Cisco Cius is Implemented at Gas Station of the Future in Brazil

Cisco Cius at Gas Station of the Future in Brazil

Cisco Cius Screen for Gas Station of the Future

BRAZIL, SAO PAULO, January 20, 2012 - Cisco Cius, an enterprise mobile collaboration device in a tablet form-factor, is part of the Petrobras Gas Station of the Future technology portfolio launched by Petrobras Distribuidora, a subsidiary of Petrobras, and Intel, last month in Rio de Janeiro. In addition to the rich, integrated unified communications and collaboration features already provided on the Cius, Cisco has customized a number of applications for the project, allowing gas station visitors to benefit from a much greater level of engagement with the station and to understand and purchase services available to them.

The first Petrobras Gas Station of the Future is a collection of the latest interactive technologies, capable of providing a customized experience when refueling, shopping and enjoying other retail services at the gas stations. The Gas Station of the Future is unique in Brazil for its energy efficiency and environmental sustainability.

Consumers can approach a Cius in a kiosk of the gas station and talk to specialists from Petrobras Distribuidora, in real-time via mobile TelePresence. This allows the customer to obtain information on maintenance activities offered by the gas station, such as oil changes. Cius also offers users voice access to the Petrobras Distribuidora customer service center, permits use of the company loyalty card, allows users to obtain information on the store product catalog and monthly promotions, provides access to maps of specific addresses in the city and other services.

"The Cius platform offers mobility and a number of features simultaneously. I'm sure that this device will be a success in all Gas Stations of the Future," said Nelson Costa Cardoso, executive manager of Information Technology, Petrobras Distribuidora.

The Gas Station of the Future project demonstrates the role of technology in increasing service interactivity to create a new experience for consumers. By including mobile devices like the Cisco Cius in this project, Petrobras Distribuidora is consolidating its reputation as a Brazilian pioneer, mirroring other global market leaders which have adopted this type of equipment to provide their customers with faster, more secure and better quality services," said Rodrigo Abreu, CEO, Cisco in Brazil.

Ultraportable and weighing just 520 g, the Cius includes a host of Cisco collaboration applications on a highly secure mobile platform. In addition to full TelePresence interoperability, Cisco Cius also offers streaming HD video, conferencing with several participants, e-mail access, instant messaging, Internet browsing and the ability to produce, edit and share content stored locally or in the cloud.

Based on an Android operating system with enterprise-grade security from Cisco, Cius is an open communication and collaboration platform whose form factor and applications were designed to provide corporate users with more secure real-time connections and the ability to access and share content they need from any network location. A major point of differentiation of the device is the centralized corporate management platform, ensuring that the services used are more consistent and secure while offering a more flexible method of technology management.

In addition to the Cius, the Cisco project for the Gas Station of the Future also includes the entire data center and network infrastructure, needed to provide users with differentiated, robust and high quality services. The project also provides the gas station with sustainable environmental management.

"This gas station has put together some integrated and interactive technologies. Other solutions are being evaluating for testing here, where they are evaluated as a gas station-concept, working as a showroom of new technologies", explained Cardoso.

Petrobras Distribuidora

The largest company on the Brazilian market for distribution of oil and biofuel derivatives, Petrobras Distribuidora currently has over 7000 branded service stations throughout the country as well as around 10,000 clients in industries such as aviation, asphalt, chemical products, energy and transportation solutions, selling a wide range of products and services. For more information, visit www.br.com.br.

Follow Petrobras Distribuidora on Twitter at @postospetrobras.

About Cisco Systems

Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) is a global leader in networks transforming the way that people connect, communicate and collaborate. For further information on Cisco, visit http://www.cisco.com. For news about Cisco, visit http://newsroom.cisco.com.

Polycom Announces Cloud Strategy to Enable Service Providers to Fast-Track Delivery of Video-as-a-Service

Polycom® RealPresence™ Cloud, Powered by RealPresence™ Platform, Provides Service Providers a Fully Managed Wholesale Video Collaboration Service to Accelerate Time-to-Market With Subscription-Based Offerings

PLEASANTON, CA–(Marketwire – Jan 18, 2012) – Polycom, Inc. (NASDAQ: PLCM), the global leader in standards-based unified communications (UC), today detailed its strategy to enable service providers to offer cloud-delivered, Video-as-a-Service (VaaS) solutions to its customers. As part of today’s announcement, Polycom is unveiling Polycom® RealPresence™ Cloud, a wholesale, carrier-ready offering to enable service providers to quickly bring to market VaaS offerings. RealPresence Cloud solutions are designed specifically for service providers to equip them with the carrier-grade infrastructure, endpoints, and services they need to offer businesses of all sizes subscription-based solutions for video collaboration. The new offering for service providers is designed to accelerate the penetration and adoption of Polycom video collaboration solutions among SMBs (small to medium sized businesses) and enterprises who want either a hybrid solution of both premises-based video collaboration solutions and video on demand, or a pure VaaS solution.

