The Future of Workplace Productivity: Smart Desks and UltraSharp Monitors

Our customers operate in highly competitive industries where every ounce of productivity is critical. Creating a workplace that empowers employees to be productive continues to be one of the key priorities for organizations of all types. While we know there are many factors that influence a workplace’s productivity, customers keep listing one issue as a priority—ensuring their employees are provided with the right tools to ensure their success.

There are many considerations that need to be taken into account to ensure employees are in the best environment for productivity. Employees need maximized ergonomics to foster efficiency as well as increased interactivity to take advantage of the entire workforce’s capabilities, while organizations need to be able to customize work styles to tailor to different roles.

At Dell we pride ourselves on knowing our customers and we work closely with them to stay ahead of the technology demands and business challenges that drive their decisions. It’s this understanding that fuels our innovation, along with a desire to provide truly connected offerings that incorporate every aspect of our industry leading hardware and software suites. Although incremental adjustments continue to be made to keep existing products competitive, Dell often leaps ahead of the curve to provide customers with the next big thing.

At Dell World in Austin today, I was extremely excited to preview two industry-leading concepts that will provide our customers with added productivity and performance opportunities they have only dreamed about—the Dell UltraSharp 27 Monitor and the Dell “smart desk” workspace of the future concept.

Unprecedented detail and compatibility to power the most creative concepts

Dell UltraSharp 27 Display MonitorOur groundbreaking Dell UltraSharp 27 Monitor is the world’s first display with Ultra HD 5K resolution (5120 x 2880) and it will be a game-changer for our creative customers. Dell serves the creative technology needs of Academy Award-winning visual effects studios, Grammy-winning artists and the next generation of students who will find entirely new ways to leverage technology in fields such as arts and design. These customers’ day-to-day jobs often depend on productivity, efficiency and precise detail to bring complex, out-of-this-world images to life in the face of rigid deadlines. Ultra HD 5K resolution is equivalent to four times the resolution of QHD and seven times the resolution of Full HD. That means photographers and our other creative customers who require the highest possible resolution to optimize their work will be able to see and control the imagery they invent at an unprecedented level of detail.

By integrating the Dell UltraSharp 27 Monitor with Dell’s entire innovative solution suite, we can offer our customers true end-to-end solutions—always backed with Dell’s reputation for security, manageability and reliability. This monitor has six USB ports and one media card reader to seamlessly connect to a litany of other peripherals; whatever our customers need to push the limits of their creative concepts will be supported. The Dell UltraSharp 27 Monitor is available for pre-order on November 13, ready to ship on December 18.

The future of office collaboration

Once an innovation proves to greatly increase productivity, it becomes hard to remember how we got by using the antiquated method it replaced: rolodexes vs digital contacts, faxes vs emails, typewriters vs computers. The Dell smart desk concept revolutionizes the productivity of digital artists, engineers, architects, and scientific analysts operating high-performance professional applications with the introduction of a new interactive zone. By combining interactive LCD touch screens with innovations in user experience in conjunction with participation from key Independent Software Vendor (ISV) partners and Dell Precision workstation performance, the Dell smart desk will change creative, design, and analysis workflows for the better while introducing a new, immersive way for professionals to interact with those demanding workflows.

Placed in a natural, horizontal location that is more comfortable for touch interaction, the Dell smart desk provides a work surface that aligns closely with the productivity requirements of professional software applications. Paired with a vertical display and powered by plug-ins to key ISV applications, it instinctually separates seeing from doing; primary work activities are close to the user while secondary ones are further away, accessible through intuitive screen swipes. Ten-plus finger touch functions as well as high-performance pen functions and gestures, paired with a new generation of tools naturally located on a horizontal surface, will allow users to easily manipulate digital content without having to step away from the task at hand. This digital desktop allows for multiple desks to be clustered around specific projects, notes that can be searched and shared, and better organization with scaling and stacking of growing content. In fact, any smart desk workspace will allow users to pick up their work session wherever they left it—regardless of location. This means that the creative cycle will never miss a beat.

These conceptual product previews are not only industry leading, they have the potential to transform the way we work. They represent an exciting shift in how we interact with technology in the workplace. However, most importantly, they are innovations that were not created in a vacuum. Not only do the Dell smart desk and the Dell UltraSharp 27 Monitor feature the latest technological developments, they also address productivity issues of real importance for every customer.

It’s this mix of innovation and practicality that really excites us at Dell – and it’s a notion that reflects the entrepreneurial spirit Dell was founded on more than 30 years ago.

About the Author: Rocco Ancona