TeamViewer has launched a new software-as-a-service remote access, support, and management solution scaled to meet the needs of larger businesses.
The German vendor with U.S. headquarters in Largo, Fla., unveiled the system, which is named TeamViewer Tensor and available immediately, at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco. The company previewed augmented reality and IoT hardware management features in the next edition of its flagship remote control and collaboration platform at that show as well.
Though it’s designed for organizations with up to hundreds of thousands of PCs, servers, IoT sensors, and other devices, Tensor is also appropriate for SMBs that want a remote access platform they can grow into or that simply prefer products with enterprise-grade functionality, according to TeamViewer CEO Oliver Steil.
“Many of them get an increased sense of comfort that if we are able to serve huge customers on enterprise out of the cloud…that must be a pretty strong application,” he says.
SMBs will also benefit from Tensor’s event auditing capabilities, Steil adds, which allow organizations to keep detailed track of when remote control sessions occur, who participates in them, and what actions those participants take. Only authorized users may view the log, which stores data for a minimum of six months and can’t be deleted. Businesses may enable or disable audit logging at any time, however.
According to Steil, Tensor’s auditability will help organizations comply more easily with the European Union’s recently enacted General Data Protection Regulation.
Other enterprise-oriented features in Tensor include a built-in SAML 2.0 interface that lets businesses integrate the product with existing single sign-on, password, and smart card authentication policies in platforms such as Microsoft Active Directory, Okta, and OneLogin.
“It really provides an additional level of security for user identification,” says Alexander Post, TeamViewer’s director of product management.
Out of the box, Tensor integrates with a wide range of other third-party offerings, including remote management platforms like Microsoft Intune, Ninja RMM, and Zendesk; mobile device management solutions like MobileIron and IBM MaaS360; and business applications like Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Salesforce.
Mass deployment functionality in Tensor, meanwhile, allows businesses to roll the system out to tens or hundreds of thousands of endpoints without disruption or downtime. “That really is a strong request from enterprise organizations,” Post says.
An entirely cloud-based solution, Tensor leverages TeamViewer’s global access network of over 1,000 routers to minimize latency. Licensing for the new product is subscription-based.
“We want it to be an easy to use cloud service,” Steil says. “It’s also what the vast majority of customers tell us they want.”
Personalized configuration assistance from a team of dedicated solution and support engineers is available to users at no extra cost. Ongoing 24/7 technical support via phone and email is available as well for an incremental fee.
TeamViewer 14, the latest version of the vendor’s legacy remote connectivity platform, is due to reach market in the second half of October. The augmented reality additions to that product showcased this week will allow technicians to provide enhanced assistance to end users performing technical tasks via a new mobile app.
“You have pointer functionalities that you can use to guide and steer people in a very easy way,” Steil says. “The idea is to really marry augmented reality with the very simple remote support, remote access functionality that we have in the product already today, and basically make it usable with any smartphone that you have.”
New IoT capabilities in TeamViewer 14 will allow operators of smart office, smart city, and smart energy solutions, among others, to collect and analyze operational data from remote sensors in real time. According to Steil, many competing solutions import such information in periodic batches instead, inhibiting an organization’s ability to spot problems or make adjustments promptly.
Existing TeamViewer users who bought the system via perpetual licensing can purchase version 14 as an upgrade. Businesses with a subscription to the product will receive a limited-functionality edition of the updated solution at no additional cost, and can purchase more capacity as needed.
TeamViewer introduced a stand-alone Internet of Things remote access and monitoring solution called TeamViewer IoT in January.
“IoT has been long talked about, but it’s getting real now, and we are I think in the center of that development,” Steil says.
Weeks after the debut of TeamViewer IoT, the company also introduced its first channel program for partners in the Americas.
