David Danto knows enterprise collaboration. I respect his work, and I read his columns closely. However, his latest piece for SCN lands on a conclusion I cannot share. One surrounding the single pane of glass for AV. Danto argues that buyers judge management platforms the wrong way. Instead of counting features and dashboards, he says buyers should measure the manual work a platform eliminates. On that point, I agree completely.
He also notes that vendors use the word “management” loosely. Accordingly, he separates five capabilities: monitoring, management, remote control, remediation, and autonomous remediation. That framework gives buyers a useful vocabulary. Additionally, his advice to verify vendor claims holds up. Buyers should demand device lists, reference deployments, and real remediation examples before signing anything.
Our disagreement starts with the single pane of glass. In Danto’s view, multi-vendor platforms usually trade depth for breadth. As a result, he rejects the idea of a single pane of glass altogether. I think he describes today accurately. However, I think he underestimates how fast tomorrow is arriving.
The case for Danto
The skeptics have a strong argument, and it deserves a fair hearing. Victoria Ferrari of M3 Technology Group made it well on a recent AVWeek roundtable.
Ferrari noted that AV borrowed the phrase “single pane of glass” from IT. Yet IT teams have never actually had one. They manage switches on one platform, directory services on another and firewalls on a third. So when AV vendors pitch another dashboard, IT sees one more pane to watch.
“Maybe it’s P-A-I-N instead of pane of glass,” Ferrari joked.
She also illustrated the depth argument with a real example. Barco’s ClickShare management platform, XMS, handles very specific tasks across an enterprise ClickShare fleet. Meanwhile, a multi-vendor platform like Utelogy offers broader visibility across brands. However, it may not let you drill as deep into any single device.
Ferrari reframed the buying question in a way I fully endorse. Do not start by asking which platform manages the most things. Instead, ask which parts of your environment consume too much labor. Then ask which parts remain unmanaged entirely.
Craig Durr of The Collab Collective added field evidence. He recently attended a Crestron customer council with 25 of its largest enterprise customers. Those organizations all ran multiple panes of glass. Even the ones with unified platforms still clicked into manufacturer portals for deeper tasks.
So today, Danto is right. No single pane exists.
Why that is about to change
The shift I see has little to do with dashboards. Rather, it involves where vendors now place their value.
Durr just returned from Zoomtopia, and his report supports my view. Zoom announced plans to support a “headless” model alongside its own management interface. In other words, Zoom will serve its data to other tools, not just its own portal.
Specifically, Zoom will expose data through Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers and agent-to-agent protocols. According to Durr, Zoom announced eight MCP servers rather than one. That approach lets organizations connect Zoom data to whichever AI workload matters to them.
Zoom calls this foundation its integrated context layer. Microsoft uses the term “work graph” for a similar concept. Zoom also introduced AI services, which Durr compared to Amazon selling its logistics expertise to other companies. Additionally, Durr noted continued investment in core meeting video, including higher frame rates.
The pattern extends beyond Zoom. Durr pointed out that Salesforce made a similar headless pivot with its AI agents. Consequently, a clear trend emerges. Platform vendors increasingly see their value in the data itself, not in how they present it.
That changes the single pane question entirely. Vendors no longer need to build the unified view. Instead, they hand off the data. Then someone else builds the front end.
The data already exists
Phillip Cordell of Visionary Solutions made the point that seals it for me. APIs and webhooks already expose enormous amounts of device data. Moreover, AI tools now aggregate that data in hours rather than years.
“I’ve got friends that can turn something on like that in an afternoon,” Cordell said.
Cordell argued that the interface no longer limits what buyers can see. Instead, the real limit is how much data manufacturers choose to expose.
Look at command and control rooms for a preview. Operators in those spaces make high-pressure decisions with little time. Therefore, they demand every available data point on one massive video wall. Directors of IT and facilities face a smaller version of the same pressure. They need alerts and information in one place. Eventually, the market will deliver it. That interface may require an 8K display. Nevertheless, it will arrive.
Durr sees the opportunity extending past AV entirely. He envisions workplace data that blends collaboration devices, IoT sensors, Wi-Fi networks and building management systems. That combined view could answer practical questions. For example, does the cafeteria have enough staff for 500 arrivals? Will network bandwidth run short today?
The catch buyers must watch
Durr raised one warning that buyers should take seriously. He expects vendors to monetize data access. In that scenario, you may need a separate license just to pull data into your unified view.
That cost could quietly erode the value of a single pane. So add a new question to Danto’s verification list. Ask every vendor what data its API exposes. Then ask what that access will cost today and at renewal.
Danto gave buyers a sharp framework for evaluating platforms today. Still, I believe the single pane of glass is coming. It just won’t come from the vendors who sell the panes.
Tim Albright is the founder of AVNation and is the driving force behind the AVNation network. He carries the InfoComm CTS, a B.S. from Greenville College and is pursuing an M.S. in Mass Communications from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville. When not steering the AVNation ship, Tim has spent his career designing systems for churches both large and small, Fortune 500 companies, and education facilities.
- Tim Albright
- Tim Albright
- Tim Albright
- Tim Albright
