came out of school in the late nineties. ⁓ and so ⁓ Right at the dawn of the internet, I always kind of ⁓ was involved in what the it right before the internet, I mean as a user, what the internet was, and got a job at a small little video conferencing startup. We were doing some really cool innovative things, but they were Polycom Reseller, Picture Tell Reseller, and ⁓ just started from there, bounced from the small little startup and went from there. Simon J Dudley (00:28:05) All right, so ⁓ what'd you do a degree in? Sam (00:28:08) sociology. ⁓ now it's interesting 'cause I ⁓ Simon J Dudley (00:28:11) course sociology video conferencing is a max clear max. Sam (00:28:15) Yeah, you know, and I I would say for the first probably 10 years of my career that I would have been embarrassed to say ⁓ what my degree was in. ⁓ but you know, looking back on it, it it actually makes it makes a lot of sense. ⁓ that that that this is the path that I felt fell into. ⁓ and again, I think ⁓ I always think about, even though ⁓ I've been doing video conferencing and collaboration and all that, it's really about. ⁓ The technology's kind of it's just enabling people to communicate with each other, right? The technology should just be hidden and it's really about the human to human connection and so it's it's it's interesting that that was what my degree in was in and interesting that this is the path that I followed for the last thirty years. Simon J Dudley (00:28:59) You know, it's funny that you say that because I do actually agree with you. I ⁓ I think that before I was in video conferencing and I started in video conferencing in ninety-three of all times, right? ⁓ so in the old V Tel picture tell days, ⁓ I saw video not only as a really interesting technical challenge, but it was a it was a human connection as well. It's a but at the end of the day, however it works, whether it's warm tapioca or or smoke, ⁓ If it works, it connects humans. It's not like selling routers or switches or laptops where n next year's model is better than this year's model, which is better than last year's model, and they just get better. ⁓ This was about always has been about a human connection. So I actually do agree with you on the sociology side. ⁓ Sam (00:29:45) Yeah, I ⁓ I I sometimes I'll find that I haven't left the house in days. ⁓ And ⁓ I don't I'm not missing the human connection because this is what I do. This is what I've done for so long. My brain is wired that I'm able to get that human connection through a camera. I don't I di the the technology folds away for me and I I get and I know that that's such a it seems like in today's world a lot of people experience this, but Twenty years ago we were s like you know this thing about video conferencing and how great it is and we were pushing people to try and use it and and it was tough and but we always just say like this is the year ⁓ and I think a lot of people now experience what you and I have for so long. ⁓ but yeah it's again days go by where I haven't left the house. ⁓ Not all the time, but you know, sometimes and and I'm just not missing that human connection because I get it all day long, talking to colleagues, customers, friends. Simon J Dudley (00:30:42) You know, it's funny you say that because I got into Video Collab because ⁓ back in ninety-three I was living in Melbourne, Australia. My dad was in in ⁓ just outside London. Two dollars a minute to ring the UK from Australia then. ⁓ And ⁓ I saw Video Collab and went, This is a way I can have a relationship with my dad. Now, the machines at the time cost more than my dad's house was worth and would fill up his entire living room if we'd put one in. So it wasn't very practical, but I like to think and I think you definitely you have done it and I think I've played my part too. We both added our little piece to that, which has allowed all of this to work over the last thirty years. Sam (00:31:21) Absolutely. I mean, the ⁓ there's a lot of us ⁓ that helped pull all of this off, but but absolutely I think yeah, you know, I've I I mean I think it's obvious that COVID really changed everything, but it was ⁓ all of the all of the hard work for the years ⁓ leading up to that that set that moment in time that we were prepared, the world was prepared to ⁓ Simon J Dudley (00:31:28) Yeah, yeah. Simon J Dudley (00:31:44) Yeah, I think I think ⁓ I think COVID ultimately ⁓ just it didn't change the world, it just accelerated existing trends, you know, perhaps by a factor of ten years in eighteen months. All right, so so late nineties, you're working for a little reseller, can we name this little company? Sam (00:31:53) T. Yeah, agree. Sam (00:32:03) ⁓ it was called Video Conferencing Services, I think, VCS. So again, it was a really tiny one. ⁓ that went went out of business. I'm gonna say in eight. So it was my first like real job out of college. ⁓ that went out of business, and then one of the sales guys went to go work at ViewTech and got me an interview at ViewTech, which at the time was Polycom's. Or Picture Tell's biggest reseller. ⁓ and so I went ⁓ as a as a field engineer at ViewTech, and this was I when I was commuting into the city. I was a field engineer, so I was traveling, but ⁓ the office was in the city, and again, I lived in Connecticut, so it was my first time getting into the city every single day. ⁓ I'm sorry, yes, the there there is only one city and it's New York and but that yes, I'm talking about New York City. ⁓ Simon J Dudley (00:32:48) The city being New York rather than Boston. Simon J Dudley (00:32:57) I I think you'll find London is the only city. Everything else is simply a copy. Yes, it is. Yes, it is. That's funny. ⁓ that's interesting because ViewTech, of course, was a huge player in that era. We're talking about the early 2000s here. I I remember ⁓ for those of you who weren't around or that hopefully you care a little bit, ⁓ VueTech turned out to be about 35% of Polycom's revenues at one point. And Sam (00:32:59) Fair you know, it's all perspective, I guess. Sam (00:33:12) Yeah. Sam (00:33:22) so it was probably Picture Tell. ⁓ because what happened was Polycom and or ⁓ ViewTech and Allcom merged, and that became wire one. And I if I remember correctly, you might be right, but I if I remember correctly, View Tech was PictureTell's biggest reseller and all comm Polycom's biggest reseller. I might be getting those inverse, but I'm pretty sure that was okay. So then it was the other way around. Simon J Dudley (00:33:46) You I think it'll the other way round actually because because I was at Polycom at the time and it it all got a bit ⁓ we were like, look, ⁓ they're doing review video's doing great. hang on. They're getting really big and and I know internally we were a bit scared of the i the tail was definitely wagging the dog at that. Sam (00:34:01) Okay. Sam (00:34:05) Well, I was still green out of college. You know, it was ⁓ it was fun times for me. I got to travel around. ⁓ again, this was all pre-9-11 stuff. So they could just the world was so different then. And I got to go all over the US. And ⁓ again, we think of you were saying like as big as your father's garage. I remember like having to work on like the big picture tell ⁓ concords and the big cards and MAG and all those different manufacturers was was quite ⁓ it was it was a really, really fun time for me to ⁓ learn all that stuff. Simon J Dudley (00:34:42) It was, and that was in a world where the user had to know so much about the technology to use it. I mean, it was just insane. ⁓ again, for the ladies and gentlemen who aren't aware of this, the Pitcher Tell Concords, they were a hundred thousand dollars each. ⁓ And ⁓ you could in your address book, you could put a six letter name for the address. So it would be it would be NYC 128. ⁓ NYC two thought, but where in New York? Sam (00:34:55) Yeah. Simon J Dudley (00:35:11) Or where in London and the other way round would be London, L O N one hundred twenty eight K. It was insane times. Sam (00:35:11) Yeah. ⁓ Sam (00:35:17) Just wild how we've evolved. Just just and that was such an inter ⁓ so innovative at the time. It was amazing. Simon J Dudley (00:35:20) It really Yes, yes it was. People would come to to demos at that time and say, I told my kids this morning that I'm coming to see a video conferencing system. And we I even had one customer say, Everyone's gonna just use this and not drive anymore. She goes, I I don't know if I and I'm like, I do hope you're right, lady. It didn't turn out to be right, but it you it Sam (00:35:32) Yeah. Sam (00:35:43) Yeah, and if you had like a if you had a bridge that had four, you can get like four connections on it, like four like different sites. What guy the you mean you were sitting there 'cause I was the technical guy just sitting there like hopefully it all works and nothing goes down ⁓ while I'm watching this. But ⁓ you were just sitting there praying it worked. Simon J Dudley (00:36:02) Yeah, I remember I met one customer who'd spent two hundred thousand dollars on a bridge, a Petritel bridge. I think it it could cope with eight sites. And