Video Conferencing

Cisco TelePresence Discussion on Climate Change

2010-05-17T16:44:00.000-07:00

Sue Bostrom: So today, we are going to be connecting all of us here at VoiceCon in Orlando with Vice President Al Gore at Nashville; John Chambers, Cisco's Chairman and CEO; and also Lawrence McGinty, who is with ITN. He is their award winning science editor for that publication in London.

In addition, we are going to have more audiences observing this session via TelePresence. They will be located in London City, in Dubai, Warsaw, and in Paris. And because TelePresence is based on this underpinning of the network is a platform and unified communication with the touch of one button, we will be able to bring all of these people from around the world together to engage in a discussion on a topic that's one of our most important, climate change.

So let's get the discussion started.

So what I am going to be doing now is touching the phone where it actually has our meeting scheduled and we will bring in the other participants.

Lawrence McGinty: Hey, there we go.

Sue Bostrom: Hello, welcome. Hi, this is Sue Bostrom. I am in VoiceCon here with all of our participants in Orlando. Welcome Vice President Gore. Hey, John, how are you doing?

Al Gore: Hi, Sue.

John Chambers: Hello, Sue, thank you. Hello, Lawrence. Hi.

Sue Bostrom: And Lawrence, of course, we don't want to forget you and all of your friends out there in Bedfont Lakes, the UK. I just want to draw your attention before we get started as all of you can see on you TelePresence rooms, they are around the world, I have just been showing the audience here in Orlando on the slide, on the presentation that we can actually share together via TelePresence exactly how we are all making this work with the network is a platform.

So with that, I think we are ready to get the discussion started. I know folks here in Orlando have been looking forward to it and I will turn it over to you, Lawrence.

Lawrence McGinty: Thanks, Sue and welcome all (inaudible) to this unique event. Welcome also to those people who are watching on the Web and watching in via TelePresence. Here in London, we are hosting a live debate, using Cisco's TelePresence technology to connect some of the leading commentators on climate change in four locations on two continents and we have two live audiences as well. We are also simulcasting globally to thousands of people on the Web and to TelePresence rooms in three continents.

So let's get down to business and I will start by introducing our panelists. First of all, someone who as I say, show business hardly needs any introduction, Mr. Al Gore. Former Vice President Al Gore, nowadays you are Chairman of Current TV, which has a television journalist, I am really interested in, a station for young people based on citizen journalism, citizen reporting. You are also Chairman of Generation Investment Management, firm that invests in sustainable projects and you are Chair of the Alliance for Climate Protection, a non-profit organization struggling to get to grips with this thorny issue.

In business terms, and I didn't know this, it kind of surprises me, you are a member of the Board of Directors of Apple, a Senior Advisor to Google and a partner with a venture capital firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. But of course, what people know you for is your two bestselling books, Earth in the Balance and An Inconvenient Truth, which creates I think a unique double because I can think of no other person in any other field of endeavor who has starred in an Oscar winning movie and won a Nobel Peace Prize but you did in 2007 with the IPCC.

To be continued...

TANDBERG Video Conferencing - The New Way of Working

2010-05-04T18:59:00.000-07:00

In these challenging times business as usual is not an option. At TANDBERG we are passionate that if everyone knew what video conferencing equipment could do, everyone would want it. It's the new way of working. So, what do we mean when we say if everyone knew what video could do? Three things: first, video enables you to do more with less; video is a technology that pays for itself. An executive system costs less than just two of the international trips it will replace. Customers like TNT, one of the world's leading express mail and delivery companies have experienced the ROI of video first hand. Our solution will help them save a EUR11.5 million on travel and deliver an ROI of 71%.

The second thing to know about video is that it can transform your organization. There is more to video and telepresence than money saved. There is money earned and competitive advantage. Video is known to accelerate decision making, scale knowledge, unify the organization and can even provide better work-life balance for employees.

Statoil, one of the world's largest oil and gas companies will tell you that issues that used to take two months to resolve now take just two weeks. And finally, be greener. While tough times won't last, environmental problems will unless we take them seriously. If 100 employees used video at home, one day a week for a year instead of driving to work, it would save the equivalent of a forest the size of 5 football fields.

The best business leaders are acting. In the example of TNT, I mentioned earlier, in addition to saving money, video will also help them become carbon neutral.

So in summary, video can help you do more with less, transform your organization and be greener and that is hardly business as usual. However, there is an if. The benefits we just spoke about can only be achieved if three requirements are met. First, quality is absolute. Business meetings require video quality not available in consumer minded products. HD is not optional.

At TANDBERG we address this with HD across our product line and with no comprises in our network products. Secondly, at TANDBERG we believe video should be for everyone. A company should be a community, not a country club. As such, one size does not fit all. We offer video end points that fit different life and work styles. TANDBERG has the broadest range of solutions in the industry, from telepresence for the senior executive to video IP forms for frontline employees. As important, at TANDBERG we are firm believers in a standards-based approach.

Now finally, desirability. At the end of the day, it's not about technology, it's about great meeting experiences and a solution that people would want to use. At TANDBERG, we address this through intuitive user interfaces that draw people in, good looking products and a passion for helping clients drive usage and adoption. In the current environment, we believe the proposition of video is unbeatable; it can help you do more with less, transform your business and be greener. It's the new way of working.

Video Conferencing and Telepresence at MyLot

2010-04-12T19:04:00.000-07:00

myLot User Profile

Just posted a new article about Teleworking over at Zimbio:
Benefits of Teleworking

Check it out and be sure to leave a comment. Thanks!

Polycom Telemedicine

2010-03-23T21:08:00.000-07:00

Dr. Deborah Jeffries:
This is Dr. Deborah Jeffries, Director of Healthcare markets for Polycom. I am coming to you today from the Andover facility and we are going to be talking about telepsychiatry and how to support primary care in telehealth.

Now as you know, there is a lot that's been going on in healthcare recently. Not only do we have the challenges of trying to treat the baby-boomers as they move into their 60s and beyond, we don't have enough doctors and nurses to provide that care. And also you will notice, we have the patients that are located at remote and rural areas where it's difficult sometime for them to get in front of an expert.

So today, let's talk about how you can use Polycom's collaborative video and voice products to solve that problem. We are going to be using the Polycom HDX 4000, the Polycom CMA Desktop and the Polycom Practitioner Cart to support telepsychiatry and telemental health. So let's start now by taking a look at what a typical telepsychiatry event would look like.

Dr. Deborah Jeffries:
Good. I hope you are comfortable. It looks like you have a nice seat there. You feel okay? We are going to be talking for the next 30 minutes or so.

Excellent. Well, Jane, if you could just tell me a little bit about what's going with you since our last visit, that would be fantastic.

During a telepsychiatry visit, the patient is positioned in front of a Polycom Practitioner Cart. The far end physician is able to move the camera on the Cart to get a better look at the patient zooming in close to see the smallest changes in facial expression.

Today H1N1 is a reality. Flu symptoms include fever, aches and sore throat. The primary care physician will want to take a history and then do a physical exam utilizing attached medical peripherals from Polycom's arena partners to look at the patient's ears, nose and throat as well as listen to heart and lung sounds.

Let's take a look at the throat for example.

Dr. Deborah Jeffries:
Stick your tongue out for me, Jane. Great and say Ah one more time. Oh, perfect. Bob, just hit the freeze button there, I want to check something on her tongue.

Now let's take a look at the practitioner using CMA Desktop to look at the patient's throat from their remote PC location.

