
Launch HN: Zynq (YC W20) – Book meetings instantly with your team - zerzar
Zerzar &amp; David here from Zynq - we built a calendar extension for Google Calendar to help you easily book meetings with your colleagues, even if they are spread across timezones. You can check it out here: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;zynq.io&#x2F;remote" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;zynq.io&#x2F;remote</a><p>Both of us worked on G Suite and quit last year because we felt enterprise calendars really needed an upgrade and they weren’t a strategic priority for Google&#x2F;Microsoft. As a product manager, I spent a bunch of time organizing meetings and moving them around which was probably the least valuable thing I could have been doing. David, as an engineer, would frequently get interrupted by meetings people would schedule in the middle of his day when he was trying to get work done.<p>We built Zynq to make scheduling intuitive: just tell us who you want to meet &amp; how long you want your meeting to be and we’ll find the best time that works for everyone. Our algorithm looks for open slots during work hours where everyone is free in their timezone &amp; not out for lunch. We rank these slots via a scoring algorithm which prioritizes focus time for everyone invited &amp; picks the top slot.  We then create the meeting and automatically add a Zoom&#x2F;Hangouts link so you never need to set that up manually again.<p>We are launching this for free given the current WFH situation to help teams move faster, but we also have a separate paid product that optimizes for meeting room utilization and that’s how we make money. We don’t plan to charge for this version, but may release paid features on top in the future geared toward larger enterprises. Our goal is to build a complete end-to-end meeting solution for smart offices including meeting room tablet software, guest check-in experience, and an analytics back-end which helps plan future office space.<p>Our long term vision is to automate away the many boring tasks you do at work so you can focus on the creative aspects of your job. We hope this is a step in that direction - please let us know your honest feedback and how we can improve!
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raymondgh
Looks nice. The hardest part about scheduling meetings as a project manager in
my org is when there's no timeslot available for everyone needed for a
meeting. I have to check each of their schedules and weigh the importance of
their attendance vs my guess of the importance/reschedulability of their
conflict in order to decide who will need to reschedule/cancel/skip something.
Sometimes this is simply a "do not book/focus time" block which (depressingly)
works out best.

It looks like Zynq currently works based on the "available" slots on
calendars, which is probably convenient for many meetings, but not really a
big deal for me. Do you think any tooling/features could help address the
issue I've described?

~~~
zerzar
One way we try to solve this problem is by prioritizing more urgent meetings
(marked ASAP in our tool) and dynamically moving flexible ones around if
possible to free up space. This is enabled by default on our paid version.
Would that be useful to you? We don't currently book on top of existing
meetings and have thought about a priority system but the challenge is keeping
that updated as it would require everyone to rank thr importance of their
meetings

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mr_puzzled
The company I work for uses Outlook/teams for booking meetings and it works
incredibly well. The scheduling part you talked about is almost exactly like
the scheduling assistant feature in outlook and teams. Sorry if this comes
across as a negative question, but what exactly does zync offer over outlook
and teams which have scheduling assistant?

Can you also briefly talk about your traction? Eg- no of users, growth rate
and at what stage you were in before YC and currently. Good luck.

~~~
nilkn
I haven't used teams, but from my experience Outlook's scheduling assistant
just shows you a few open time slots. The biggest problem is when there aren't
any acceptable open slots within a reasonable window into the future (e.g.,
this week), and the only way to make the meeting happen is to move stuff
around. This then becomes pretty problematic if you have to start asking other
folks if they can move conflicts around.

(I don't know to what extent Zynq resolves these issues.)

~~~
ska
There isn't a general solution to this, which is why the typical scheduling
tools just punt back to user.

I suspect the real difficulty for a company trying to offer something more
powerful is balancing effort/input the user has to take against dynamism and
principle of least astonishment.

I don't think it would be hard to write a scheduling algorithm in this space
that basically works but everyone hates, for example.

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aylons
It took me a while to realize that this has nothing to do with FPGAs (or APAC,
as they are trying to rebrand). Also, given that Zynq is not a common word,
Xilinx really could hurt you bad if they want to.

~~~
myself248
Same; HN titles are already notorious for overloading existing words, and this
just exacerbates it. HN is exactly the place I'd expect to find interesting
FPGA news.

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kevindong
Re: the comments on the name 'Zynq' being used for something else already: I
had never heard of the SoC company before. I'd expect most of your target
customers to have never heard of them before either.