about five years later, mid two thousand and five, something like that, I went to see this client and we looked at their bridge and they realised they'd never made a call on it. It was an advertising agency in London with offices all over the world. They'd never ⁓ once ⁓ used the bridge. Cost them a quarter of a million dollars. Sam (00:36:08) What? Yeah. Sam (00:36:23) ⁓ Simon J Dudley (00:36:32) to buy and maybe forty thousand dollars a year just for the maintenance contract. I just tell switch it off, save on the electricity, you're not using it anyway. It's just ma and that shows how fast the world has moved. So let's move forward a bit 'cause Sam (00:36:48) Okay, so yeah, I was ⁓ so ⁓ ViewTech became Wire One ⁓ and I left Wire One ⁓ right before right before V Span and then they became BT Conferencing, which became like ⁓ again, major, major player in the market. But I left right before them. I went to another startup ⁓ that ⁓ didn't last very long. They were a company you and you people you probably know. So the company was called NIAD. So was Giles Adams, who's still around. ⁓ he was one of, and so I went to work with Sal Tamino. ⁓ and we went, we were gonna start a ⁓ part of NIAD in ⁓ the United States. Didn't last very long. So from there I did a bunch of consulting work, like mostly field, like I would go do installs, a lot of Tamberg ⁓ installs on their bridges and gate, gatekeepers and things like that. ⁓ I have I had a few. Instances where I had to sit in operating rooms where there were surgeries going on where the doctors would broadcast them. So I got to watch these latharoscopic surgeries. So I had a bunch of like random, weird experiences through that. And then I got a job. ⁓ so I was at wire one, I was at wire one during 9-11. I was in New York City, got to experience that whole thing. But then from ⁓ after I had my consulting, I went to work for Empire Bru Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield. Who is who ⁓ yeah and customer. So I got to experience the end customer side for about a year. Now they had their data center in the World Trade Center. ⁓ And so obviously they lost all the data center. They went and rebuilt all their infrastructure, they had MGCs, they ran, they were regional at the time. ⁓ they were since long since acquired, but ⁓ they had it was a regionalized insurance company in the New York area. And so I went into the city every day, into New York City every day to manage their environment. And then from there, ⁓ the Empire Blue Cross was a polycom house where it was a bunch of polycom gear. But at the time, ⁓ I was trying to Tamburg was courting me and I was gonna pull Tamberg in there, which again, interesting based on my history, but ⁓ the Sam (00:39:06) then I got a phone call literally the same day. I got a call from Polycom ⁓ and from Tamburg to go be SE's to be an SE for each of them. So I had my choice really as to which one to go to and I chose Polycom. So this is 2004. ⁓ And then I so I started as an SE, a sales engineer in New York at Polycom, and then was there, ended up being there for 17 years. Simon J Dudley (00:39:34) Now you didn't you weren't an S E for all of it. In fact you weren't an S E for most of it, were you? So Sam (00:39:39) No, yeah. So I started as an SC in New York. ⁓ and I had a lot of great big New York accounts, met a lot of customers. ⁓ as I said earlier, I grew up with a big loud mouth. ⁓ and so I use that mouth ⁓ to ⁓ talk a lot internal inside of Polycom and drive and and get ⁓ people to pay attention to what they should be doing. You know, I think ⁓ maybe it's has to do some of my sociology mindset, but ⁓ it's really about solving. I you know, I spent a lot of time with customers and end users and finding what the real problems were and driving those use cases, the feedback, driving as much like you know, being the voice in the customer inside of the organization. I really pro was very you know proud of that. I really drove that ⁓ and people inside of Polycom listened. And so I I I was started as ⁓ Think back of like, you know, Dina Bikina, who just retired from from Poly, and Quinn Packard and Matt Lysio. And had a bunch of friends locally in New York that I became, I was their SC, and then they had me support just the New York region, and it just went global from there. And then I moved into product man running some of the product managers. I had Neil, who who became part of my team, ⁓ and Neil Flooster. So I've had ⁓ you know, I l wore lots of different hats in Polycom. ⁓ Simon J Dudley (00:40:58) Neil Flouster. Sam (00:41:04) But it was really you know, most of it was driving, you know, being the voice of the customer, being the voice of the field and sales and partners and driving that into the organization was was ultimately, again, my job title changed many times, but really that was at the core of what I was doing. Simon J Dudley (00:41:25) And that's I said at the beginning of this conversation that you and I have been on different sides of the same fence. I did some of that in the generation before you at Polycom. I joined Polycom in ninety nine and left in three, so a year before you joined. And I worked with ⁓ I I was a sales guy looking after distribution. BT Conferencing was one of my accounts. And then I ran end user sales and I was the voice of the customer. And I would work with Kanoya and Malloy, who were guys who who would invented the video division of of ⁓ of Polycon it would have been known as via video down in Austin and they would invite me over and it would upset all my leadership in in the UK and in Europe because they're like, why why are we sending this young lad or relatively young lad over to Austin? Why aren't you sending me? It's like because he actually has met some clients. So my advice ⁓ to anyone watching this, if you're if you're young enough to get into a position where you have kind of a day job that you can get as far Done as quickly as possible. And then you can do the interesting stuff, which is be the voice of the customer to the product people. It it's a fascinating position. I I will say, just for the record, it can be a bit of an awkward one because leadership may look at you and go, What's he do? Right? If they're only commercial, they can they can not understand how you add value to the business. ⁓ if they're more product focused, then they will. So You were doing this with ⁓ Polycom, and I, of course, was doing this with LifeSize. ⁓ and so I was the voice of the customer to all our engineers. I used to joke that ⁓ people would say to me, Well, you're not an engineer and life size doesn't have a product, so what do you do? And I said, My job is to ensure that the engineers build something that customers want to buy rather than something that engineers think is cool. Because if you build the Sam (00:42:56) Yeah, and I Simon J Dudley (00:43:20) Things that engineers think is cool, you're going to end up with the world's best copehanger cigar lighter. You can light your cigar while putting on your jacket, isn't it wonderful? But no one actually wants to buy that. So, and that's one of the reasons why I knew who you were, but didn't know you then. And I think it you and I've both done that, Role. It was the it wasn't the best paying, but it was the most interesting job I've ever done. Would you agree that that was true for you as well? Sam (00:43:48) ⁓ a a thousand percent. It was a lot of fun. It was definitely not the the best paying job. ⁓ but it was ⁓ extremely rewarding. I was ex very, very lucky position ⁓ to be in. I I think ⁓ I I can think of many times of ⁓ not only ⁓ Your point around not only making sure you build a product that solves real customer problems, but some of the I mean there was really smart, I'm sure there's really smart people at Logitech, but there were really smart people at Polycom. And ⁓ I took the responsibility very seriously. And I would ⁓ share just problems ⁓ that ⁓ people had in the world of just I I wasn't trying to engineer. solutions. What I would say is these are problems that users face every single day. ⁓ And I took it very seriously because I would just I could mention something under my breath or in passing and then a year later. You'd get something like, hey Sam, we got something to show you. Take a look at this. And I mean there are and I used to put on ⁓ so that it rolled ultimately to this thing that we called wow sessions. ⁓ and a lot of people know me and Neil because we used to drive these wow wow sessions. And what I was able to do is work, it would dig in that same role of talking to engineers, they would share with me. I would say, here's problems. They would come back to me with ideas or come up back to me with prototypes, just concepts. And ⁓ I was very lucky in that I got to leverage that and get on front of stages small and big and show people just innovations. And if I think of some of the some of the technologies that, you know, things like noise blocking, the potato chip. We we demonstrated the potato chip bag demo ⁓ the the first time. I'm sure Polycom was the first company in the world to demonstrate