Polycom RealPresence Cloud solutions compress the time-to-market and time-to-revenue for service providers to deliver VaaS solutions. Powered by the Polycom RealPresence Platform, the most complete and interoperable solution for universal video collaboration, RealPresence Cloud provides the carrier-grade scalability, reliability, availability, and security required for service providers to offer VaaS to SMBs and enterprises. RealPresence Cloud solutions encompass a fully managed multipoint video service that supports a multitude of connectivity options between standards-based room, mobile, PC, and Web-based endpoints, as well as Microsoft® Lync™ 2010, IBM Sametime®, and endpoints supporting the non-standard TIP protocol. Service providers can leverage Polycom RealPresence Cloud solutions to offer their customers a true business-to-business VaaS solution without having to fully integrate and support the core infrastructure on-premises. This solution leverages the Polycom RealPresence Network (formerly the Halo®/HVEN network acquired from HP in 2011) to allow service providers to fast-track their capability to deliver video from the cloud.

Polycom RealPresence Platform Powers Video Clouds from China Unicom and Airtel

Polycom will continue to work closely with service providers to develop VaaS offerings for a range of business and delivery models from on-premises to hosted to managed services. Several carriers around the world are currently using the RealPresence Platform as the enabler for VaaS solutions. For example, China Unicom has created one of the largest video clouds in the world, powered by the RealPresence Platform, which enables the delivery of VaaS to more than 10,000 business and government organizations throughout China. The RealPresence Platform provides the scalability, reliability, and interoperability that enable China Unicom’s video cloud to interconnect approximately 100,000 endpoints (and growing) from 10 different vendors. Another example, Airtel, a leading service provider in India, is also using the RealPresence Platform to deliver VaaS solutions to SMBs and enterprises throughout India. These solutions provide a differentiated offering for both companies and are helping to drive further adoption of video collaboration throughout China and India.

Wainhouse Research predicts the five-year compound annual growth rate for the hosted and managed UC market worldwide is forecast to be 30.7 percent with revenues of approximately $5 billion in 20151, further expanding Polycom’s total addressable market. Polycom’s cloud strategy builds on the company’s goal to make video collaboration ubiquitous and is a key proof point of Polycom’s recently announced software strategy.

“Polycom RealPresence Cloud is a key component to our vision of making video collaboration ubiquitous. Service providers are critical partners to drive video collaboration growth through VaaS offerings, which will dramatically lower the up-front investment for SMBs and enterprises, enabling them to reap the benefits of video collaboration,” said Andy Miller, President and CEO, Polycom. “We want to make it as easy as possible for service providers to augment their existing offerings with video collaboration solutions. To that end, we’re removing the barriers to entry with our wholesale cloud offerings and other delivery options that meet service provider requirements related to investment, management, and operations, thereby enabling our partners to get to market faster and generate new revenue more quickly. Our go-to-market objective is clear: we will be an enabler of cloud services, partnering with service providers and, in-time, solutions providers, and unlike competitors, we will not compete with service providers or offer a retail service direct to end users.”

“As the demand for video collaboration continues to grow, cloud-delivered video offerings will be a key contributor to this growth. Many SMBs and enterprises will find Video-as-a-Service offerings attractive due to their flexibility, scalability and cost savings,” said Rich Costello, IDC senior research analyst. “Polycom’s cloud strategy is compelling, as it provides an accelerated path to market for cloud-delivered video, and gives services providers the robust infrastructure, scalability, and interoperability needed to deploy wide-scale video clouds and deliver compelling VaaS solutions to customers.”

“Video Infrastructure as a Service dramatically reduces the cost of supporting multi-party conferencing. It will become a prerequisite for the support of pervasive video in the enterprise, for example in unified communications deployments,” according to Scott Morrison, managing vice president, Gartner, Inc.

Polycom Vision: Make Video Collaboration Ubiquitous through Multiple Routes to New and Expanding Markets

Polycom believes that the most effective and productive way to collaborate is by seeing people face-to-face. Video collaboration brings people face-to-face to increase productivity and, in addition, provides a great solution for business continuity as there are many obstacles that prevent people from physically being together: weather conditions, natural disasters, epidemics, and a range of unpredictable conditions and events that simply prevent people from meeting in-person. Polycom’s goal is to make it possible for everyone to use face-to-face video collaboration as their preferred method of communicating — easily, reliably, and securely — no matter where they are and regardless of network, carrier, protocol, application, or device. The company is making that possible through multiple routes to market:

Cloud-based delivery of Video-as-a-Service solution from service providers – With enterprise spending on cloud infrastructure and services rapidly growing, and the technology and standards maturing, the “video cloud” is set to explode in 2012. Polycom RealPresence Cloud will enable service providers to quickly bring to market VaaS offerings and should help drive new and differentiated business models, along with significant incremental video collaboration usage across SMBs and enterprises.

