Hi-def Video Conferencing Gaining Grounds

As prices of high-definition video conferencing equipment go southward, more
customers are likely to invest in it, especially as it eliminates the need for
executives to travel frequently. This in turn will result in huge savings in
cost as well as man hours, besides ensuring that the turnaround time for
decision taking is very short. It was to educate a select gathering of CIOs and
CTOs that LifeSize Communications came together with Dataquest and PC Quest, and
tried to dispel the myths surroun­ding this technology and highlight its
benefits instead.

Video conferencing as a concept has been around for several years now. But it
suffered from issues like poor quality of image, unclear sound quality, too many
session breakages due to the fluctuating transfer of data and high bandwidth
requirement, not to mention the high cost of the equipment. Its hi-def version
tries to eliminate all these negatives.

There are several reasons why globally enterprise customers are now willing
to opt for hi-def video conferencing and the key one is the closing gap between
the prices of the low and hi-def versions. “Soon, the prices of hi-def video
conferencing will overlap that of low-def video conferencing and customers will
no longer need the latter,” informed Craig Malloy, CEO, LifeSize Communications.

Craig Malloy, CEO, LifeSize Communications

Another important reason why enterprises will readily invest in hi-def video
conferen­cing increa­singly is because it eliminates the need for its executives
to travel. This in turn will result in huge savings in cost as well as manhours,
besides ensuring that the turnaround time for decision taking is very short.

Given that most manu­facturing companies have outsourced the production of
some of their product compo­nents to third party agencies all over the world,
one can see how video conferencing can come in handy in taking spontaneous
decisions, without incurring the expenses of travel. Additionally, it propels
global team collabora­tion as different offices of an organization can
communi­cate with each other in real time taking quicker decisions, improving
productivity.

The Indian videocon­ferencing market in 2008 was pegged at $35 million per
year and has registered a 28 percent growth over 2007, according to figures
shared by LifeSize Communi­cations. Several myths abound about the technology in
the country, which is why the vendor decided to have select end-customer
meetings to dispel them.

Touching about the cost of deploying and operating the equipment, Malloy
pointed out that prices for the equipment were coming down and the inbuilt
features made external intervention unnecessary.

Some of the other gathered CIOs and CTOs agreed that this develop­ment would
be of great interest to them as customers. Their enthu­siastic response is
evidence of the fact that they were keen to experiment with video conferencing,
which in turn signals a good business avenue for channel partners.

In fact, the underlying message that came across was that video conferencing
was not merely a boardroom solution, but is more of an IT solution, where
partners play a critical role. At a time when partners are seeking more
solutions to add to their product stack, this might be a welcome addition.

Vinita Bhatia

vinitavs@cybermedia.co.in