Isn't what you're describing already built into Google Calendar via the 'Find
a Time' tab?

~~~
zerzar
Find a Time tries to find the most recent upcoming free slots and suggests
them. We try to be smarter - by automatically picking the most productive time
for everyone. This means picking a time where everyone's uninterrupted focus
time is maximized and their preferences are respected (eg if you're more
productive in meetings in the mornings vs afternoons)

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ChuckMcM
So have you talked to Xilinx yet about sharing the trademark "Zynq" ?

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MisterTea
> please let us know your honest feedback and how we can improve!

Don't name your business after a well established product? Because as soon as
I saw Zynq I thought Xilinx FPGA SoC. And many people searching for Zynq will
find the same.

[https://www.xilinx.com/products/silicon-
devices/soc.html](https://www.xilinx.com/products/silicon-devices/soc.html)

~~~
smt88
Been in software for 20 years. Never heard of Xilinx or their Zynq product. I
expect most of Zynq's intended customers will be the same.

~~~
nikofeyn
that's a separate problem and unrelated.

zynq is a trademarked product name for another technology company that makes
both software and hardware, and a major one at that. your never hearing of it,
which while surprising, doesn't change that fact.

from a search result perspective alone, it is a terrible idea. unsurprisingly,
searching for "zynq" will bring up results for xilinx zynq. the name is
terrible from both legal and business development standpoints.

~~~
smt88
> _the name is terrible from both legal and business development standpoints_

I guess someone should tell UberConference and Box about that. They seem to
have mistakenly thrived despite using extremely well-SEO'd software brand
names.

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q3k
You might want to consider a new name - Zynq is Xilinx's flagship family of
FPGA/ARM SoCs. With Xilinx being a pretty large corporation I'd be surprised
if they don't immediately try to defend their trademark.

~~~
joshmn
IANAL but the idea of trademarks is to avoid consumer confusion. I don't think
there's much consumer confusion between the name of a SoC and a startup
offering to manage your calendar. They're in completely different industries.

Now if you were Dell coming out with a Zynq line, that would be a different
story.

~~~
user5994461
They're both tech companies selling software solutions. It's quite similar.

If I were Xilinx and reading this thread. I'd be preparing the lawyers
already. Just my two cents.

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ska
"just tell us who you want to meet & how long you want your meeting to be and
we’ll find the best time that works for everyone."

FWIW, I used to have a very competent EA and would tell them basically exactly
this and they would work everything out. But the amount of effort and
intelligence (and phone calls) that went into that behind the scenes was, er,
significant.

~~~
zerzar
Absolutely, especially if it required others to move meetings around to
accommodate. We've spoken to a few EAs at big tech companies that spend 3+
hours on some days doing just this and they were incredibly excited to try out
the product

~~~
ska
I bet. The tricky part here is the metadata. A good EA will know importance
level of various meetings, flexibility, etc. in a way that is not typically
encoded in calendars.

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jayp
Zerzar - this looks awesome! Right now we're a small team in the same
timezone, but can definitely see value as we expand our team!

~~~
zerzar
Thanks Jay!

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koolba
Isn’t this a trivial feature for Google to add to all Apps accounts? I can’t
imagine the logic for picking a meeting time being that complex and “next
available” is likely the right answer for most people any way.

Shared calendars could easily be done by them as well for the entire GSuite
ecosystem with one off “approve picking a spot” on a per meeting basis.

~~~
zerzar
Google/MS can certainly add this feature (for enterprise accounts) but it
would not be trivial. IME "next available" means urgent, and that was not true
for 80% of my meetings at work. There were many times I booked a meeting one
or two days/weeks ahead, so that I could spend X hours today/tomorrow getting
something important done without interruptions or waiting for some progress to
be made.

The paid version of our product adds another dimension to optimization by
improving room availability/utilization. Our goal is to build an E2E product
suite including room tablet SW, guest check-in experience & real estate
utilization analytics, which would be more of a challenge for Google/MS to
trivially add to their suite. By doing this, we are also able to gather more
high-fidelity data about office spaces that doesn't currently sit in G Suite
or Exchange.

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rjsw
Which HDL do you use ?

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indigomm
Looks like a great tool and would certainly help if it can intelligently
suggest changes across calendars to facilitate meetings.

One question I have is all the permissions it requires. Amongst others, it's
asking me for:

* View and manage the provisioning of calendar resources on your domain

* See, edit, share, and permanently delete all the calendars you can access using Google Calendar

I've no idea why it would need the first permission there? I'm assuming the
second relates to seeing co-workers calendars, and perhaps it also needs to be
able to move meetings. However "permanently delete all the calendars" seems a
bit over the top.

~~~
zerzar
Thanks @indigomm! The first permission is needed for us to book meeting rooms
(not relevant in the current WFH environment, but historically what we have
been doing)

The second permission is just read & write on your calendars (since we are
booking meetings on your behalf). When we request "write" access, it
automatically gives us delete access and there is no way for us to turn that
off unfortunately.

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alex-wallish
If this proves to be a feature that people actually want, what would stop
google/microsoft from building it directly into their calendar? How do you
plan to make this product defensible?

~~~
zerzar
Our main business is improving utilization of physical meeting spaces (via the
same scheduling product) - we are building out an E2E solution including
meeting room tablet SW, guest check-in experiences & real estate planning
analytics. The idea is that this will more than just a scheduling tool on top
of calendar but rather a full suite of products to help real estate planning &
utilization. This will also allow us to gather a lot more data about office
space than currently exists in G Suite / Exchange giving us a moat as well

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zackbloom
The real dream for me would be something solving the satisfiability problem of
conference rooms (obviously not an issue this moment anymore). If it was
possible for every meeting to have a priority the computer could figure out
which meetings should be when to allow as many of us to have rooms as is
possible. The current system is horribly inefficient, with the first person to
book getting whatever room they happen to choose.

~~~
zerzar
This is exactly what our paid product does: [https://zynq.io](https://zynq.io)
:)

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kkotak
Good deal! I think this will require people to block off times on their
calendar when they don't want to do a meeting. Not all available slots in my
calendar are up for grab.