that on any type of scale. I did I demoed that potato chip. I'm gonna say. Sam (00:45:49) 2013, 20, you know, 2011. I mean, it was a long, long time ago. ⁓ but that's the type of talent that was there that it was just, you know, noise block, acoustic fencing, just ⁓ just things like ⁓ scheduling. Simon Booth, who went on to Zoom and drive a lot of the things innovations at Zoom, right? He built ⁓ some of the scheduling things. ⁓ the ⁓ Adam Jacobs at at Microsoft who built ⁓ what became you Well, I peckSip does it now where you you can you just ⁓ you don't have to have the Teams client, you could just click it and it j dials the gateway. I mean there was a lot of innovation that came from from Polycom, and then my role of kind of being in the center there and helping expose these. Like I would get to expose the cool technology, everyone would get excited about it, and then the product managers would then take it from there and actually productize and make it a real thing. When I think of The poly innovations, polycom innovations over the last ten, fifteen years, twenty years, I was a part of that. It was pretty wild. It was this is a really fun role. Simon J Dudley (00:46:53) When he is now? Simon J Dudley (00:46:58) Now, Polycom was a great company ⁓ and did some amazing things. But it it did have a reputation for producing some unbelievable lemons. Normally things with three letter acronyms in the title. ⁓ VTX one thousand. for those no one, no one but Sam and I are gonna remember the VTX one thousand. So just for the ladies and gentlemen, Sam (00:47:02) Absolutely. Simon J Dudley (00:47:28) Polycom was famous for making the triangular spaceship phones, as that wasn't the official title, but many clients called them those. And they were ⁓ wildly successful conference phones. And what Polycom did in the turn of the millennium was produce one that had a modem in it so that if it talked to another one, it would do the ⁓ modem noise that everyone is familiar with at that time. ⁓ And then it would do a data link between the two. And then you get a wideband audio call on it. And suddenly your conference phone sounds ten times better than it ever had before. Theoretically, brilliant. In reality, there were a few problems. The first one was if the user experienced this thing, and normally it took 30 seconds or so to actually negotiate the call, so many clients were just hang up thinking it had broken. That would be one problem. The second one would be if you dialed someone who didn't have one of these ⁓ VTX one thousands at the other end, it would then go back to narrowbands of really poor quality audio, and therefore the customer would think it would broke had broken. And then the third one was if you rang a bridge for a multi-way call, it would always be narrowband audio, so the client had thought it a broken. You can see that it ⁓ this was a perfect example of a of a Coke hanger cigar lighter. Technically a genius product. In the real world, 95% of the calls would be narrowband and therefore the client wouldn't see any advantage in it and pay twice the amount. And then the 5% of calls, they go, wow, that's amazing, but not know why it had done it and couldn't repeat it. So did you touch the I'm not I'm not here to blame you. This is to blame Sam Kennedy for the VTX 1000. Sam (00:49:21) It's all my fault. Simon J Dudley (00:49:23) But did you touch the audio side of the business as well as the video? Sam (00:49:26) ⁓ I I I did. I touched ⁓ all all sides, even after even with Plantronics. So I was able to ⁓ be involved ⁓ in quite quite a bit of that throughout like pretty much anything Polycom was involved with through the years. ⁓ you know I was I had some ⁓ touch point on it ⁓ on some level and you know, sometimes ⁓ not everything is a winner. ⁓ But you know. Simon J Dudley (00:49:33) Right. Simon J Dudley (00:49:55) And and you know, in in ⁓ in ⁓ defense ⁓ of the VTX one thousand, hey, at least Polycom tried it. Nobody else did, ⁓ and the other smaller players in the market could have done it. ⁓ It wasn't technically a particularly hard problem to solve, really, just a pair of modems in a device. And they had no market share and Polycom had like Sam (00:50:04) ⁓ Yeah. Sam (00:50:17) Well, wasn't just the modems, right? It was the audio algorithms on top of that that were able to leverage Polycom invented Siren 14 and SIREN 7 and all of those low bandwidth protocols. And you know, at the time, ⁓ it was ⁓ like you said, it I think you said this earlier that the hard to hard if ⁓ Polycom had 90% market share in conference phones. And so it was about trying to drive innovation and drive a better, I mean. Simon J Dudley (00:50:41) Yes. Sam (00:50:46) The core goal of what we were trying to build then was how do we deliver a better experience for the users? Now, ⁓ because ⁓ most conference calls go into a conference bridge, if that doesn't support it, that's obviously not gonna work. But the core of the reason we went down that path in the first place was deliver a better quality experience for the end user. So the spirit of ⁓ doing that was still. ⁓ Our hearts were in the right place and you know again, not everything's gonna be a winner, but the the the the the spirit of what we were trying to build was still still the right thing to do. Simon J Dudley (00:51:26) Completely agree. And and again, a another massive credit to Polycom at the time. ⁓ I can't think of another company that has 90%, I think it when I was there, it was 93% market share. I mean, to put it mildly, it was wildly dominant. ⁓ No company, or very, very, very few companies of 93% market share decide to be the innovator. Because why bother? Just simply milk the thing and make a ton of money out of it. Sam (00:51:38) Wild. Sam (00:51:49) Yeah. ⁓ Hey, think of the this is the other thing that it's so hard to even think about today. The reason that we had to do that on the VTX 1000 was because this is before IP calling, right? Like now you're like, you're like you actually had like a PSTN like jack in your conference room in order for that. Like that was the reason is you could couldn't get that higher level of quality over that PSTN because the market just hadn't evolved yet. So It was trying to fix a problem that it was, you know, before its time maybe on some level, but fixing a problem in the market that Polycom couldn't fix on her own and this move to IP. But once things moved to IP, that obviously changed changed everything there. But that's part of the reason that we got there with that. Simon J Dudley (00:52:41) Yes, and this fair. And of course, remember this podcast is the before it was obvious. So ⁓ you know, in hindsight, all of history looks obvious. ⁓ Well, of course this happened and this happened and this happened and you know Battle Hastings and the Norman Conquest and Magna Carter. Well they're all obvious. Well they weren't. And and neither was the VTX one thousand. It looked like a good idea at the time, it turned out to be a commercial failure. But I just for the record, as if it matters, I actually left Polycom for two reasons. One Because I hated their management application so much that I couldn't sell it to my clients. GMS. ⁓ it was the worst. It was just the worst product in the world. Sam (00:53:14) Which one? ⁓ Okay, there you go. We we had a a ⁓ couple of clunkers after that one as well, but ⁓ Simon J Dudley (00:53:25) ⁓ Yeah, but you've solved that and we'll talk about what you're doing now later. ⁓ so that was one of it, and then I saw the VTX one thousand and went, I could make money selling these in the in the in town, London being my town, not New York. ⁓ And ⁓ you know, that didn't work out either. Well, yeah, London is a town, remember, 'cause the city of London is a specific part. It's i i it was obvious at the time, ⁓ a thousand years ago. ⁓ anyway, okay. Sam (00:53:40) Town versus city, sorry. Ha ha ha. ⁓ okay, okay, okay. Simon J Dudley (00:53:55) So what let's well let's lean into this whole idea of before it was obvious. So what you did hundreds of products when you're at Poly, Polycom, should I say, in your era. What can you think of a couple that that stood out and let's move on from the VTX one thousand. I feel we flogged that one to death. ⁓ can you think of some that were were looked like they were gonna obviously big winners at the time and then turned out not to be? And then can you think of a few that that weren't didn't look like they were gonna be winners, but turned out to be massively successful? Sam (00:54:32) ⁓ sure. I'm sure I can think of all sorts of different things. ⁓ the one that comes to mind, and I know, I know this is gonna be super provocative once I say it. I'm I'm gonna get a visceral reaction from you. ⁓ but probably the one that would be good for us to talk about would be Centro. ⁓ so I was pretty involved in Centro. ⁓ And for for those who don't know, which is probably most people or anyone who does know is probably gonna have this negative connotation. But as someone who got to use it a lot and someone I was very involved in a lot of that, ⁓ it was an amazing