Configuring Teams Rooms SIP/H.323 Calling

Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) provides a powerful meeting experience, but many organizations still rely on SIP and H.323-based video conferencing systems (eg.Cisco, Poly). To bridge the gap between Teams and traditional video conferencing, Microsoft offers several interoperability options including Direct Guest Join and partner Cloud Video Interop (CVI) Solutions. In this post, we’ll break down the different methods for connecting SIP/H.323 devices to Teams meetings and how to configure the newest option for Teams Room SIP/H.323 calling using HP CloudConnect powered by Pexip.

1. Direct Guest Join (DGJ)
Direct Guest Join is a feature in Microsoft Teams Rooms that allows users to join Zoom and Webex online meetings from their Teams Rooms devices with a single touch. This is the most basic form of interop and requires no additional license other than Teams Room Pro. Direct Guest Join uses WebRTC technology to transcode audio video and content share between Teams and the other platforms and comes with a few limitations, notably:

• Video Quality: The maximum video quality for Direct Guest Join is up to 720p at 30 frames per second, which might be lower than what some users expect
• Content Sharing: While you can receive shared content, sending content from Teams Rooms to third-party platforms is limited. For example, you can't send content using an HDMI or content camera.
• Display Support: Direct Guest Join supports only one front-of-room display
• Feature Availability: Some advanced features like breakout rooms, reactions, and content annotations are not available when using Direct Guest Join

Configuring Direct Guest Join is simple and the detailed steps are provided in the Microsoft website: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/rooms/third-party-join and therefore will not be repeated here

2. Cloud Video Interop (CVI)
Cloud Video Interop is a paid Microsoft qualified 3rd party solution that enables traditional SIP and H.32 VTC devices to join Microsoft Teams meetings seamlessly. This technology is an enhanced option compared with DGJ and participants using non-Teams devices can enjoy features like HD video, audio, and content sharing, as if they were native Teams clients. It also supports functionalities like scheduling meetings via Outlook or Teams, joining meetings hosted by external organizations, and using layouts similar to the Teams experience. The HP Poly CloudConnect for Teams powered by Pexip one of the available CVI solutions in the market today. For those who are interested in the details, Microsoft provides a detailed comparison table between DGJ and CVI here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/rooms/third-party-join?tabs=MTRW

HP Poly's CloudConnect for Teams stands out for its seamless interoperability with SIP and H.323 video conferencing systems, offering a native Teams experience with 1080p30fps HD video, audio, and content sharing. Some feature highlights include:

• Ease of Use: Poly CVI simplifies workflows by allowing trusted devices to bypass the Teams lobby and directly join meetings. Other CVI solutions also provide interoperability but may require additional setup steps.
• Layout Options: Poly CVI offers dynamic layouts, including a "Teams-like" experience, multiscreen displays, and presentation views.
• Integration Features: Poly CVI supports bi-directional content sharing and localized welcome screens, enhancing user experience.

Below is a diagram showing the solution overivew:

2.1 CVI - SIP Guest Join
The core functionality of CVI allows an organizations SIP/H.323 VTC systems to join Teams meetings that are scheduled and hosted by themselves since they have purchased and deployed the CVI solution. For Teams meetings that are scheduled and hosted by other organizations that do not have CVI deployed, there is the option to enable SIP Guest Join (SGJ) which allows the CVI-enabled organization's VTCs to join these non-CVI enabled Teams meetings. There are no additional licenses that are required to enable this other than enabling One Touch Join (OTJ) on these VTCs. Details on how to configure OTJ are provided in this link:  https://help.pexip.com/service/otj-configure.htm Below is a diagram showing a sample OTJ configuration on my lab tenant

Once OTJ is configured and working, we can enable SIP Guest Join on our CVI tenant and since we are using the CVI OTJ service in the cloud, no additional configuration is required and the VTCs are automatically able to use the guest join feature. Do note that Teams for Home or Small Business and Microsoft Government cloud are not supported for SGJ. The diagram below shows the difference between the core CVI interop and the SGJ interop:

2.2 CVI - ​Microsoft Teams Rooms SIP/H.323 calling
The latest addition to CVI functionality known as MTR SIP/H.323 calling allows Microsoft Teams Rooms devices on Windows to make audio, video, and screen-sharing calls with other endpoints supporting SIP or H.323 protocols. It is available only for Teams Rooms devices with a Microsoft Teams Rooms Pro license and is not compatible with Teams Rooms on Android. Basic requirements for enabling this feature are

• Teams Rooms resource accounts need a Pro license.
• An agreement with a certified Cloud Video Interop (CVI) provider offering SIP and H.323 dialing is necessary.
• Configuration details like the “AreaCode” must be obtained from the CVI provider
• A SIP & H.323 Video Teleconferencing Policy must be created and assigned to Teams Rooms resource accounts.

We use the Teams Powershell commands New-CsTeamsRoomVideoTeleConferencingPolicy and Grant-CsTeamsRoomVideoTeleConferencingPolicy to create and assign the policy to the resource accounts used by the VTC for Exchange calendaring. Below is a screen shot of the cmdlets used on my lab tenant which simply uses the existing TurnOnSIPH323 policy globally:

Another requirement to enable this capability is to grant consent to the cloud app in our M365 tenant. To do this you will need to get an email from your CVI provider and have global admin permissions to click on the link to activate. After signing-in with global admin credentials, accept the permission pop-up screen as shown:

Once the policy takes effect, we can start to make and receive SIP/H.323 calls from Teams Room on Windows For calling by a meeting ID (Teams meetings or meetings with other third-party providers): on the Teams room touch console, select Join with an ID, select the meeting provider (for example Teams, Zoom, Cisco Webex, Google Meet), and then enter the meeting ID and passcode. To call a VTC directly: select Call, then select SIP or H.323 as appropriate, and enter the address of the VTC. Example screenshots of both scenarios are shown in the diagrams below

In conclusion, Teams interop with other meeting platforms has evolved much over the years and hopefully this post helps readers to understand the latest offerings at the time of this writing and provide guidelines on the features and configuration steps.