Why do it live if you can do it online

Captain Haldane’s motto in The Pacific series is: “Never run if you can walk. Never walk if you can stand up. Never stand up if you can sit down. Never sit up if you can lie down. Never lie down if you can sleep “. The motto in the post-pandemic becomes: “Never do it live if you can do it online”. Let’s talk about work, of course. And this is what the leaders of LinkedIn, the “professional social network” with 740 million registered users in the world, are betting on, 15 in Italy alone. LinkedIn has just added to Hopin’s list of investors, the video conferencing and online events platform just valued at over $ 5.5 billion. According to confidential sources, LinkedIn’s investment would be around 50 million dollars. Hopin, a startup or Londoner founded just two years ago, has grown exponentially during the months of the pandemic thanks to the demand for a platform that would allow you to organize meetings with a feeling as similar as possible to face-to-face meetings. His clients include companies of the caliber of American Express. And now it’s expanding its product range, after purchasing the StreamYard video streaming service and app developer Topi. Hopin herself recently launched her own smartphone app. LinkedIn’s support (which is part of the Microsoft group even though it conducts its investments separately) reflects the general climate of post-pandemic job expectations. The investment in Hopin is in line with the now transversal vision in the tech world on how lockdowns have changed the approach to work, making it clear that the presence in person is not always necessary. Skeptical of smartworking, he gave something about remote working, announcing a hybrid formula for Apple employees starting in September. Others, like Google, Microsoft and Facebook, have embraced the change with greater enthusiasm. “Hybrid work represents the greatest paradigm shift experienced by our generation” explained Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and requires a new operating model that concerns people, places and procedures ”. Or, to put it in a nutshell “Virtual events are here to stay,” as Scott Roberts, LinkedIn’s vice president of business development commented on the investment in Hopin. We are not just talking about the possibility of working from home, but, by virtue of the “paradigm shift” mentioned by Nadella, we are also talking about taking into account a series of factors that go well beyond the pandemic. “From a personal point of view I am as excited as everyone at the idea of ​​the vaccine and I am tired of staying at home” explained Hopin CEO Johnny Boufarhat “but we were a hybrid business beforehand”. Hopin was born from an idea that goes beyond the lockdown, even if it had, like many, a push from the anti-Covid measures.Its aim, from the beginning, was to bring greater accessibility to the workplace, with a technology that allows a mix between in-person meetings and remote events without losing naturalness, with an eye also to the environment as well as to the value of people’s time, reducing the need for travel when the face-to-face meeting can easily be replaced by a videocall.