experience. It was in many ways before its time. But what what it was was ⁓ a 360-degree camera, which Polycom was very involved with. Polycom acquired the round table product from Microsoft and was the manufacturer of that for many years. So we had the technology to do 360 cameras, and and obviously we had amazing audio because Polycom Audio was amazing. And then we put cameras around the device. So it was a three hundred and six screens. I'm sorry. So we had to through the the screen ⁓ cameras that went around that could get everyone in the room, had screens around it so that ⁓ and the idea was that you put this device in the middle of in the middle of the room, ⁓ and therefore the far end is always within your peripheral view. Even if I may be talking to someone across the room, the people on the far end are still can maintain. Simon J Dudley (00:55:34) ⁓ screens. Sam (00:55:59) Eye contact with it with the people with with every so I've contact with everyone, either both remote ⁓ and ⁓ in the room. ⁓ and it as a the development was all out of Austin. I live in Connecticut, like I said. And so the the I was the far-end participant in a lot of these meetings, and I got to use it a lot. And it was it was a really amazing experience. Now it failed for a few reasons. ⁓ one, it was too wildly expensive. It it just was we we I think on some level it was built to be a kind of flagship wow product to show and drive innovation, which it absolutely for all the things that you can say were negative about it, it absolutely landed and put Polycom back on the map of driving innovation because people were not thinking of Polycom as innovative at that point. And so so it it was as very much a success. in in on that side. ⁓ so it was wildly too expensive. And what we needed to do in the first version, it needed to be a tabletop version. We made it a piece of furniture. ⁓ it was the yeah and the idea there was let's make it let's make the big one first and then we'll we'll learn ⁓ all the nuances and then we'll come out with a ⁓ fast follow of a tabletop version where we'll shrink the cost. But then in a product development you'll you'll learn so much You'll understand understand about cost and how to drive the cost down. And that way we could get a much more scalable, high, ⁓ lower cost, highly scalable product. That was ultimately what the goal for what Centro was. ⁓ because it it was ⁓ so expensive, it it it and which is the feedback, you know, listen to your customers. And they said don't make it this expensive. ⁓ And ⁓ unfortunately we did and therefore was not a success. But as far as a product, it was I'm still super proud of it because it was way just way before its time. It it was an amazing experience when you got to use it. Simon J Dudley (00:58:00) You know, I so I have experience of ⁓ of Centro and I I'm really pleased you brought this one up because ⁓ it was twenty fourteen, thirteen, something like that. It was 70 for those who are unaware of it, and I'll put a picture up. I don't normally do this, but I'll put a picture up of this in the video. It was it was an amazing product. ⁓ I Sam (00:58:14) Yeah. Something like that. Sam (00:58:22) It was that cool. I mean, it was amazing. Yeah. It it was seventy thousand dollars list price. Yeah. Simon J Dudley (00:58:31) Seventy thousand dollars in you know twenty twelve or thirteen money, that's a lot of money. However Sam (00:58:36) And it was meant as like a huddle space. It wasn't meant as a you know, so that was one of the problems was it was just ⁓ so wildly expensive for the use case. It was meant as a collaboration huddle room technology. And and you had to get rid of your desk or your table, like there was no table. So you're like, okay, well, this conference room that fits huddle spaces, you gotta throw your table out, which people are not gonna do. So if we would have had a smaller desktop version. Simon J Dudley (00:58:51) It i it was also a time Sam (00:59:06) Still believe it would have been wild. Simon J Dudley (00:59:08) Ma may, I don't know that that's true. I the other problem with that technology was that it was competing directly against the telepresence world and everyone and his mate, from Tamburg and Cisco and LifeSize and Polycom and a few others ⁓ all had a telepresence room which was about the same price. The problem with a telepresence room is that after you've been in a telepresence room, it's like a TV studio, special lighting, special desks, ⁓ special acoustics. After you've been in there an hour, you're exhausted. The the thing with the Centro was that it felt to me, and I I so I wrote a really scathing piece about it, by the way, when it came out. ⁓ yes, you would have done, yeah. And ⁓ a whole bunch of ⁓ people I still knew from Polycom days invited, I felt demanded, that I go to their office in Austin, I lived in Austin at the time, and go and have a look at it. Which I duly did. And the and Alan Nimri. Sam (00:59:49) I remember. Simon J Dudley (01:00:07) as he's pouring me a coffee, said, I haven't I haven't poisoned your coffee. I mean he actually said that to me, which I was like, ooh, okay, Alan. ⁓ yeah. I I see the world of memory. But anyway, ⁓ and I go in and I see this thing and I realise at the time that it would have been brilliant for things like advertising agencies. For a group of people at one end in London, in town, ⁓ Sam (01:00:13) ⁓ That sounds like him. Simon J Dudley (01:00:36) Going to talk to all the their New York equivalents, right? And you could have six people in each room and you could do a workshop all day in such an environment. I think Polycom didn't know how to sell it. I think that was as much ⁓ of it. I don't I disagree with you on the price. I don't think it was the price. If you got the right customer, you would have been able to justify it. The problem was. You you couldn't have sold you can't sell it to A V managers or IT managers. You had to sell it to like, well, Don Draper, right? From Mad Men, that kind of level. And you didn't have that, and neither did any other company, by the way, in the space. No one had that kind of relationships. So that that's a really good example of a of actually a great technology that failed. Now, what about the other way around? Can you think of a of a what the hell is this? And you sold a million of them. Sam (01:01:08) Yep, yep, yeah. Yep. Sam (01:01:29) ⁓ I don't know that that that one's a little bit tougher for me to think about, like what we were not expecting. You know, what one that ⁓ that I definitely am proud of and got to experience ⁓ was ⁓ I got I was involved in the first Android devices and ⁓ that that was a pretty wild like so Tim Root who I don't think gets the credit that he deserves. but he was really the driving force behind ⁓ actually making this ha happen. And again, the timing worked out pretty well for the on one hand, the timing worked out really well for Polycom. On the other hand, maybe it didn't. ⁓ but you know, we were the ones, ⁓ I was you know part of small team that that Tim ⁓ that Tim was leading, ⁓ and he was the leader of the product group at that point, ⁓ and driving, putting Zoom getting working with Zoom and getting and showing them our first USB bars, like our competitor to the meetup, and then getting and working with Zoom to ⁓ enable that product to have Android on it, that we would run the first Zoom room on it. And so ⁓ I I'd say I was pretty com I think we were all that small group that was building that were all and it was It was a ⁓ it was not as easy as you might think it should have been inside of Polycom, or maybe you think exactly that it was probably hard to just dropping the whole let's go native Zoom room, let's go native apps versus standard H323 and H320 and SIP, and trying to break that mindset inside of the company ⁓ to to drive that. ⁓ was ⁓ pretty amazing. And now to see, I mean it's the standard. I obviously, you know, we came out and we launched and we were the first ones to launch with Zoom. And then I then you then the same keynote at Zoom Topia where Neat ⁓ gets ⁓ launched at this at the same event obviously took some of the wind out of our sails, but ⁓ it was really an amazing just that that period of time of just Sam (01:03:52) Rapid innovation and drive towards what today, like we all just take for granted a video bar, like everyone has a video bar, but that wasn't the way it was in 2018, right? Like that, this was ⁓ I I I as I said, I had the this great role that I got to be the first person that I got to show everyone. I remember, I think it was ⁓ Infocom 2017, is what I'm gonna guess, so maybe 10 years ago. I was in the back room doing NDAs all day long of showing a G like one of the first G7500s ⁓ running ⁓ apps on it. So it was the first true video, like all Android. It wasn't an all in one because that was that came slightly after. ⁓ but ⁓ ex sh showing and getting people to experience it. I I'd say yeah I knew at the time it was gonna be a really big deal. Did I ever imagine that it would be like that's what the only way people buy right now? I don't think any of us could have ever