All New Huddle Hits The Enterprise Collaboration Market

UK-based cloud collaboration and content management service Huddle has launched a completely redesigned version of its platform, which brings together files, discussions and feedback and puts them onto a single streamlined page.

With an eye on the consumerisation of IT, Huddle aspires to create an enterprise tool that looks and feels like a regular social network, and says the re-worked platform has been simplified with a more intuitive interface, giving faster access to information while retaining all of the functionality that made it popular.

Huddle up

The new Huddle tracks all views, file changes, colleagues’ comments, discussions and approvals – regardless of whether they were made online, on the desktop, via mobile apps (iPhone and iPad apps were redesigned earlier this year) or email.

The platform allows users to search documents, copy text to the clipboard, zoom and print with a single click, without having to download the files. It has even introduced the “@mentions” and the new “Share” button, no doubt inspired by Twitter and Facebook.

“Enterprises understand the value of ‘social software’ as well as cloud-based content management systems: both can drive productivity, break down departmental walls and increase knowledge sharing,” said Martin Schneider, research manager with 451 Research. “Today we are seeing content and sharing more closely aligned in tools like Huddle.”

“The new central view enables the team to access and interact with their documents a lot faster and not having to download our files saves a huge amount of time,” commented Jonathan Barwick, Bid Manager at Keolis UK, one of Europe’s leading public transport operators.

“Organisations need knowledge, not just silos of content that take up storage space on servers,” said Alastair Mitchell, CEO of Huddle. “New Huddle is the first enterprise tool that brings together content, conversation and enterprise-level security, giving workers a full 360-degree view of information that is important to them.”

“Discussions are focused on specific content, knowledge is transmitted to the people that need it and the enterprise data store is enriched and available for everyone in the enterprise ecosystem,” he added.

The company is very optimistic about the new product, projecting an eightfold increase in enterprise sales this year. The new version of Huddle is already being rolled out to customers, including 80 per cent of the Fortune 500 companies and 80 per cent of central UK government departments.

In February, Huddle started its product innovation drive with Huddle Sync, a feature which automatically syncs relevant documents from the corporate knowledge store, based on keywords and personal usage histories.

Are you an expert on printers? Take our quiz!