Dr. Deborah Jeffries:
This could be allergy generated, so we are going to actually talk a little bit about some of the things that you were exposed and see if we can get you fixed up.

Well, as you have seen, we are able to use Polycom's collaborative voice and video products to support telepsychiatry, telemental health, prenatal health, primary care. In addition to that, you can also use these products to support cardiology, dermatology, one important application is telestroke where you have the ability to bring in a neurologist over Polycom's equipment to hook up with their patient, review the symptoms they are having and make a decision about appropriate medications. Not only is this beneficial to the patient's outcome, it makes it easier for the practitioner to access that patient and it makes it easier for the hospital emergency room to accommodate the folks that should be there.

So thank you so much for joining us today. Be well.

Cisco Telemedicine

2010-03-15T20:14:00.000-07:00

Telepresence will be changing all of our lives because it allows us to connect to anybody across the globe in a heartbeat.

David Hsieh: Distance won't be a barrier any longer to getting the best quality medical care.

Josh Reviz: Hi, I am Josh Reviz. I am here to see Dr. Heimel.

Hello Josh. Welcome to Istanbul.

David Hsieh: With these Healthpresence Pods, you can just go to the closet available Pod which hopefully would be down the hall or in your office building or in your town or village.

One moment while I call up your medical records.

David Hsieh: You go to this kiosk and there is a medical assistant there and your doctor will be there and he will say, hey, how are you feeling? What's wrong with you?

Dr. Heimel: Hi, good to see you again. What's going on?

Josh Reviz: Well, I have got chest pain and I am a little freaked out.

Dr. Heimel: Let's get an EKG.

Josh Reviz: Okay.

David Hsieh: They can take a connected device like a blood pressure cuff or a heart rate monitor and hook it up to you. So they can basically do just about everything that they could do in person.

Dr. Heimel: I see some widespread changes on your EKG.

David Hsieh: To be able to meet with the specials no matter where they are in the world to get the best possible diagnostics and the best possible treatment.

Dr. Heimel: Josh, I have called in a cardiologist, Dr. Hudson, to take a look at your results.

Josh Reviz: Okay.

Dr. Hudson: I am looking at your EKG, I would like to run a scan.

Josh Reviz: Sure.

David Hsieh: It reads all your vitals, it does some kind of matching in the network to figure out what disease you might have and that information is actually transmitted to a doctor on the other end of the telepresence connection.

Dr. Hudson: Josh, you have pericarditis, an inflammation around the heart. For this, I am going to prescribe some anti-inflammatory medications.

Josh Reviz: Okay, how long will that take?

Dr. Hudson: When you check back with Dr. Heimel in two days, you should be feeling much better by then.

Josh Reviz: That's great. Thank you so much.

David Hsieh: So it's a pretty exciting way to extend healthcare to far corners of the Earth and to areas where getting quality medical care is just not as easy.

Josh, remember, check back in two days.

Josh Reviz: Will do.

This is going to happen in our lifetime. In fact, I am convinced it will happen within the next 10 years.

And transporting your presence on to flat screens is just the beginning.

Very close to be able to transport a full three dimensional image and therefore presence of you or any object and render it on the other side in full 3D high definition color. It will change everything.

TANDBERG Unified Communications

2010-03-08T17:15:00.000-08:00

Hakon Dahle, Chief Technologist, TANDBERG: Unified communications has a lot of things. Instant messaging, presence, voice, email, voice mail and video and the most important part of unified communications is business quality video. That's what really adds value to unified communications. And at TANDBERG, we believe that if everyone knew what video could do, then everyone would want it.

This is the new way of working. It allows you to do more with less to be more efficient and to reduce costs. It allows you to transform the business to get access to experts wherever they might be to unify the organization and to accelerate decision making, and it's about being greener, traveling less, polluting less, yet still being able to meet face-to-face. But for this to work, there are some very key requirements that have to be in place.

First of all, access for everyone. I believe everyone should have access to video wherever they are, whether it's in the telepresence studio, the meeting room, at their desks, at home or even when they do have to travel, they should be able to communicate over video. And that's why we are working with Microsoft on integration with Microsoft OCS allowing Office Communicator users to connect on video right there from their PC wherever they are.

It's also about quality. Quality is absolute. We are talking about business quality video, not consumer grade video. We are talking about high definition everywhere from a telepresence studio to the meeting room all the way to the PC. That's why we have developed the TANDBERG high definition USB camera, which allows high definition video calling right from the PC.

It also needs to be really easy to use. This has to work the first time, it has to work every time. And if these requirements are met, this will enable a new way of working.

Cutsom Cisco TelePresence

2010-03-05T17:42:00.000-08:00

Greg Simpson, Chief Technology Officer, GE: Most of our teams are spread across the globe. So we have resources, you know, spread everywhere. So getting them all together, talk about different topics and way that they can communicate effectively has always been a challenge to us.

Gary Reiner, Chief Information Officer, GE: The reason why Cisco TelePresence is so intriguing was it allowed us to have a real-time experience globally where one can be in Fairfield and one can be in Shanghai and be able to communicate as if one is in the identical same room communicating in real time.

In the old systems, you never felt like you were in the same room. You could see what somebody looked like but you certainly didn't feel like you had a real life experience with that person. One way to put it is this. With the old systems, you felt like you needed to visit them at least once in order to know them. With the new system, you don't need to do that.

Greg Simpson, Chief Technology Officer, GE: The business-to-business opportunities for Cisco TelePresence are pretty great. Now I can do an executive briefing with the supplier in an hour or two hours or five hours, whatever is appropriate and I don't have to travel in order to do it.

Gary Reiner, Chief Information Officer, GE: In terms of how GE is using TelePresence, one is big meetings. Usually, when I was going to fly to London, we would have about 50 people from the continent having to fly to London and the 20 people that are in London, we would all get together and talk for three days. Instead, we start at 6 AM in morning here and noon in our various cities where we have TelePresence and no one had to travel. We are running at a clip of 40% less T&L for commercial use and even higher level, corporate era, we don't feel like we are missing a beat with that lower T&L because we are able to cover that with the greater use of TelePresence.

Greg Simpson, Chief Technology Officer, GE: One of the things I love most is, when I go to a meeting in India as soon as I hang up, I'm home.

Gary Reiner, Chief Information Officer, GE: The technical side of using TelePresence is actually quite a bit easier than legacy. All you got to do is press a button to make it happen, whereas in the old system you definitely needed the help of outside vendors.

Greg, how you are doing?

Greg Simpson, Chief Technology Officer, GE: We are looking at new ways to apply the technology all the time, how we can apply to a new product development, so that we can take teams that work together periodically all the time on new products and dramatically speed up the cycle time to new product development and bringing that product to market faster.

We have engineers and a team in the U.S., working with engineers of a team outside of U.S., in a meeting room where they come together daily and meet and have the ability to show parts or pieces of equipment and interact like they are in the same building.

It's hard to do an interview over a phone. We find it's very effective to do an interview over TelePresence. We got the same body language queuing, same real-time. So, it also extends our executives.

Peter Cavanaugh, Operations Manager, GE Global Learning: GE spends about a billion dollars a year on developing employees. TelePresence has allowed us to bring in executives or bring in speakers to different classes that's relevant for the class. A recent executive meeting that was here wanted to have input from China and what we did was set up a TelePresence so that the expert in China could be speaking to this group of 50 executives.