Software delivery to mobile devices – Today, more than a seventh of the human population teleworks2, and most are remote or mobile at least some of the time. Polycom’s mobility solution is Polycom® RealPresence™ Mobile, a free-to-download software solution that extends the enterprise-grade video collaboration capabilities of the Polycom RealPresence Platform beyond the conference room, office, and firewall to mobile tablets, enabling video usage anywhere.

On-premises delivery – The Polycom RealPresence Platform integrates with hundreds of business, UC, and social networking applications, as well as core networking and security infrastructure, to meet today’s enterprise and service provider on-premises video collaboration needs and to flexibly support expansion to mobile and social applications and private cloud delivery.

Web-based delivery to social apps – Social apps, now moving rapidly into business, are another new high-growth market for video collaboration: By 2015, the number of people participating in web-based video chats is forecast to grow 14-fold to more than 140 million, and they are expected to make 11 billion video chat calls that year.3 Polycom® RealPresence™ Social solutions take video collaboration one more step away from premises-based systems and specialized endpoints, even beyond mobile devices, to enable Web access to video collaboration, independently of the device.

Embedded delivery on industry-leading devices (laptops, desktops, tablets) – Polycom video collaboration software will be embedded in industry leading devices, enabling users to quickly launch Polycom RealPresence video collaboration solutions right from their favorite devices.

Open Standards and Interoperability: Polycom® RealPresence™ Video and OVCC™

The ability to achieve video ubiquity also requires open standards and interoperability, which does not lie within the power of any one customer, equipment manufacturer, service provider, or standards body to solve. It takes a concerted effort by the industry to solve this problem. Polycom’s approach is to use open standards to orchestrate interoperability across all of the elements in a communications environment, including multiple solutions, vendors, networks, and connection protocols. This approach is three-part: platform and endpoints plus ecosystem.

The Polycom RealPresence Platform provides an open standards-based foundation for integrating the diverse UC applications and infrastructure in most enterprise environments — from video endpoints to mobile devices to UC communications infrastructure from Microsoft, IBM, BroadSoft, Juniper, and Siemens, to name a few. In the interest of driving video ubiquity, the RealPresence Platform also interoperates with some proprietary systems, such as Cisco Telepresence products that use the TIP protocol. In addition, the RealPresence Platform, which powers Polycom RealPresence Cloud solutions, delivers the industry’s only true carrier-grade reliability and scale, supporting up to 75,000 device registrations and 25,000 concurrent sessions.

In addition to the infrastructure foundation and interoperability hub provided by the RealPresence Platform, Polycom is also active in helping develop the commercial and technical solutions necessary to ensure interoperability across a global partner ecosystem. In June 2011, Polycom partnered with leading global telecommunications solution and service providers from around the world to unleash broader visual communications adoption by enabling interoperability and global business-to-business (B2B) connectivity for telepresence and video conferencing. The Open Visual Communications Consortium™ (OVCC™) organization was incorporated in August 2011, of which Polycom was a founding member. Currently, there are 16 OVCC members whose mission is to develop and support a ubiquitous video marketplace by establishing secure, quality-assured, and video-capable interconnections between service providers. Service enablement across the OVCC organization is expected to become commercially available in mid-2012.

“We believe that video as a service from the cloud will be a true game-changer. Delivering video as a service will make it possible for anyone to connect and collaborate face-to-face with anyone as easily as we text or tweet today,” said Andrew McFadzen, President, OVCC. “Making this happen, however, requires that the UC and telco industries come together to solve the underlying interoperability challenges of delivering video across the assets of multiple carriers and video networks. Polycom, along with many of the leading telecommunications solution and service providers, has been working to address this and the result will be the opening of an open video cloud in 2012.”

Availability

Polycom RealPresence Cloud offerings are available now with limited availability for qualified service providers.

Collaboration in High Performance Organizations

By Bob Preston http://collaborationbenefits.blogspot.com

It is fair to say that voice, video conference, content sharing, and telepresence collaboration solutions can be utilized throughout any organization for a variety of purposes, even as recently show on the Simpsons! (note Polycom SoundStation conference phone on the table). Furthermore, the way in which such tools are used (the application in a business process) can be quite different depending on the functional department or line of business (LOB) in which collaboration solutions are being implemented. In working with customers and partners through my position at Polycom I see several key areas in which collaboration is utilized to improve productivity and efficiencies within high performance organizations.