thought that, but but you could tell ⁓ you could tell this was the right thing to do because it just it just made sense. It aligned to where the market was. ⁓ and I ⁓ and and I it'd be super proud of just being a little part of helping build that. Simon J Dudley (01:05:05) And that was just to confirm the model numbers. That was the X thirty and the X fifty. Sam (01:05:09) Correct. That's what we lost. So we we the G seventy with the whole plan originally was start the G seven again, like I with Centro, you start with the G seventy five hundred, learn everything there, and then just build different form factors, right? Because it was slightly easier to build the G seventy five hundred because it didn't have a camera or anything like that, right? So start there in this modular. It was a set box with like again, modular. ⁓ so you had to have an external camera. Exactly. So that we started with that, and that's what you kind of built everything on top of, and then they Simon J Dudley (01:05:26) Yeah, that was a that was a separate d for those of you don't remember, a separate box and you could add your own cameras, microphones. Sam (01:05:38) We built the form factor of stud you know, Studio X thirty, studio X fifty, which had the guts of the G seventy five hundred, but in this all in one form factor, which again, we all think of today as the is just that that is the way people buy these devices today. But at the time, that was revolutionary. And again, Tim Tim does not get the credit for being the person ⁓ that that invented that category. ⁓ and again, being part of that was just it so much fun. Simon J Dudley (01:06:08) You know, that's i i I mean, one I agree, Tim's ⁓ he doesn't know it yet, but he's meant to be on this show. I need to I need to book him. ⁓ Tim Roo, if you're watching this book, ⁓ subtle as an air raid, I know I'm talking to an audience of one now. ⁓ so I think you've y you've hit a nail on the head. It's really interesting, right? For much until that time, until what, seventeen, twenty seventeen. Sam (01:06:14) Good. You should. Sam (01:06:24) ⁓ Simon J Dudley (01:06:35) We had for the previous thirty years been obsessed with well H three twenty, which was the ICN standard, then H three two three, which was the IP standard, and then somehow ⁓ we we went to SIP, which was really a a stripped-down version of H three Two Three built for phones that was then rebuilt for video again, and then we all adopted that. It didn't really make a lot of sense. And it was a great example of how an open standard Which in theory is meant to drive a market forward. Failed to drive a market forward. And then Zoom came up with a walled garden. If you have a Zoom device with a Zoom application on it, it'll work better in the same way Apple did with FaceTime or WhatsApp did with WhatsApp on other devices. And it's a really interesting example of how an open standard should drive innovation, but actually often doesn't. And then when an organization has the opportunity to ⁓ build a wall garden ⁓ and they can innovate within that wall garden. They don't have to worry about what everyone else is up to. ⁓ we did the same thing at Life Size. So LifeSize was interesting. When we started, there was this old video standard called H261. I won't bore anyone with the details of it. It's just older than dirt. But technically, you had to have it to be H323 compliant. And we decided not to bother with it because it would have taken loads of compute time and engineers time. And we built this other ant standard called H three two six three. Sorry, we built H two six three instead. And Polycom ⁓ ripped into us and said, You're not you're not standards oriented, which we weren't technically, we were not in compliance, but no one used two six one. Three years later, the sales organization told us that if we didn't have two six one, we couldn't get into certain deals. So by the time we fit and I lay over the railway tracks and said, do not build it. Took them two years to build it. So by the time we built it, no one had ever asked about 261 again. And it's a good example of how ⁓ asking customers what they want can be a real problem because they tell you what they want, but they don't have to live in the world of compromise. And compromise means I don't do this because I can do something else instead. And Simon J Dudley (01:09:04) We went to two six four and two six one should have been left to die. But our customers told us that we should have done two six one. Now, whether they really wanted to, or someone like you ⁓ told them to, because it buggered up our sales model. By the way, I would have done it to you. you know, I mean it's the way it works, right? If you define the fight, you can win any fight. It's people said to me, you know, how would you win against I said I'd fight Mike Tyson and I'd win. Sam (01:09:22) Sure you did. Simon J Dudley (01:09:34) And they'd look at you at me and go, How the hell would you win? I'd lie on him. No, I wouldn't lie on him. I'm I'm not quite that fat. But I'd play him at chess. I I wouldn't play boxing against him, I'd play a different game. ⁓ And ⁓ that's part of a really well put together business strategy. And you know, credit where it's due, you sold an ocean ⁓ of those X thirties and X 50s. And and by the way, by that point, I was at Logitech. This has turned into a much more of a Normally I leave my guests as just you know do their own thing, but this has turned into a rather different interview. ⁓ Logitech, right at the beginning, and I joined Logitech in twenty sixteen, we said we will only build devices that are either BYOD, so USB and you bring your own compute, ⁓ or that run apps. We made a decision very early on, we are not gonna touch SIP or H323 or any of that old legacy stuff. Because although there was a market for it and Polycom did very well selling those devices, we perceived and we turned out to be right that the market had moved to a different world. So great great example. ⁓ if you got a third Sam (01:10:41) Yeah. Yep. Thank you. Sam (01:10:48) ⁓ on just ⁓ products, ⁓ on ⁓ w ⁓ I don't ⁓ know. I I mean I was involved in every product. So w was there produ what what was the question again? ⁓ examples of Simon J Dudley (01:11:04) A product that that had a different outcome than the perhaps you expected. Sam (01:11:10) ⁓ maybe some of the video phones I could say. Like, you know, back in the day, ⁓ I was pretty in, you know, again, I like you asked me earlier if if I was involved in phones, ⁓ and I definitely was. And you know, there was a definite time when ⁓ you would think video phones ⁓ it it just it felt it felt obvious at the time that video phones were gonna become ⁓ ubiquitous. ⁓ And Polycom was really driving a lot of that. And ⁓ the it never really got. I mean, I know obviously, you know, I think Polycom was probably the first to market with a lot of that. Cisco then started to show up. And I'm sure Cisco was quite successful in selling cameras in phones. I don't know how well the ultimate adoption was, but it surely felt ⁓ that the market was gonna move that way for a variety of reasons. You know, back in the you know, fifteen years ago, 10, 15 years ago, where ⁓ personal computers just weren't as ⁓ didn't have as much power in them. I mean it seems relatively obvious, but that's ultimately just not it it just never was adopted and I I I suspect there's very few I mean it's probably very few phones even sold today, but you know, they even f less ⁓ phones with ⁓ cameras and screens and and all of that but there was a time when it felt like that was going to be ⁓ heavily adopted and it just for a variety of reasons it just ⁓ never just never really came to be a thing and ⁓ so yeah it was I'd say you know video phones were were a fun thing to be involved with but it just never grabbed that market attention. That we would have thought it was gonna get at the Simon J Dudley (01:13:04) Yeah, it's fascinating you bring up video phones. And I'm I I'd actually completely forgotten about them as a sector. ⁓ for for the ladies and gentlemen at home. No one bought video phones. No one bought them. They ⁓ and and plenty of companies tried it. Even back in the ISDN days, in the turn of the millennium, people were building ⁓ phones, like a handset phone that sat in your desk with a with a little display on it. Sam (01:13:09) Yeah, right. Sam (01:13:14) What's a phone? Simon J Dudley (01:13:31) And theoretically they would be successful. And no one bought them. But what was interesting was that Cisco or Tamburg, with both, either, some point they changed names, right? They were successful with selling big displays, like like look like a Mac, an iMac, an all-in-one device with a big display on it. They were often put on executives' desks, they weren't very often actually used. They were often used. I had a friend of mine who sold these things who told me that the usage of these things was actually pretty tiny, but the sales of them were really quite big. And they were often used as status symbols on senior executives' desks. You know, you're talking about a $7,000 device