Gary Reiner, Chief Information Officer, GE: The long-term vision for TelePresence is that it just be the way we operate. We are so global, we are so spread out, we have so much need for cross functional collaboration and global collaboration that (reinvention) of time where this will be just the way we work.

ROI with Polycom Video Conferencing Equipment Part... ROI with Polycom Video Conferencing Equipment Part IV

2010-02-28T18:40:00.000-08:00

Scott Whitney: How long does it take to go through that process?

Bob Preston: Well, it really depends upon how detailed you want to get. There are two modes of input; there's one that uses industry averages for companies like yours, Scott, so I could kind of set that up in advance and show you an example. But if you really wanted to get detailed and specific for your organization, then we would have to sit down and go through a couple of meetings to be able to pull that information out and make sure it's accurately represented inside the tool.

But fundamentally, Scott, we really want to help people cut their cost, deal with their cost cutting issues that are kind of beyond their control and really be able to work smarter, faster and more efficiently using Polycom video conferencing equipment.

Scott Whitney: And just a reminder again, where is the ROI calculator on the website I found?

Bob Preston: Well, the calculator that's on the website is the cost savings, a more simple and basic cost savings calculator and that's at Polycom.com/ROI.

Scott Whitney: And what happens if I don't have Polycom equipment? Where do I go, what do I do to reach out to somebody so I can get in front of a Polycom account manager?

Bob Preston: You could just call 1-800-polycom and we'll set up a meeting with one of our Polycom account managers and by the way, when you get on the phone, you can just tell them that Bob Preston sent you.

Scott Whitney: Very good. Hey, Bob, thanks for joining us again on the show.

Bob Preston: You bet, thanks, Scott.

Scott Whitney: And to the person listening right now, thank you. Until our next show, I am your host, Scott Whitney. We'll see you next time.

For additional information regarding ROI and Polycom video conferencing systems, please call 1-800-224-7083, or visit us online at: http://www.ivci.com/videoconferencing_polycom.html

ROI with Polycom Video Conferencing Equipment Part III

2010-02-21T21:06:00.000-08:00

Bob Preston: And by the way, you know it's difficult for them to ask questions because typically they are on mute, right?

Scott Whitney: Right, right.

Bob Preston: So, you don't really know even who is on and how many people and what they are thinking.

Scott Whitney: Right.

Bob Preston: And yes, it's one of the real disadvantages.

Scott Whitney: Right. So, Bob, instead of going through a, you know, a long list of Polycom products that you think can have, how can I prove whether or not Polycom can help improve my business ROI to begin with without actually spending the money?

Bob Preston: Yes, a great question, Scott. Let's begin by saying we are going to for hypothetical reasons, we are going to talk about a sort of a generic Polycom visual collaboration solution, okay.

Scott Whitney: Okay.

Bob Preston: I mean like you said, it could be designed or implemented in a variety of ways through video conferencing or telepresence. But let's just say we have already decided on what that solution is going to be and we are going to look at ways that that can benefit my organization. Does that make sense?

Scott Whitney: Sure.

Bob Preston: Okay. Well, so, the first way would be on our website at Polycom.com/ROI. There is a very nice simple, what we call, cost savings calculator and this is great for individuals or department heads or the heads of work groups who are kind of trying to get a handle for how much their face-to-face meetings are costing them when they are bringing people in from around the world, around the country or whatever for a meeting, all right?

So, what you do with this calculator, very, very easy to use, is you input your motor transportation to these meetings, say air travel, right? You identify the basic cost around the travel; for example, the number of people traveling, the length of the day of the trips, the cost of hotels, etcetera, etcetera. And what it does for you, it actually calculates and measures the total cost in terms of dollars, people's time, and of course, don't forget about carbon emissions, right, how much is it putting into the atmosphere in terms of carbon, measures all of those metrics and gives you that kind of feedback.

And then finally it shows that if you were to cut back on some of those meetings and instead of traveling to meet face to face, you use the Polycom collaboration solution, it shows you which you would actually be saving and bringing back to the company in terms of the overall financial benefit.

But let me tell you what the tool doesn't do. I mentioned earlier that this tool is really designed for individuals, department heads, or small work groups who are trying to identify the cost savings they could bring back to their department through using Polycom. But what if you wanted to take a look at an enterprise wide ROI, really an enterprise caliber, full implementation across an entire company. You know, this web based cost savings calculator really would not be appropriate. In that case, we have another tool, which is an Excel based ROI calculator. And for that you can actually sit down and meet with one of our Polycom account managers and they can take you through a very, very detailed analysis.

Scott Whitney: Well, that's interesting. Now, Bob, what about this advanced tool is compelling enough for me to want to talk to a Polycom person versus just trying to figure it out on the website?

Bob Preston: Well, first of all, your Polycom account person can really talk about what type of solution would be appropriate and most appropriate for your organization and can take a look at the network infrastructure and how such a solution could be implemented. Do you remember when I talked about the cost savings calculator online, we sort of assumed that there would be this generic Polycom solution.

Well, in this case, you can actually identify what that solution would be and you can also calculate the key financial metrics that it would return to your organization. So we talked about the ROI calculation earlier and what that means. Certainly, it would give you the total cost of ownership, a net present value in terms of today's dollar terms, cash and income statement payback and also internal rate of return.

So, truly, this advanced ROI calculator that's based in Excel, that you can work with your Polycom account manager demonstrates the overall ROI and also the positive returns using a specific Polycom solution.

To be continued...

ROI with Polycom Video Conferencing Equipment Part II

2010-02-10T17:34:00.000-08:00

Bob Preston: Well, really, Scott, you know, any organization is interested in having a return on their investment, right? But when we talk about ROI calculation and financial metrics and these types of advanced calculations, we are really talking about large organizations, primarily enterprise type companies, but they could be healthcare facilities, they could even be higher education campuses. And in terms of who, you know, you are talking about department heads, division heads, you know, the ones that are really watching the financial results probably signing the checks, you know.

Scott Whitney: Yeah, right.

Bob Preston: You know, and in a large enterprise, certainly any CFO, why because he manages the finance and ultimately he is probably signing the checks. The CIO, he is responsible for the enterprise infrastructure and properly leveraging any network resource. And of course, the CEO, right, he is responsible to the bottom line and ultimately for a return to the shareholders.

Scott Whitney: Bob, I'm sure there is a variety of ways folks are trying to communicate more efficiently, more effectively now, right?

Bob Preston: Yes, absolutely, Scott. In any organization, if there is an effort to cut cost, one of the first places that a company will look is their travel expense. So, if people aren't going to travel to meet and collaborate, how will they do that, how will they communicate? Well, they are the old fashion ways, right? There is picking up the phone and calling somebody. A problem with that is today you get a voice mail message and their communication goes back and forth. That's really kind of inefficient. Same with email. You send an email off, you might get an answer the next day and this type of ping ponging thing can go on for several days before any kind of conclusions is met, it's not particularly efficient.

The other way is voice conferencing. Voice conferencing is very powerful. It's very efficient today with high definition voice but, you know, pretty much just for short meetings, right? If you get together, you have a common purpose, you want to talk about something specific. It's a pretty good way to communicate, but if you are talking about a larger meeting, more people on the line, maybe a longer meeting, some type of a business review, it's really, really tough to get the full essence of the content that's exchanged unless you can really see the presenters to their faces, see the material they are presenting and really have that sort of visual interaction.

Another method that's popular today is web conferencing like WebEx, Microsoft Live Meeting.

