The service provided by the FCT's FCCN Unit, which allows videoconferencing sessions to be held in classrooms, events or meetings, showed an upward trend in the number of minutes, participants and sessions held in the first four months of 2021, compared to the previous year.
The impact of online academic activities on Colibri service
During the first four months of 2020, the Colibri service saw a very significant increase in use. In the same period, due to its strategic importance for carrying out remote teaching activities, this service of the FCCN Unitconsolidated its front-end infrastructure and increased licensing by 1111%.
One year later, these developments resulted in a sustained strengthening of the usage metrics of this service. By analysing the usage data for the first four months of 2021, we can see a significant growth trend in terms of the number of minutes, participants and sessions held.
In comparison to the same period of the previous year, there was a 420% increase in the total number of minutes relative to meetings and webinars, surpassing the 1.8 billion minute mark. With regards to the number of sessions, this increase was 393%, having been carried out, over the last four months, about 1.85 million events and meetings using this service.
This increase is also matched by a significant increase in the total number of participants. If during the first four months of 2020 about 7 million users passed through the sessions, in 2021, this number more than tripled, reaching about 26 million. This growth of 263% is explained, in part, by the approximately 19 thousand new users registered in the same period.
These figures show the preponderant role of this service from the FCT's FCCN Unit in the context of distance learning. In an interview published in July 2020, the manager of the Unit's Video Technical Service FCCN, Nelson Schäller, highlighted the importance of the service in replacing face-to-face classes: "the Colibri service has become in great demand as a support tool for distance learning, to cope with isolation, maintain teaching activities and bring people closer together now that they are teleworking."
You can follow up-to-date usage data for this and other services on the Colibri website. FCCN and for more information and user manuals, visit the Colibri website.
