For Those Who Can Afford to Pay, the Video Conference Grows Up

Video conferencing systems have matured so that unobtrusive equipment allows face-to-virtual-face meetings. Those who use it say the saved travel expenses outweigh the steep costs to deploy the systems.

Thu, November 01, 2007CIO Accenture always had an interest in video conferencing. Employees debate about the exact date when the first camera and monitor landed in a meeting room, but by most accounts, Accenture has tried to add video conferencing to its arsenal of collaborative technologies since the early 1990s. However, due to lagging technology, video conferencing never resonated as the world’s largest consulting firm might have hoped.

Television monitors, with bad pictures and big cameras mounted on top of them, didn’t cut it. When conversing, meeting participants often had to look straight into a camera, rather than at a person; the camera’s presence would dominate the experience and cause the person to forget what it took to run a good meeting, to collaborate on work projects. “The technology, historically, had great promise,” says Frank Modruson, CIO at Accenture. “But the delivery didn’t live up to expectations.”

Analysts and researchers say Accenture’s experience mirrors that of most companies that have explored the technology in the past. As it turned out, perfect, crystal clear video conferencing happened only in Hollywood productions. The most celebrated example is Star Trek, in which the captain frequently asked his lieutenants to put an alien life-form traveling in another spaceship “on screen.” But on the planet Earth, amidst the sobering halls of the corporation where the demands of technology can’t be faked, video conferencing just couldn’t cut it. Slow connection speeds and old clunky setups proved unreliable and, in many cases, required hours of IT support for a one-hour meeting.

After many years of promises, experts on collaborative technologies believe video conferencing has finally grown up. The advances could have a huge effect on international businesses looking to minimize travel costs—and the human wear and tear that comes with travel. Better connection speeds, coupled with the use of high-definition monitors like the kind people drool over on a trip to their neighborhood Best Buy, have upgraded the experience. The result: While very expensive (some video conference rooms are priced as high as $300,000), the technology could reduce travel budgets and boost productivity by letting people collaborate with one another from the comfort of their home offices.

Remember Out-of-Sync Pictures and Sound?

Video conferencing has been around for a while now. Television stations and the military have used it for decades because they had the huge budgets and technical expertise required to install and run it. Commercial video conferencing dates back to the mid-1980s, according to Claire Schooley, an analyst at Forrester Research. Throughout most of the 1990s, video conferences connected over Integrated Service Digital Network (ISDN) lines. Since ISDN lines were expensive, IT departments would often devote only 25 percent or 50 percent of the line to a single video conference. Because of this, users of video conferences would sometimes experience "packet drops," which occur when packets of data traveling over the wire fail, or take entirely too long, to reach their destination. It caused a disparity between the sound coming through the speaker and the person's lips moving onscreen. (This reflects a correction to the originally posted version of this story. See the corrections page for details.)


Loading...
Network MarketSpace
Thinking About Deploying Mobile Broadband?
Explore lessons and best practices experienced by companies that have deployed mobile broadband to their workforce. Learn more »
Increase Application Performance and User Experience
This research shifts the attention from basic load-balancing features to application delivery features. Learn more »
Gartner Magic Quadrant, Application Delivery Controllers 2009
The market for products to improve the delivery of application software over networks remains dynamic. Learn more »
McAfee's Network Security Platform IPS
McAfee's Network Security Platform IPS; the costs, benefits, flexibility, and risk elements. Learn more »
The Cost of SQL Sprawl
Learn how a new approach to SQL server consolidation can reduce server counts by 50%, lower maintenance costs by 70% and reduce administration time by 75%. Learn more »
A Bottleneck-free Infrastructure
Storage bottlenecks have a significant impact on performance and productivity. Learn more »
Application Delivery Despite Emerging Challenges
IT organizations need to choose appropriate application delivery solutions that can scale to support the emerging challenges. Learn more »
 
SPONSORED LINKS
 

ROI of Application Delivery Controllers

Upgrading to VMware vSphere with vWire

Maximizing website Return on Information with high-quality search

See how AT&T can help protect your network.

Webcast: Unleashing the Power of Customer Data

White Paper: Improve Agility with Operational Responsiveness

White Paper: Legacy Tools: Not Built for the Helpdesk

Taking a Seat at the Executive Table: The Reality of Virtualization

White Paper: Next Generation Remote Infrastructure Management

Keeping Your Members Safe from Online Scams and Predators

The Total Economic Impact of Network Security Intrusion Prevention

Generation Remote Infrastructure Management - Changing the Paradigm

Cloud-Based Email Management: Opinion Shifts In Favor

eBook: How Can You Make Your People Productive Anywhere?

Achieving Business Agility with Application Grid

Ready to virtualize tier one applications? Check your virtualization maturity.

Seven Ways ITIL Can Help You in an Economic Downturn

Tips for successful virtualization management.

AT&T Synaptic Storage as a Service. Expand on demand

Trend Micro ranked #1 against real-world malware. Read more.

Webinar: Jump-start your in-house e-discovery with Ringtail QuickCull from FTI Technology

Streamline IT Costs. Boost Performance with WAN Optimization.

Build your 1st app FREE with Force.com

TDWI checklist helps define data readiness for analytics. Download report.

eZine: A Roadmap to Reducing IT Complexity

Gartner Magic Quadrant, Application Delivery Controllers 2009

Return on Information: Google Enterprise Search pays you back

Cut Costs & Green Your IT Operations with PC Power Management

White Paper: 4 Customer Service Myths

White Paper: Managed Security for a Not-So-Secure World

White Paper: 5 Best Practices for Smartphone Support

Global Research: CIOs Weigh In On Virtualization

5 Key Virtualization Management Challenges

Secure Email and Web-Based Communication from Evolving Attacks

WagerWorks Takes Fraudsters Out of the Game using iovation

Seven Design Requirements for Web 2.0 Threat Protection

Increase UPS efficiency without sacrificing protection.

Learn how advanced forecasting tools can deliver significant business results for global corporations.

Lower IT Costs with Oracle Database 11g Release 2

White Paper: Visibility and the New Normal of Mobile Work

Taking the Service Desk to the Next Level

Learn about The Information Technology Infrastructure Library.

Return on Information: Google Enterprise Search pays you back. Get the facts.

VMware. The source for Business Infrastructure Virtualization.

ShoreTel tells businesses to untangle from competitors' complexity and turn to its brilliantly simple UC solution

Top Five CIO Challenges

Read the RSA report: Security for Business Innovation

64-page prescriptive guide to security, compliance, and IT operations.

A Clear View Toward Virtualization

Virtualization Technology as a Business Solution

 
 
RESOURCE CENTER