Scott Whitney: Right.

Bob Preston: Web conferencing is a great way to communicate if you are kind of doing a stand up and present type meeting, where I'm pitching information and that's mainly one way communication because you can hear me speak and you can see my slides and at the end of it, you know, everybody applauds and they like the information exchange. But for a longer meeting, where there's a collaboration going on, there is a lot of back and forth, we feel that web conferencing just doesn't really cut it.

So today, you know we are talking about in terms of ROIs is really the Polycom visual collaboration solution, video conferencing or telepresence where you can really truly see what's going with all the people in meeting. Multiple people can come into the virtual meeting room, they can see each other, they can see their facial expressions, the way they are communicating. They can exchange ideas, they can show things visually, right, and also of course, exchange content.

Scott Whitney: You know about web conferencing, it's been my experience that if you do like a WebEx thing, the problem with it is you can't tell what the audience is doing. You don't really know if they are engaged with you or not.

Bob Preston: Right. You don't even know if they are listening.

Scott Whitney: Right.

ROI with Polycom Video Conferencing Equipment

2010-02-03T20:11:00.000-08:00

Scott Whitney: Welcome everybody to Polycom OnDemand. I'm your host, Scott Whitney and for today's show, we are going to take some time to figure out how to determine the return on investment associated with using Polycom video conferencing equipment.

Hello again everybody and welcome to Polycom OnDemand, the show that demonstrates how collaboration technology can make your life much, much easier.

I am guessing that it's not new news to anybody listening to this podcast, that in order to bring any new technology into the enterprise, a serious examination about return on investment or ROI is a critical step. For a discussion about how to determine whether or not a Polycom deployment can demonstrate its worth through a tough ROI analysis, I'm joined on the phone from his offices in San Diego, California, by Polycom VP of Industry Solutions, Bob Preston. Bob, welcome back to the show.

Bob Preston: Hey, Scott, nice to be back. Thanks.

Scott Whitney: Great to have you, Bob. Hey, Bob, before we jump into the whole ROI discussion thing, what are some of the reasons why this is becoming an even more important topic than ever before?

Bob Preston: Well, Scott, in today's economic environment, there is a lot of pressure on companies to do more with less. It's uncertain when the economy will turn around. They are being asked by managements and their Board of Directors to reduce their cost, in cases perhaps even reduce the number of people, the headcount, that are working at the organization. And the bottom line is companies are under a severe amount of pressure even in this type of economy to be (inaudible) the shareholders and show a good return. At the same time, companies want to achieve more, right? Whether there is a recession or not, they are wanting to work faster, smarter, more efficiently. They want to gain market share and like I mentioned, kind of already improve the bottom line.

So, in today's economy in this environment, it's all about ROI more than ever it's necessary for a company to be able to prove the ROI before they would invest in any kind of IT infrastructure and that includes Polycom.

So, it's not just about cool stuff or people can connect and be visual through communication, it's really in today's environment about ROI and being able to prove about inside any kind of organization.

Scott Whitney: Bob, just to clarify, what exactly do you mean by ROI?

Bob Preston: Well, technically ROI means the benefits of an expenditure that comes back to the organization offset by cost. But your calculation of ROI is the benefits or the amount of positive return to its company divided by the cost, which gives you an equation known as ROI. More generically though, it's really you know, what are you going to do for me? What is your technology going to do for my company and what -- how is it going to benefit me and what is it going to bring back to my company in terms of bottom line performance? So that's kind of the general topic.

Scott Whitney: Okay. Now how would you describe the types of companies and even the types of individuals for us to deal with these issues?

To be continued...

Polycom HDX 4000

2009-11-06T19:58:00.000-08:00

Polycom HDX 4000

High Definition Personal Video Conferencing Solution

Bob Knauf: Hi. My name is Bob Knauf. I am the Senior Product Marketing Manager here at Polycom in Austin, Texas. Today I would like to talk to you about our new executive desktop system, which offers premier personal conferencing to the desktop, the Polycom HDX 4000. With the Polycom HDX 4000, Polycom is extending its UltimateHD experience to the desktop. UltimateHD gives you the absolute best in voice, video and content sharing capabilities. You will receive 720p video or 1280x720 resolution at 30 frames per second, unbelievably powerful audio with Siren22 kilohertz audio in stereo surround and HD content sharing capabilities.

The HDX 4000 truly does give you premier conferencing at the desktop. There are many, many applications where the HDX 4000 would be a perfect fit but here are just a couple of examples; the executive desktop. You might be a CEO, you could be a high level manager or a project manager and you have a team located all over the world. It's very critical for you to be able to have instantaneous high-quality video and audio communications. The HDX 4000 allows for that type of communications. Also as we will learn in just a little bit, the HDX 4000 can be used for much more than just a one-on-one conversation. It can actually be used as a small group or huddle system and we will talk about that technology in just a bit.

Another perfect application is telemedicine. In telemedicine, it is so very critical for the doctors to have a very good rapport with their patients. Let's take telepsychiatry for example. It's very critical for those psychiatrists and psychologists to be able to have a communication that takes down the technology barriers. With the HDX 4000, the patient can feel very comfortable because they are seeing and hearing the doctor very clearly. But it's also more critical for the doctor to be able to hear and see the patient critically. And with the UltimateHD experience, the patient and doctor are having a very good conversation in UltimateHD.

Another perfect application is legal. In the legal field, video communications is used quite often on a daily basis. It might be lawyers deposing a witness at a great distance; it might just be lawyers communicating with one another with a weekly meeting or a daily meeting. But how critical could it be for a witness and a lawyer to actually be deposing a witness talking to them and actually seeing those verbal cues, hearing the verbal cues with that Siren22 kilohertz audio and being able to adjust their questioning accordingly. Like I said, these are just a couple of examples where the HDX 4000 can fit in, but hopefully, you will be able to find applications and examples for yourselves.

Now let's talk about some of the features and benefits of the Polycom HDX system. I already touched upon the UltimateHD experience that you will receive with HDX. You will receive the absolute best in voice, video and content sharing. The HDX 4000 is truly a multimedia device. With a 20.1-inch monitor, this display acts not only as your video conferencing device but also as your PC or Mac display. So there is no need to have two displays on your desktop. This HDX 4000 does double duty. [As you have that] such a large screen, you can open up multiple presentations, excel spreadsheets, Internet browsers, wherever it might be, you have a lot of landscape to work with.

We talked about HD voice and the incredible audio that you are going to be receiving from the HDX 4000, there are two large speakers built on either side of the display that are downward firing subwoofers that actually are using the tabletop or desktop space to actually reverberate that low base sound back into the user. So the audio experience that you receive is quite amazing. Bob, I think the idea to have the sales meeting in January is an excellent idea. It will help us position the organization and align early on in the year as opposed to waiting until later in the quarter. So I am excited about having it in January, great idea.

Bob Knauf: And because there is microphones on either side of the bezel, there is a stereo separation. So stereo surround to the far end is absolutely incredible for all the users that are in the conference. Of course, if you are using your HDX 4000 as your computer display, you are more than likely to go into want to share your data with the far side. With Polycom's patented People+Content, you are able to do so. It's just a simple click of a button. Polycom also has its patented People on Content feature, which allows the presenter to become part of their presentation using chroma key technology.

The intelligent user interface makes using the HDX 4000 a breeze. Users will notice that the HDX 4000 user interface is very similar to all other Polycom video products. And there is no need for the remote control anymore, all the features and functions of the HDX 4000 can be accessed through the keypad that's built into the base of the HDX 4000.