here 20 years ago or 15 years ago. That's I think there's an interesting, I don't know what the answer to that story is, but there's an interesting angle in there that if you were a certain level. within a company like Cisco, you had one of these devices, a DX eighty or one of those other devices, on your desk, and it signified this is who you are. It was almost like the company car of the of the twenty-first century at some level. I I don't know what the answer or or what the lesson of that particular story is, but it is interesting. And video phones, which were well under a thousand dollars for most of them, With a little five inch display on them. Look like an obvious idea. Every well of course you'll have a it's only a couple of hundred dollars more than the normal phone. Why wouldn't you have one? No one bought them. And and I don't really understand why. There's a the camera's in the wrong position, the screen's not big enough, you can't put a group in front of it. Maybe Sam (01:15:13) Can't see content. Simon J Dudley (01:15:15) Yes. Maybe the PC took over, or more likely, it desktop video was always seen as a status symbol and it simply didn't look s high enough status. I I I don't know. ⁓ for for those of you who are watching this and still watching this, ⁓ thank you. And also ⁓ go and watch the conversation I had with Tim Banting. It's another one of our recordings, and he talks extensively about Cisco's ⁓ IP telephony. experience and how at one point they had over thirty different IP phones. And most of that was status driven and nothing to do with the quality or the the experience of the phone. It was simply, well you are this level and therefore you get this level of phone. Apparently the more senior you are, the more buttons you require, which is kind of funny. Sam (01:16:04) You think it'd be the opposite, but yeah. Simon J Dudley (01:16:06) Yes. Yes, you really would. I mean if you're real if you're if you're the president, you just pick up the receiver and there's someone who answered. There's no there's no buttons at all, but who knows? Okay, so you did all this stuff for Polly and and it's it was a good long journey, seventeen years not to be sniffed at. When did you leave Polycom? Sam (01:16:14) Yeah. But Sam (01:16:28) ⁓ so I left in the fall of 2021. So there was ⁓ yet another leadership change there. I got caught in the middle of just new leadership coming in, ⁓ not really understanding a person's that that of the value what I bring because it's I I didn't fit in a traditional org chart and Even though I was so customer centric and user centric and had a lot of great relationships with a lot of those end customers, these new people that came in from outside the industry who didn't necessarily understand what it like why people liked Polycom. ⁓ that it was mostly a lot of the reason I mean they had good products, but they had really good people. And I think a lot of those customers stuck through with Polycom because of those people. ⁓ So I left, I I decided to so I had Crestron who was calling me, ⁓ and I decided in 20 the fall of 2021 to ⁓ leave Polycom and join Crushtron. And I moved into marketing. ⁓ and so ultimately ran product marketing and experience centers and technical marketing and a bunch of different things ⁓ there. And ⁓ you know, it was a I wanted to, I I saw value in staying in the industry. Simon J Dudley (01:17:24) Right? Sam (01:17:52) you know, Krestron is obviously a household name and a leader in the categories that they that they are involved with. So again, I felt it would have ⁓ felt it would have been a good fit for me. Simon J Dudley (01:18:06) Yeah. But you didn't stay seventeen years. ⁓ And one of the things that's interesting for the again, for the audience who aren't intimately aware of this, Polly had been a publicly listed company. I mean, yeah, it'd been bought by private equity and sold by private equity and change leadership and all of these different things over the years. But it was a a a very public company in the sense you could look at the financials, you could actually work out how they did business, they sold through distribution and resellers. Sam (01:18:09) But I didn't stay seventeen years. So Simon J Dudley (01:18:35) And Crestron ⁓ well, I'll let you tell the story about Krestron, Crestron is a very different sort of organisation, isn't it? Sam (01:18:43) It it it ⁓ in many ways it was a very different organization. So yeah, where and and being at Polycon for so long, it was actually like working for lots of different companies, even though it was it was really you know the same. I was there at 17 years, but it was it was in the different eras, ⁓ they were very different types of organizations. ⁓ but yeah, going to Crestron was a more of an A V company. I mean, what while Crestron is successful and Unified Communications was more of a traditional A V type company, ⁓ family-owned versus ⁓ you know publicly traded or ⁓ private equity or anything like that. So just the it was philosophical differences ⁓ of just how they run their business. ⁓ And ⁓ again, a lot of really good smart people driving towards to to to you know. solving problems just in a bit of a different way than what I was used to of what I was able to drive a polycons. Simon J Dudley (01:19:49) Now one of the things I've talked to a number of guests about is how and it it's always amazed and surprised me how the CEO or the the the absolute senior leadership in an organization with multiple thousands of people in it can complete who you possibly probably for most folks never meet changes the mood music that the rest of the organization lives in. It's it's like they they they ⁓ Put those scent in the air somehow about this is how we are doing business as a as an organization. So, you know, without spilling too much tea, what did you notice as the difference between ⁓ poly polycom, should I say, ⁓ as an organization culturally and crestron? What were the pros and cons of each in your experience? Sam (01:20:42) ⁓ you know, I think ⁓ being at Polycom because it was a and I don't know if it's because, but but ⁓ as it was a publicly traded company, ⁓ it was ⁓ it it was ⁓ one of the jokes we used to say at Polycom would be it was some senior leader at Cisco decides to leave Cisco and now is gonna become the CEO of Polycom. And we're just and you know, if you liked him or didn't, it didn't matter in two years they were gonna be out. ⁓ because they were gonna leave for whatever reason. And so it was ⁓ it it it very ⁓ even though I started with Bob Haggerty who kind of grew up there. So Bob was quite different. ⁓ and I, you know, I was lucky enough to be ⁓ to know most of them most of the CEOs. And ⁓ we actually just ⁓ Mar Mary McDowell just became ⁓ part of our ⁓ board of directors of my current company so I had great relationships with with the senior leaders there but but most of them had you know worked at other places and you know had a lot of ⁓ ways to do things that they brought to Poly to to Polycom or Poly and and then like you said, ⁓ used whatever magic they did to drive that down throughout the organization. Crestron was extremely different in that ⁓ as I got there, I I did not ⁓ I showed a crestron in the fall of twenty twenty one after Randy was there. So I never was the I never Was employed under ⁓ my my tenure at Crestron didn't include Randy. It only included ⁓ my god, Dan. I'm sorry. ⁓ So it only included Dan, Dan Feldstein. And so, you know, Dan ⁓ and ⁓ grew up there, right? And so it's that that company is in his blood. It is not, it is so different versus just a traditional corporate job that that that was at Polycom at Cresttron. It was It's I mean it literally is is blood to them. And so ⁓ it's just a different, it's just very different, right? I I I I don't truly not saying one's better than the other. It's not what I'm trying to get across. It just you know from a from a just a difference of this is ⁓ I feel that they it's like their legacy, their father created this company 50 years ago, ⁓ and ⁓ they are. Sam (01:23:09) leaders in their market and they've taken it over and it's their their legacy ⁓ is in this company. They're custodian. Yeah. Simon J Dudley (01:23:14) It it feels like they're a custodian. It feels they're a custodian of a thing rather than the just driving a business. I think it is a very different culture. I think it's fascinating to note that. Sam (01:23:20) Yeah, their family, their blood. Yeah. It was very fascinating. Very fascinating to experience the the just the differences between those. Again, I I ⁓ is one better that I'm not making any claims to any of that, right? I'm just saying it was for me to experience it was it was a bit of a different ⁓ culture shock, maybe a little bit for me. ⁓ just because ⁓ just again because of that, because it just the the ⁓ what what what drives them is more than a Simon J Dudley (01:23:38) No no no it it's Sam (01:23:57) I mean, I can't speak for them, so I don't want to say this, but I'm I'm gonna say it, but ⁓ like it's more than just money, right? It it's it's about their family's heritage