~~~
zerzar
We let you set what times in the week you want to have meetings - no need to
block off your calendar!

~~~
kkotak
Thanks @zerzar. Unfortunately this changes for me, and I'd think for others,
from week to week.

~~~
zerzar
Ah I see, is the use case for things like doctors appointments vs more
repeated tasks like picking up kids from school?

~~~
zerzar
We currently look only at the logged in account, but we have been toying with
the idea of looking at both your personal & work calendar -- especially during
the current WFH times.

Out of curiosity, how do you currently handle the case of your calendar being
open, but not being free? Do your colleagues book the meeting anyway and then
you let them know that they should reschedule because you're busy?

~~~
kkotak
At the moment I'm not using any auto calendaring app, but sharing my
availability through external interactions. Happy to help further if you'd
like. kkotak at gmail dot com.

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floatingatoll
Will this handle the scenario of “I need to schedule a new meeting with a
higher priority to me than others I’ve requested, triggering a wave of
automatic rescheduling?”

~~~
zerzar
Could you explain what you mean by higher priority to me vs others? Currently
each meeting has an urgency defined by the organizer (ASAP, this week, etc)
and automatic rescheduling will happen based on that. We don't currently
support priorities per meeting attendee

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throwscroogld
Think this is something that fails Paul Bucheit's infamous "why won't Google
just copy you?" test.

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statictype
Looks cool. How many enterprise users are using the Google Calendar web app
for booking meetings? Is it significant enough?

~~~
zerzar
Office has most of the market share but there are still millions of employees
using G suite to book meetings so it is a significant initial target for us.
We will expand to outlook in the future

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nickgervasi
"All our team members are certified organic and non-GMO" Love it. Congrats on
the launch!

~~~
zerzar
Thanks Nick!

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sivakon
How is this different from x.ai?

~~~
zerzar
x.ai focuses on scheduling meetings with people outside your company (so there
is still a manual step of choosing a time) and doesn't work great for 5+
people.

We're focused on internal company meetings, and so we can automatically choose
a time without any party having to pick between several available times even
for a 5-10 person meeting.

~~~
ammbo
Hi guys, Ammon from x.ai here!

Killer app you built, looks like it has a lot of smarts. Love the native
calendar extension UX. Really slick!

We just updated out user experience for 5+ users if 2 or more are not
connected to x.ai and it is proving successful. However, if everyone is
connected to x.ai, whether they are internal to your company or external, we
find a time for everyone instantly.

For internal meetings, coworkers do not need to be connected to you on x.ai.
If you can see their calendar, we can see their free/busy info and we book it
instantly as well.

Cheers!

~~~
zerzar
ammon - thanks for chiming in! I have not used x.ai in a while and it looks
like you guys have added some really awesome features since then. looking
forward to trying it out again!

~~~
ammbo
Absolutely! Installing yours, too, it has some very clever features!

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PopeDotNinja
This could be cool for recruiting, too, if it handles sequential meetings.

~~~
zerzar
Would love to learn more about the use-case for recruiting! Are you thinking
in terms of scheduling when the candidates come in / hop on the phone based on
interviewer availability?

~~~
PopeDotNinja
I'm just thinking for a series consecutive interviews. Like 3 people interview
candidate over 3 hours, or whatever.

~~~
zerzar
ah got it - yeah most large companies have proprietary systems to help with
that since its not a simple problem at scale.

do you work in recruiting? If so, I'd love to understand the problem space
more deeply in that domain!

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pronouncedjerry
how is this different than
[https://www.getclockwise.com/](https://www.getclockwise.com/)

~~~
zerzar
Clockwise allows you to move existing meetings to maximize focus time for
yourself (and possibly team if everyone is using it)

We're a scheduling tool that helps you create meetings and optimize for focus
time for everyone invited as well as each users' preferences.

~~~
cathyreisenwitz
Clockwise is an intelligent calendar assistant that will automatically move
meetings to open up the most Focus Time for everyone. It also has a scheduler
which will find the best time for a meeting automatically while respecting
users' preferences.

The only difference I can see from the description is the meeting priority
inference, which you get with a paid plan. Clockwise is currently free.

~~~
zerzar
Sorry for the confusion - our paid product does more than just meeting
priority inference, it allows you optimize meeting room utilization and is
targeted to companies to help them better utilize office space.

We launched this free version with a subset of features since some things
(like room utilization) don't make sense for an individual. We're looking to
port over more features as we get adoption & based on demand. Our priority
inference also works a little differently than clockwise -- there's no step of
marking meetings as flexible, that happens automatically at scheduling time
based on your urgency