The HDX 4000 series consists of two different models. Let's start with the HDX 4001. The HDX 4001 offers the wonderful form factor of the large 20.1-inch screen with stereo surround audio and all the patented UltimateHD content sharing capabilities that's in all the HDX products. However, the HDX 4001 is standard definition only. That means you will be running 4CIF video resolution, not high definition video resolution. For users that would like to upgrade to HD in the future, that is definitely possible.

The HDX 4002 is the second model in the series that again offers all the same form factors, the 20.1-inch screen, stereo surround audio, the UltimateHD content sharing capabilities. However, the HDX 4002 will have HD or 1280x720 video resolution at 1 megabit and above. The incredible video resolution on the HDX 4000 starts with the built-in 5 megapixel electronic pan-tilt-zoom camera that is built into the bezel of the top of the unit. There is also a privacy shutter that allows users to turn the camera on and off. A user would still be able to use the HDX 4000 as their computer monitor while having the privacy shutter activated. This camera along with our processing power is a very natural and realistic representation of people video in both high definition and 4CIF video resolution.

One of the cornerstones of the UltimateHD experience is HD voice. With the built-in stereo speakers, we are providing the users with a wonderful multimedia experience with Siren22 kilohertz audio and stereo surround. Another great thing about the HDX 4000, it can also be used as a fully functional speakerphone. There is an analog phone jack built into the unit that can be used as an analog speakerphone or a voice-over-IP speakerphone. The Polycom HDX 4000 offers patented keyboard noise reduction technology. This technology eliminates the noise that is associated with someone typing on a keyboard. So on the far side, the only thing they will hear is the HD voice. The HDX 4000 has a split form factor. By this, I mean it has two separate components. The first component is your LCD screen. This is being used as your display device; this is also where you are going to be placing and receiving your video calls.

The second component of the HDX 4000 is the base box. The base box contains most of the electronics for the system and also your PC and network connections. The advantages of having a split form factor include having a nice clean desktop. It may sound funny but honestly, if you had to run all your connections for your network and for your PC all to the desktop, you are going to be giving up valuable (inaudible) on your desk. By having the base box either mounted underneath your desk or on a nice shelf, you will be able to run those cables and keep them out of sight. Another advantage of having a split form factor is low noise on the desktop. Some competitive video systems that sit on the desktop have fans built in, which introduces quite a bit of noise to the desk and really is quite annoying to the end user. Another advantage of having a split form factor is that you will be future proofing your purchase. We don't know what our engineers might be able to come up within the future. Perhaps, you will want to, in the future, you will want to have a larger monitor to use with your HDX 4000. This all might be possible because we have a split form factor.

If you are concerned about running HD video on your network or over the public Internet due to perhaps a packet loss and so forth, fear no more. Polycom is introducing Lost Packet Recovery or LPR. This patent pending technology offers clean consistent audio and video on dirty networks and on the public Internet. Whatever your network and whatever your application, the HDX 4000 will fit the bill. The HDX 4000 offers IP, SIP, BRI, PRI and V.35 connectivity. The HDX 4000 offers maximum flexibility for those users who like to share content in standard definition or high definition or run their multipoint calls in HD or in standard definition by offering call speeds up to 4 megabits per second. If privacy is a concern, the HDX 4000 delivers. With the privacy shutter on the camera, we also have built into the unit a headphone and microphone jack. So you will be able to use a headphone and microphone or you can use a third-party device that allows you to actually use a handset to talk to the far end. There is also AES encryption built into the unit for the more secure and sensitive conferences. We have multiple sales tools for the HDX 4000 series. All of these sales tools can be found at the Polycom Resource Center or at Polycom.com.

Polycom Telepresence

2009-11-06T18:36:00.000-08:00

In an interconnected world, opportunities can arise anywhere, elevating the importance of communicating across distance to new levels. Our common 21st century challenges - travel expenses and delays, the need for increased productivity, environmental impact - require a new approach to connecting with co-workers, customers and partners. What if you could be there and there without leaving here?

Well, you can with Polycom Telepresence, an easy-to-use intuitive and reliable high-definition video experience that provides you with the same life-like communication that comes with being physically in the same room. Polycom Telepresence is your perfect answer for the opportunities and challenges of today's world. With Polycom Telepresence, we easily connect with others no matter where they are. Whether you are on a research and development team in Bangalore or in your global headquarters in Zurich, Polycom offers a complete portfolio of high-definition telepresence solutions that meet every application and need at any location.

From desktop systems that allow you to collaborate from your office to fully immersive telepresence suites, Polycom delivers standards-based solutions that interoperate with the millions of video conferencing systems deployed around the world.

Polycom RealPresence experience, RPX HD, is the world's only truly immersive telepresence solution. Imagine stepping into a room and greeting face to face your colleagues from Delhi, Munich or London in cinematic view on a wide screen video wall with life-size proportions, studio lighting, vibrant high-definition color and clarity, integrated acoustics with microphones, cameras and controls discretely conceal.

RPX HD delivers an exceptionally heightened multisensory experience. You feel as if you are in the same room. Stereo surround tracks and follows your conversation around the room. Tabletop displays provide you with powerful content sharing and high-definition visuals enable you to sense emotions, enthusiasm, frustration and reach decisions faster.

Whether you are connecting with individuals across the country or teams around the world, Polycom RPX HD creates a truly immersive environment that connects people more closely than ever.

Polycom Telepresence experience, TPX HD, is a powerful high-definition communication solution for your conference rooms. Make sure yourself easily and quickly connecting with colleagues around the world. TPX HD delivers vivid, high-definition video, multiple plasma displays, flexible layouts, modular designs, powerful content sharing tools, a multi-purpose conference table accommodating up to 12 people and connectivity to the millions of standards-based video conferencing systems deployed around the world. Freed from complicated controls and interfaces, TPX HD allows you to focus on communicating with one another rather than the underlying technology.

Polycom TPX HD, providing powerful, flexible and easy-to-use visual communication for your most pressing needs.

The Polycom HDX series of high-definition telepresence solutions deliver group and personal communication in any environment. The powerful award-winning HDX series provides high-definition video, flexible interfaces, dynamic content sharing and quality innovations that safeguard image clarity. Standards-based designs ensure seamless integration of the HDX series with your conference platforms, management applications, and the millions of existing video conferencing systems around the world. From the desktop to the conference room, HDX propels visual communication into the mainstream.

The Polycom HDX series: For high-definition visual communication in group and personal environments across your organization.

You can ensure seamless and effective telepresence meeting experiences with a Video Network Operations Center or VNOC. It's easy to conduct RPX HD and TPX HD telepresence meetings with VNOC services. With a single request to a VNOC, your telepresence suites are reserved and configured to deliver a flawless, effortless meeting experience. You are completely freed from technical setup and concerns about reliable connections. There's no pushing buttons or adjusting cameras. You can focus solely on communicating with your colleagues. Expert assistance from a VNOC service provider guarantees your meetings progress productively, efficiently and on schedule. When connecting across multiple locations, VNOC services join widely distributed teams seamlessly.

Here, you see a multipoint call involving groups from 8 locations around the world using a variety of telepresence systems from desktop to immersive environments; a typical and powerful example of how Polycom systems interoperate and how VNOC services enable you to fully leverage your telepresence investment.