and legacy and and being custodians of what their f that what their father had built. So I again I think it's ⁓ again just a philosophical difference that I got to experience both sides of that fence. Simon J Dudley (01:24:18) I think that's wonderful. And by the way, for the for the record, and if anyone could help me get them on, ⁓ Bob Haggerty, ⁓ I would love to have you on the show. Hi, Bob. ⁓ I don't know Dan. Love to get him on the show. I'd love to get Andy Klein on the show. ⁓ so you know, if you're watching, you know how to get hold of me. or ⁓ and if you're if you know them and think that they would be interested, get in touch, right? Because these I I love understanding how ⁓ Sam (01:24:26) He's great. Sam (01:24:31) Great. He would be great. Yeah. Simon J Dudley (01:24:47) organizations work. This this whole podcast is about helping people understand what everyone has done in the past because then perhaps we can learn something from the past. I Sam (01:24:58) Getting Dan would be amazing because 50 years, you know, f his whole life, you know, I don't I've no how old he is, but the company I know is fifty-one or fifty-two years old, something like that. So I mean his whole life has been he's been part of that organization and to get his perspective ⁓ on just like what he's lived through in order for that company. It would be it would be a really fascinating interview for you to have him. Talk just talk to him and get his per se per per perspectives. It was funny because I remember, again, I I get really excited and motivated when I'm talking to customers and I'd often have to present with ⁓ I know I'd like I would do a lot of the presentations when I was at Crushtron and a lot of times Dan would be in the room and and he would always tease me that I was selling Crustron to him because I would get so excited and be so fired up about the things we were doing. And then he would tease me about ⁓ that I was trying to sell the company to him. But yeah, i he would be I'm sure he has got a lot of fascinating stories to tell. Simon J Dudley (01:25:58) I mean, I've always and again this isn't meant this is may stop me ever getting down on the show, but ⁓ many of us, and certainly I will speak for myself, have always treated Crestron almost as a cult. There are people who there are people who sell Logitech or Polycom or LifeSize or Cisco. People grow up in in Crestron. ⁓ It it is their career. They they and there's nothing wrong with it. You know, both bus business types have their advantages. But it's always interesting if some w you can tell someone has gone through the Crestron initiation ceremony and they are now in the Crestron cult. And that sounds awful because you know cults generally don't have very positive PR. But I don't mean that in a particularly negative way. It's more of a there are many folks who've built entire careers on that one organisation. And I think that's a really fascinating model. Sam (01:26:52) It was fascinating to experien it. It was fascinating to experience it. And ⁓ and so so I only I lasted there about three years. ⁓ and again, I I I don't mean that with any kind of negative connotations, right? That I lasted that. I mean, you know, it was a great time, ⁓ great people, the great products. ⁓ but but it wasn't a 17 years for me like it was at Polycom. so I had a good run at Crestron. I l learned a lot, made a lot of great friends. ⁓ left there in 2024, about two years ago now. ⁓ and you know, one of the things that I had been thinking about was ⁓ going and I'd been I helped build so many products and wanted to leverage a lot of what I've learned ⁓ and start at a place and build. So I had been thinking about. Either starting my own company or being part of a startup. And so it just so happens, excuse me, excuse me. So it just so happens that I met Eric DeGeorgie, who is the CEO of NetSpeak. ⁓ And he had some ideas around ⁓ and some vision and had some early prototypes around ⁓ what could be this next generation of management platforms built around AI in this moment in time. ⁓ And so it it just it it it was it felt like the right thing for me to take a chance to try and drive and go take a lot of what I've learned over my last you know 25 ish years ⁓ working for Polycom and Crestron and others and then take that and now apply that to a whole new brand brand new company drive culture drive product build the team build teams build build it all from scratch ⁓ and so it's been ⁓ it's been a pretty wild and fun two years. Simon J Dudley (01:28:49) So what have you learnt in two years? And what's worked I I know it's early days, right? But what have you d have you the f I guess the first question is, have you pivoted? 'Cause almost every startup thinks they're gonna do one thing and then goes, hang on, no, we're gonna go and do something else. Has the has the has the story stayed the same? Sam (01:28:52) Ha ha Sam (01:29:11) ⁓ it I wouldn't say we've pivoted. I don't think we've had to pivot. ⁓ but you know, as I I ⁓ I used to say when I first started here, we were we're gonna turn every, you know, turn over every rock. Because, you know, I think the story as we first started talking to people about our vision, showing early concepts and demos, it was we wanted to be all things to all people. ⁓ And again, I wouldn't say we pivoted. But we've continually narrowed down what the focus is. And so, you know, I think in any good product and any good solution and any good company, ⁓ it's you wanna net narrow down to the core of what ⁓ you're trying to solve for. And then you can start to build it back up and start to go wider. ⁓ And so I I wouldn't say we've had to pivot, though I would say we've shed some of the early let's go after this and let's go do this and let's go do this. Instead, I think we've gotten more and more focused versus ⁓ having to pivot away. I think, I think we from the day, at least when I joined from day one, it's been ⁓ we know a problem. ⁓ We have a really good handle on the pro I mean I mean and the problem we're trying to solve for, I joke often with customers and partners that I'm paying for the sins of my hardware manufacturer side of you know, for 20 years I worked on the hardware. And the hardware manufacturers in general are not really incentivized to make it all work together and make it super simple and make that like they're you know, ⁓ the the easier it is to deploy and the easier it is for users, the more people will buy, but they're not really incentivized to make it all work together as a complete solution. And so. And I think what what I'm doing, I joke, we're trying to solve for all of these sins of the past of ⁓ not being incentivized to make all of that happen. Here we are, right? It is our core focus to take all of these these disparate technologies on the product side, like all these different things together. And because of this moment in time that there we can leverage AI as a back end, we can now start to accomplish things that for my tw like self-healing spaces, that that's a Sam (01:31:36) you know, science fiction and things that I would have shown in wow sessions years ago, but to pull it off and it actually be reality is amazing. And and so again, we've not had to pivot, but it's you know, we continue to whittle and focus. Yeah. It's Simon J Dudley (01:31:51) But focus. Focus is important too. Focus or pivot, I guess they're ultimately they're not the same, but but they make sense. So so what does a perfect customer look like for you? Sam (01:31:57) Yeah. Sam (01:32:01) Well, we're we're still early on. So a perfect customer to us is anyone that has, you know, fifty to a hundred to tens of thousands of conference rooms ⁓ that are struggling. Well, ⁓ that inherently in that many rooms, you're gonna have multiple spaces or multiple manufacturers, you're multi you're likely to have multiple locations. ⁓ anyone that is struggling with the 100% uptime for their spaces looking to do something new, are not afraid of AI and understand that AI. And I'm happy to go through the details around AI. It's not just like we're we're not just, you know, the big scary AI of like it's gonna, you know, end the world or anything like that, right? We're very, it's a very focused AI solving a very specific problem. And so ⁓ you know, perfect customer for us is anyone more than 50 to 100 rooms, a couple of locations, struggling with a hundred percent uptime. Is not afraid of AI, not afraid of working with a star w we're a startup, but most of us are industry veterans. The the people like again, we have ⁓ we have Dan Rude, we have Spencer Wise. I mean, we we Osman is the head of product. Well most of us who've been work Deb, we have most of us who've been work in the most of us who work here have been in the industry for you know 20 plus years. So we know the problems we're trying to solve for. but any customer and lots of verticals, it's it would be it's pretty fascinating that I find it fascinating. ⁓ Of it's been a lot of financial services organizations, it's a lot of higher education. ⁓ that and it's it makes a sense, right? Like in a higher