Telepresence from Polycom: Effective, effortless communication. People see each other face to face, read body language, exchange ideas, communicate clearly and without ambiguity. Whether you are a teleworker in a home office, an executive conducting a global business review or a project manager collaborating with vendors around the world, Polycom Telepresence Solutions set the standard for a high-quality visual communication. Polycom Telepresence Solutions allow people to connect with each other no matter where they are in the world.

Connect with Polycom or a Polycom certified partner today to schedule a live demonstration.

TANDBERG FindMe

2009-11-06T18:28:00.000-08:00

FindMe is a unique feature of the TANDBERG video communication server that helps bridge the gap between communication devices. FindMe makes it simple for those trying to reach you to get in touch in the most natural way possible. Instead of having separate numbers for work, home or mobile devices, FindMe allows you to establish a single identity that controls and routes calls to specified communication devices in the order that you determine. No redialing, no misconnections, no missed opportunities.

When someone dials your FindMe identity, calls can simultaneously be routed to your desktop video system, your mobile phone or your home office, reaching you on the best possible device no matter where you are.

Not available? Calls can then automatically be routed to a unified messaging system or alternate devices. Users can individually configure the FindMe interface to separate per call destinations for up to 5 devices.

TANDBERG FindMe: One number to reach you regardless of location, device or protocol. That's natural communication.

Cisco TelePresence

2009-11-06T18:09:00.000-08:00

Guido Jouret: Hi. My name is Guido Jouret, Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Cisco's Emerging Technologies Group. There are lot of rumors about Cisco TelePresence versus the competition. I would like to present you with a few facts.

First of all, what makes Cisco TelePresence different from video conferencing? Most video conferencing is hardly ever used. The research shows at best about an hour per day. Our customers tell us that they use Cisco TelePresence 5, 6 or more hours a day and customers can use Cisco's TelePresence technology with their existing video conference system. Let me just repeat that. Our system is interoperable with all standard video conferencing solutions on the market today.

Cisco is the market leader in TelePresence technologies. According to Wainhouse Research, we have 67% of the market; our nearest competitor has less than 10%. And it's more than just simply business meetings. It's about a comprehensive video collaboration solution; it's also about the ease of use of a single button to push. So unlike competitors' solutions, which require all these remotes figuring out which buttons to push, Cisco TelePresence doesn't require any of that. It works with the networks that our customers already have. It works with our service providers who have offerings to enable them to do intercompany TelePresence; that's how we keep the complexity down and the feature set high.

So Cisco is partnering with a wide number of partners, both hotel chains and service providers, so we can make TelePresence suites available to the public. So we have partnered with Marriott and Starwood Hotels and we have also made it easier for companies to connect to cross carriers, so our customers can call nearly anyone else with Cisco TelePresence. So you can rent a public TelePresence suite and place intercompany TelePresence calls to your partners, suppliers, customers and employees.

So one of the key proof points is we are believers in the system ourselves. Cisco itself has more than 500 endpoints in a 150 cities in 50 countries running more than 5000 weekly meetings. Over 3600 of the meetings connect multiple locations simultaneously. Our systems are in use 67% of the time, that's 6 to 7 hours over a 10-hour day. We have saved over $260 million in travel costs, $97 million in terms of increased productivity and effectiveness and we have run this entire installation with only 8 people.

So now, let's bring in Phil Graham, VP of Engineering and his global engineering team. Notice, one button to push.

Guido Jouret: Hi, Phil.

Phil Graham: Guido, how are you today?

Guido Jouret: I am doing well. And I see we are on a multipoint call. London, are you there?

Unidentified Speaker: Good to see you, Guido. here.

Nigel: I am Nigel.

Guido Jouret: Good to see you both. And what about some folks in Texas, I believe?

Kevin: Hey, it's Kevin from Richardson, Texas.

Vicky: And howdy, it's Vicky.

Guido Jouret: Good to see you all. So, why don't we show out some of the key aspects of this TelePresence system? In particular, starting with the voice activated switching, how does that work, Phil?

Phil Graham: Well, we use the microphones to help [us decide when to] switch in videos. You don't need a remote.

Guido Jouret: And everybody always appears on the right screen in life size giving a great experience. So, one of the key aspects for video is, of course, low latency so that we have very smooth motion being able to optimize for that is really important. So let's see some waves.

Vicky: Sure, we can do that.

Guido Jouret: Okay, thanks guys, thank you. And now, Phil, why don't you tell us about some of the key technical specifications of TelePresence?

Phil Graham: Thanks very much, Guido, I will be happy to. Hi, I am Phil Graham. I am the VP of Engineering and CTO for TelePresence at Cisco. We have been all over the world over the last five years with our product and customers tell us it's simply the best. Why do they like it? For starters, multipoint capability of 48 segments in a single meeting. People could be anywhere in the world and the way we arrange the cameras is to create a seamless meeting environment, really makes the great eye contact and the best possible experience.

Wideband special audio is the heart of Cisco TelePresence's audio system. When somebody speaks on the left, you hear them on the left and when they speak on the right, you hear them on the right. It's just like a face-to-face meeting. Scheduling a meeting is easy. Using groupware, such as Outlook, you schedule a meeting like you would any other meeting. And then, when you come into the room, you just start the call with one button. You can record for a broadcast later, you can manage events or you can share presentations with colleagues. Cisco TelePresence is just a phone, built upon the same 8 years of experience that we have with voice-over-IP and unified communications. Using products such as CallManager, it's simple to use.

Now, I will hand it back to Guido.

Guido Jouret: Thank you very much, Phil. And to put you at ease, our technical response center has the top experts in routing, switching, security, unified communications and video available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. With more than 1000 logistics depots around the world, the products you may need are rarely more than a day away; downtime is just not acceptable. And we also sell and support all of the underlying and complementary technologies that make TelePresence even more powerful.

We constantly listen to our customers to introduce new innovations as part of our TelePresence portfolio. Initially we introduced two endpoints, the CTS 3000 and 1000; we then very quickly introduced the 500 as well as our recent introduction of the 1300. So we are continuing to extend the range of TelePresence endpoints available to our customers. And what it really means is that now you can collaborate not just with people inside your company but with anybody anywhere around the world.

So how would Cisco TelePresence help you in the future? It will bring your teams closer together, facilitate better face-to-face interactions, accelerate your entry into new markets, deliver content more immediately to your distributed global workforce and we have only just begun the journey with video at Cisco. We have already integrated TelePresence with digital signage, digital media systems, video conferencing and collaboration tools like WebEx Integration. So let's do this together. See us soon at Cisco TelePresence.

NEW! TANDBERG Personal Video Conferencing Starter Kit

2009-08-02T22:39:00.000-07:00

The power of video communication to the desktop

In today’s environment, business efficiency is no longer a buzz word, it is essential. Video collaboration is one of the simplest, most effective ways that businesses are lowering travel costs and enhancing productivity. The value of video communications is well documented. It helps companies reduce business travel, accelerate decision making, scale knowledge, unify the organization, promote a stronger work/life balance and be greener.

Now it is even easier for businesses to bring the power of video to the desktop. TANDBERG is reinventing the desk phone by merging voice, video and collaboration into one device. The TANDBERG E20 is a highly scalable solution for enterprise mass deployment — everyone in the organization will immediately see the benefits of increased productivity and daily collaboration.

Exciting New Video Conferencing Offer

To make it easy for you to start using video conferencing technology, we have created
a Personal Video Starter Kit which includes:

• Ten E20 Desktop phones

• Video Communications Server (VCS) Control Application

• TANDBERG Management Suite (TMS) Server Licenses

Users of the TANDBERG E20 will enjoy:

• An affordable desktop video solution at over 15% off of the standard list price

• High-resolution video straight to their desk

• CD-quality audio with a full duplex speakerphone

• Simple, intuitive interface with enhanced calling features

• Seamless integration with other standards-based video which will make it an
integral part of the unified communications platform

Customers can also choose to video enable mobile workers by adding the mobility option which includes 25 Movi licenses! Mobility is the new way of working. For workers in home offices or well-traveled “road warriors,” Movi offers a cost-effective, easy to use video solution that allows them to stay visually connected to colleagues, customers or suppliers.

Terms and Conditions
This offer is available until December 31, 2009. This offer is not applicable if combined with any other special discounts or promotions. TANDBERG and IVCi reserve the right to change or cancel this promotion at any time.

For additional information on how your organization can benefit from TANDBERG video conferencing solutions, call us at 1-800-224-7083 ext. 2376 or visit us online at www.ivci.com.

TANDBERG Quick Set C20Video Conferencing System

2009-07-29T20:19:00.000-07:00

I am proud to introduce to you the C20. It offers absolute quality with 1080/30, 720/60. It is easy to use, it is easy to deploy, and it has unrivaled price performance. You take it out of the box, and you know the connectors you need to connect, those are clearly marked with orange. And connecting things like microphone, network and display, and you are going and you can use video almost instantly.

This product, I typically see, will be used in the small-to-mid sized meeting rooms. It offers excellent quality and in combination with our high performance cameras, it offers the best video available. It could be managed using TMS. You can use all the type of the network products that TANBERG offers, while utilizing the MCU for conferences, you can use the VCS or your full setup and this is a full blown TANDBERG product, being able to be part of the total solution that TANDBERG offers.

So to sum it up, this is absolute quality in a small, easy to install box. It is easy to use, and it offers unrivaled price performance.

Video Conferencing and Telepresence ROI

2009-07-23T15:59:00.000-07:00

Polycom® High Definition (HD) video and telepresence solutions give organizations a rapid Return On Investment (ROI) and can quickly deliver real cash savings.

Why HD Video Conferencing and Telepresence?

In the current tough economic environment, as executives tackle the challenge of reducing and containing costs, HD Video Conferencing and telepresence solutions have emerged as an easy answer. With increasing global economic uncertainty and constant change, more and more organizations are cutting travel budgets. Now it's easy for companies to get a rapid return on investment when they implement Polycom HD Video Conferencing and telepresence solutions due to the quick reduction in travel expenses, but even more beneficial is the time and productivity gains that are made by reducing constant travel.

Increasing Productivity

According to an IDC Research Survey, "Travel savings are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to telepresence ROI." Respondents to the survey cited up to a 30% increase in productivity after deploying video communications in their companies. The cost of hours and days wasted in transit can equal or exceed the actual cost of the travel itself. Companies also increase employee roductivity by using HD videoconferencing and telepresence solutions as part of a total unified communications environment.

Achieving an Agile Enterprise

When employees have collaboration tools like Polycom's HD video conferencing and telepresence solutions, tools that are easy to use and allow on-demand interaction, their enterprise experiences two fundamental changes:
• The business can "sense and respond" more quickly
• The quality of business decisions improves with "anywhere access" to vital information and key personnel

In fact, enterprises use Polycom collaboration solutions to achieve significant gains with mainstream business processes and workflows that involve fixed location employees as well as mobile and virtual workers.

Lowering Overhead Costs with Collaboration Tools

When fewer employees and contractors need to report to a centralized work location, your company has the opportunity to reduce its cost structure, both immediately and over time. This translates into consolidated real estate holdings and savings from lower energy bills and reduced spending on office furniture, parking spaces, security, and food services.

How Polycom Delivers ROI

Cut one business trip for a few employees who either travel across the U.S. or to Europe or Asia and you've paid for a Polycom telepresence system. Polycom customers — such as Deloitte, W.R. Grace, CoStar and the Virginia Supreme Court — are saving millions of dollars per year thanks to Polycom telepresence and HD video solutions. Many Polycom HD video conferencing and telepresence customers see a complete ROI for their investments in as little as one to six months. Travel savings are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to telepresence ROI. Polycom customers tell us that the time they save by not travelling is more valuable than the dollars saved.

Gaining Affordable Training with Collaboration Tools

Traditionally, a significant amount of business travel involves employee training, conducted internally and with partners and suppliers. Using HD videoconferencing and telepresence collaboration tools, companies now train new employees at dramatically reduced expense. Allstate Insurance, for example, annually trains an averageof 2,000 new agents. Today they train on a video conferencing network so students can fully participate remotely without having to travel to the physical center. Another example is Owens-Illinois (O-I) who now offers government-mandated training using a distance learning video application. This training once required participants to leave their manufacturing locations for an entire week. With savings on airfare, hotels, meals and employee productivity, O-I is conservatively saving half a million dollars a year.

Streamlining Interviews and Hiring with Collaboration Tools

In HR, the use of Polycom HD video conferencing and telepresence solutions is being broadly adopted because it speeds the entire recruitment, interviewing, and hiring process and reduces travel-related expenses. Polycom solutions help cut hiring timelines and associated travel costs by streamlining the interactions between HR, executive recruiters, and candidates. By holding interviews remotely, organizations can also record and archive sessions, so other stakeholders can review them and help ensure the best possible hiring decisions. Faster placement of a key individual has competitive implications, as well. Beyond “scooping” rival companies on a valuable resource, with shorter recruitment intervals, the new employee can make productive contributions sooner. Overall, the increase in productivity and the savings in time and costs are huge.

Using Collaboration Tools to Speed Time-to-Market

Using Polycom videoconferencing and telepresence tools to accelerate the pace of business can significantly impact other key business workflows. For example, your company can use them to tighten the links between departments, groups and key partners and suppliers to reduce product development cycles. The entire lifecycle schedule can be cut—from upfront needs assessment, validation and design, to testing, quality assurance and market introduction—using integrated collaboration tools. And your company benefits by getting your offering out the door faster.

Opening New Doors with HD Video Conferencing and Telepresence

One of the most significant benefits of telepresence and HD video conferencing is that it allows organizations to do things that were previously impossible. Innovative applications include remote quality assurance, telemedicine in prison systems, and telejustice systems that improve public safety by allowing prisoners to be arraigned without leaving jail facilities. And every day the list of uses grows as businesses discover productive—and lucrative—ways to use video communications.

Lowering Your Corporate Carbon Footprint

Finally, with the growing emphasis on energy efficiency and “green” policies, video conferencing is a way to directly lower a company’s carbon footprint. Less time traveling by plane or car means fewer carbon emissions in the atmosphere. Polycom customers use telepresence and HD video systems to meet their green initiatives. Often, the carbon reductions are immediate and impressive (one company reduced its costs by 41 percent in France and 49 percent in the UK in the first three months of use.)

Find out more.

Explore how Polycom solutions can help you be more productive while reducing costs. Call Platinum Cerified Polycom Reseller, IVCI at 1-800-224-7083, or visit us online at www.ivci.com today.

Polycom Telemedicine

2009-07-21T15:20:00.000-07:00

Glenn Hammock: Almost everybody today acknowledges that healthcare globally is facing a challenge and that challenge is two-fold. On the one hand, there is not enough doctors and on the other hand, specialized skills are needed and they are not always available where they need to be. NuPhysicia LLC is a new telemedicine services company that uses Polycom Visual Communications, and it's a very essence of its business.