ed, what what one of the reasons we we get so much interest from them is ⁓ in a classroom in a university. the ⁓ their customers are the students in the room. And if that technology doesn't work, I mean obviously their professors have very low tolerance for things not working. And part of it is they don't want to be embarrassed in front of their customers. And so if the technology is not working, it's not like a, it's not like I work for a bank and we can say, okay, well, we're just gonna reschedule this meeting to Monday. It doesn't work that in a school, right? If the class doesn't happen, the class doesn't happen. And that that is a failure and that's money that that school Sam (01:34:15) Like that, that they take that personal. So anybody that has spaces that need high uptime, ⁓ which again, ⁓ not everybody needs my rooms to always be working, but the majority, I I it was I get another anecdote, I guess I could say, is when I was working on coming to ⁓ to NetSpeak, I was actually interviewing to go work on the end customer side. So I was thinking of, hey, maybe this is a time in my career to maybe let's let me go back. To then customer to try that. And I remember meeting with the CIO of this Fortune 500, and he was telling me, well, my rooms work about 95% of the time. But that 5% ⁓ downtime, that 5% that doesn't work, that causes sleepless. I'm the CIO of a multi-billion dollar Fortune 500 organization. And that 5% uptime means I'm getting yelled at from the CEO, from our chief revenue officer, from our HR head. Like people are, that 5% is keeping me up at night. What can you do about solving for this problem? And again, they they think about 95% up that's pretty good for those spaces the in the history that you and I have where 95% we would have we would have killed for that for many, many years. ⁓ but again, what we're what so what we're trying to do is close that gap. I mean, you know, hundred we work in technology, so we'll never be at a hundred percent, but how do we drive better experiences? How do we enable like I I think about all the time, I I ⁓ I wrote a blog, I don't think it Simon J Dudley (01:35:26) Yes. Sam (01:35:41) Posted it yet. But ⁓ like how many spaces in our customers, how how many rooms in our customers' environments have issues that don't that go completely unreported? That the users themselves walk into the room and go, this isn't working, but I'm not gonna waste my time to go open up a ticket on that because I don't care enough. They're just gonna leave it and then the next person's gonna have a bad experience and they're not gonna care. And so there's all like 95% uptime, and that's what you know, versus Probably practicality. So again, what we're trying to solve for is closing that gap, increasing the uptime, making people more efficient, more effective, happy at their jobs, driving this perception that the technology and conf I mean, you and I've been doing this, we just talked about this like huge long history. Yet if you talk to an average person of the go use the technology in a conference room or a classroom, most people cringe and that want nothing to do with that. And you and I have both spent our lives. Focused on this. ⁓ And ⁓ my god, like that just like it embarrasses me that that that's the opinion of people that they're afraid to go into the rooms. So again, this is why I'm saying we're trying to solve for these problems that have that just been pervasive. ⁓ The industry has moved ⁓ so far. I'm not saying it hasn't, but We're still not at a place where these vendors are all the technologies working together in a more seamless way. And that's at a core of what we're trying to do. Simon J Dudley (01:37:13) And we went we're not even at ninety nine percent reliability. And you know, thirty years ago I'd talked to telecoms managers who would say, Well, IT will never take over because they can't even get above two nines of reliability, because telecoms was always at ninety nine point nine nine nine percent, which is twenty percent sorry, twenty minutes a year of downtime. ⁓ the the idea that we're even remotely close to that is Sam (01:37:16) Yeah. Simon J Dudley (01:37:43) laughable in our space, it shouldn't be laughable. So I'm pleased you're trying to fix it. So so let's r well good. Let's reflect a bit. If you were to ⁓ well you've got kids, you've got two daughters. What's your advice to them about what the world's gonna look like in the next ten, fifteen, twenty years? What would you say to them about careers or education or any of those, you know? Sam (01:37:48) Yeah, we are. And we we think we can. Sam (01:38:12) Yeah, ⁓ you know, I have two two daughters, two daughters ⁓ in university right now. ⁓ one in her senior year, so she's about to about to, you know, move go to the next step. And so ⁓ yeah, it it's ⁓ the things that I drive with them is you do something that you want to wake up to every day. ⁓ I've been luck very lucky in my career to both find something that's ⁓ I've enjoyed. Being able enabled me to be around people that I like, ⁓ enabled me to travel the world. ⁓ And ⁓ and you know, I I the thing I say to them all the time is just do the right thing. Like take the high road, you know, treat people with kindness, ⁓ and don't be afraid, don't be afraid to tell people bad news. ⁓ you know, do just do the right thing. And you know what I've found throughout my career, which is, you know, that is ⁓ things always I mean, you and I have been in this industry at multiple jobs, and we have respect. When I go walk around Infocom, I have respect from a lot of people who come up to me and say hi, because I've always I might not always have the answer that they want to hear, but I'm always gonna tell it to them straight. I'm always gonna, you know, take the high road, do the right thing. ⁓ And I don't always win. I won't always win. But but that's less important to me than doing the I I'm not one of those people that's, hey, can I stay in this position? If I can, if I can ⁓ not care about everyone else. It's one of the fun things about building a company is ⁓ is if I can focus on ⁓ building a culture where we we do the right thing, I'm gonna win more often than not. And the and so you know that's really my advice to everyone is is ⁓ you know choose like pick a path. that works for you. Don't don't be necessarily afraid of of ⁓ of ⁓ what I I don't know that anybody has a crystal ball of ten years from now, like in this world of things changing, but but do the right thing and and good things will will come around and happen. Simon J Dudley (01:40:26) I'm gonna leave you with this last question, which always flummocks everyone. Let's see how you get on with it. What question should I have asked you today that I didn't? Sam (01:40:36) Yeah, I d I don't know. ⁓ it it it it it definitely stumps me a bit as to I think we talked about a lot of different things. ⁓ you know, probably ⁓ we know we I even talked about my kids and stuff. So ⁓ it's ⁓ I I don't know that I have like ⁓ what's my favorite products? What are my what what are the best competitive products? What ⁓ I don't even know what I would say, but ⁓ it's ⁓ yeah, I d good question. She stumped me. Simon J Dudley (01:41:16) Well, that's perfectly fine. Sam Kennedy, I've been looking forward to this interview. I look forward to all my interviews, but this is particularly close to me because it feels like I'm holding up a mirror in many respects. We've had such parallel careers, and therefore this has been a real joy. Thank you for being. Sam (01:41:22) Good. Sam (01:41:34) Thank you. And I it's it's it's like the we're like a bit in the funhouse mirror, right? Because we've been like on, and you know, there's a few of us in the industry like that who ⁓ you know, I got to be a lot of the spokesperson for Polycom. You were on life size. I think of like Sean Lesman when he was at Tamberg. I mean, there there's a few of us ⁓ in the industry who were lucky. We were just so lucky to be in these positions of in i in the industry as it was evolving and coming up and like we were just so lucky to be in those seats at that moment in time that it's really fun for me to get to spend time with you to reminisce. ⁓ Simon J Dudley (01:42:14) I agree. And it's nice also to note that you're rivals, not enemies. ⁓ and this is that is an important distinction, I think, if anyone's to take something away from this, it's that you can have a highly successful career and so can your competitor. This isn't a zero sum game. We all make each other better. ⁓ in the old Italian phrase, one hand washes the other. with that, Sam Kennedy. Thank you so much for being my guest. Sam (01:42:19) Totally. Yeah. Sam (01:42:30) Yeah. Simon J Dudley (01:42:42) Everyone, if you enjoyed the show and you got this far, go on, go mad. Give us a subscribe, give us a like, give us a comment. ⁓ I'll put all Sam's details in the ⁓ in the description below and we will see you next week for another fantastic guest. And don't forget to go and check out all our other ⁓ guests so far. Sam, thank you, my friend. I'll see you soon. Sam (01:43:05) Thank you.