NuPhysicia started out at the University of Texas medical branch, it had a long history of telemedicine doing work in the prison system of Texas, but then it quickly moved into other areas. At NuPhysicia, taking it into oil and gas markets, taking it into employee health, we think it's an attractive, attractive place to be, the idea that we don't have to take half a day off to go to the doctor and that we can actually go some place in our building or some place in our neighborhood and actually see a doctor in a very convenient way, that's really what NuPhysicia is all about.

Oscar Boultinghouse: The value proposition for using the technology in the remote area has to do with making the best decision possible about evacuation strategies, evacuating patients from remote areas is risky and very expensive.

Michael Davis: Injury, illness or an emergency can happen anywhere, anytime.

Glenn Hammock: Just in the Gulf of Mexico, a unscheduled nighttime evacuation can cost $30,000 to $40,000 per episode, and that cost gets higher, the further you get away from the Continental US.

You have got 7% to 10% that are nobrainers, you are going to move the individual. The remainder though is where the tough calls are and that's where you want the influence of a doctor, using Visual Communications to see what's going on to make the best call because it's the ones that are a little murky is where the highest risk to the patient is and the highest risk to the organization is.

We had the opportunity about two years ago to have a doctor take a Polycom unit in a case with a satellite unit to Masalani Hospital in Kenya and he was able to examine cases of Rift Valley Fever that can have tremendous epidemic consequences. And with a very simple satellite system and Polycom equipment, we were able to hear the heart and lung sounds, where we were able to look at their skin, where we were able to understand what was going on. And it was all being run off this little [on the] generator in the -- literally in the middle of the jungle. And so, it was a great example of the flexibility and the durability of Polycom Visual Communications.

Oscar Boultinghouse: We had a patient in Antarctica that suffered a tendon that attaches a knee cap to the bone in the lower leg, the tibia. The oversight of the orthopedic surgeon at UTMB using the Polycom equipment, we were able to talk the emergency medicine provider to repair that tendon. Being able to reach back to a higher level expertise to help manage issues is a unique aspect of what this technology allows to deliver to the event side.

Polycom has done a wonderful job in developing very intuitive user interfaces for this technology and so I can concentrate on recruiting the best physicians I can find and not necessarily people that are skilled with technology. Using a Polycom equipment, we are able to see patients from virtually anywhere from the deck of their sailboat, from Big Sky Montana, from their study at home.

There really is no limitation to the number of physicians that can provide services using the Polycom technology and the ability to manage large groups physicians is something that we have done well, being able to scale and productionize not only the technology and the network, to provider group as well.

Glenn Hammock: The promise of Polycom Visual Communications is really healthcare independent of time and location. Your doctor can be anywhere, you can be anywhere and good effective high quality medicine can be practiced.

The systems are easy to install, they are easy to maintain, they are easy to operate. Polycom has the largest presence in clinical telemedicine in the world. And it's been their commitment to working in improving healthcare that has really earned them the position as the top visual communications provider in healthcare.

For additional information regarding Polycom HD Video Conferencing and Telemedicine solutions call Platinum-Certified Reseller IVCi, or visit us online at www.ivci.com.

HD Video Conferencing and Telepresence from Polycom

2009-07-21T12:11:00.000-07:00

Video conferencing today is fundamentally changing business communication. Whether in an office or the field, on a webcam or immersive suites, video conferencing is increasing communication efficiency and reducing the cost of doing business for companies around the world. Video's popularity however, has resulted in a host of terms, acronyms and technologies that can complicate finding the right solution for your organization.

What do you need to assess to make the right choice? First, review your applications. Will video conferencing be used for face-to-face interactions, content sharing, high motion graphics or more? What resolutions and frame rates are needed to ensure optimal experiences? How much bandwidth do you need? What about display sizes and types? And can you ensure the choices you make today will last into the future?

Let's take a look at these technical variables and consider how they influence one another in different applications. The first factors most people consider with video conferencing are resolutions and frame rates. Right now, you are seeing me in 1080p resolution. 1080 represents the lines of vertical resolution, while the letter p stands for progressive scan, in which all of the lines of each frame appear in sequence. You may also see resolutions like 1080i, the i stands for interlaced. And generally in the world of video conferencing, progressive scan is preferred because interlacing causes details to twitter and blur at the cost of image clarity.

Now let's compare the impact of resolution and frame rate on an actual video conferencing interaction. Lisa and Larry are in a traditional video conferencing conference that uses CIF resolution and about 384 kilobits of bandwidth. Now let's see Lisa in standard definition or SD, which is about four times the resolution of CIF and requires about 768k of bandwidth. Notice the level of detail in clarity Lisa has over Larry. Now let's move Larry to 720p, also known as high definition or HD. 720p at 30 frames per second uses about 1 megabyte of bandwidth and it's a primary driver behind today's widespread video conferencing adoption. In this interaction, Larry's gestures and expressions become immediately more impactful.

Everything we have seen up to now has been shown at 30 frames per second, but now let's take Lisa to 720p and also double the rate to 60 frames per second. This mode uses about a meg and a half of bandwidth and is the equivalent of high definition broadcast TV. Notice that even at the same resolution, because Lisa is being shown at twice the frame rate, her motions are much smoother.

Now let's move Larry up to 1080p at 30 frames per second, which uses about 4 megs of bandwidth. So, as you can see, significantly increasing the traffic on your network does not necessarily translate into better image quality. Note: Lisa will appear in better quality as her frame rate remains at 60. This underscores the importance of display size and selecting the appropriate resolution. While increasing frame rate has the same impact on any size screen, the impact of resolution declines in proportion with the display size.

For example, PDA or cell phone displays support low resolutions but look great because of their small size. As a rule of thumb, the human eye can discern 1080p only when the display size is equal to or greater than 70 inches and the viewer is sitting about 10 feet from the display. Not all video conferencing applications today involve face to face interaction.

Now that Larry and Lisa appear to have made up, let's take a quick look at some applications illustrating the relative importance of resolution and frame rate. In this live musical performance, where motion smoothness and the ability to discern fine motor movements take priority, optimal viewing occurs at 720p resolution and 60 frames per second.

Another example of where motion smoothness takes precedence over maximum resolution is in this clip, where a doctor is instructing a remote group of students in a new medical procedure using captured video conferencing as part of his lesson.

In some cases though, clarity and fine detail matter more than motion. These examples from healthcare highlight the importance of maximum 1080p resolution. It's essential for the remote physician to see fine detail such as an enlarged blood vessel or changes to the cornea. And in this example, the remote consulting physician sees the diagnostic image in 1080p high definition enabling an accurate diagnosis of a patient hundreds of miles away.

The importance of detail also extends into commercial applications. In these two examples, 1080p enables remote quality inspection of two very different products, a printed circuit board intended for using consumer electronics and a garment being manufactured for the retail market.

In the world of video conferencing, clearly one size does not fit all. Balancing quality with cost effectiveness by choosing the right combination of frame rate, resolution, and bandwidth for your environments and requirements is critical.

Whether your video conferencing enabling desktops, conference rooms, lecture halls or immersive suites, we hope this video helps you make a more educated decision.

For additional information regarding Polycom HD Video Conferencing and Telepresence solutions call Platinum-Certified Reseller IVCi, or visit us online at www.ivci.com.