Corporate Communications

Whether it is a CEO giving a State of the Company address, a sales manager announcing quarterly incentive results or an HR director sharing the latest benefit enrollment package, collaboration solutions help break down the distance barrier by allowing the free flow of information. Important company announcements and information can be distributed more frequently and on demand to anywhere in the world. HD voice solutions make audio communications crisp and clear. Video communications and telepresence can enhance voice-only calls by providing a visual connection with the audience. Planning time and costs are reduced, comprehension is increased and information dissemination is easily coordinated. Live streaming and recording options can ensure an even more widespread communications reach.

Distance Learning and Training

The innovative use of collaboration solutions as training vehicles allow information dissemination to dispersed audiences regardless of location, thereby enabling employees, channel partners, franchises and suppliers to benefit from a quality learning environment without geographical boundaries. A virtual training classroom allows organizations large and small to quickly and easily share the latest corporate strategies, product information or market intelligence. Sessions can be archived and replayed by video streaming for on demand learning so students or new hires can attend courses at their convenience. Costs are decreased, relationships are strengthened, and geographical boundaries become insignificant.

Project Management

Any type of project – marketing launches, IT implementation, product roll outs or sales seminars – require steps that involve a high degree of collaboration between teammates. From material preparation to schedule coordination to implementation, collaboration solutions provide a more streamlined process for project management. In a new product launch, for example, steps might include product definition, design and testing, product release and life cycle management. Through the use of voice, video, content sharing and telepresence collaboration solutions, marketing teams and engineers worldwide can collaborate on product ideas... engineers can hold calls daily to expedite product design as effectively as in-person meetings... launch plan coordination is simplified and product information updates can be disseminated to the field instantly with increased comprehension on the receiving end.

Interviewing and RecruitingMy favorite application for collaboration tools and solutions is in the process of hiring and building a team. I have personally recruited, interviewed, and hired a number of my staff members by video conference without ever leaving the convenience of my office or putting the new recruits on a plane to HQ. Hiring the right candidate for the job is key in any organization but geographical boundaries, time-constraints and travel-cost limitations can impact the ability to find the most qualified candidates and get them hired quickly. The hiring process in most organizations takes on average three months as finding the right candidate for the job is a complex matter. Just think about the steps: job requisition development, posting, resume search and referrals, initial qualification interviews, face-to-face interviews, follow-up interviews with individuals in different locations, reference checks and then the delicate negotiation and acceptance phase. Collaboration tools shorten the interview process, reduce travel costs, eliminate geographic barriers and simplify scheduling, while maintaining critical face time.

By integrating voice, video, content, and telepresence collaboration solutions into business processes and work flows, all types of organizations can reduce costs, enhance organizational efficiency, improve employee quality of life and satisfaction, and improve company productivity. Efficient work flows + improved communications = competitive advantage.

Enable the Avaya Collaborative Cloud for your Enterprise

By Jon Alperin | 2 Jan 2012

Most enterprises are looking at ways to reduce cost and improve time-to-service. Most are also looking for ways to improve the operational efficiency of the data center. Wouldn't it be nice if you could deploy a new application across multiple data centers in an instant? Wouldn't it be nice if we could allow IT the ability to simply say "yes' when there is a new application or service needing to be deployed on the network?

The 2012 Avaya Technology Forum (February 6-9, 2012, Orlando, FL) will answer these questions, show you how to simplify your network, and showcase the brightest and the best technologies Avaya has to offer. The 3-day event features subject matter experts from Avaya providing insight on solutions that will move enterprises into the next generation of collaboration by building the Cloud-grade network infrastructure. Come join us for Avaya presentations, demonstrations from key DevConnect technology partners, and insight from industry analyst perspectives.

Avaya Virtual Enterprise Network Architecture (VENA) is our exciting new virtualization strategy for the next generation enterprise data networks. It is the infrastructure that will allow enterprises to build the private cloud and an architecture that is easily extensible from the data center to the campus and beyond. We believe that enterprise customers will see an immediate benefit by creating a virtualized data center backbone, making operations more efficient and allowing a better and tighter integration between application and network virtualization.

The Avaya Virtual Enterprise Network Architecture is empowered by its ability to integrate multiple different types of networks running across the virtual services fabric. These virtual service networks could be anything from business applications to unified communications, next generation collaboration, storage computing or some disruptive technology that doesn't yet exist but will have to be dealt with in the future.

These virtual networks can be created in seconds with single touch provisioning. We are able to build, create and configure the network core one time, and never have to touch it again. This reduces the human error factor, and makes it very easy and very quick from a time-to-service standpoint.

The next generation of network virtualization will make networks much more dynamic than they are today; you will create the infrastructure once and simply enable networks at the edge without the need to continually make modifications to core. These virtual service networks can be transparently extended within a data center or between data centers.

A critical factor in Avaya's VENA is the manner in which the network will migrate from where it is today into this truly dynamic infrastructure of the future. The Virtual Services Fabric can be enabled in parallel with all other protocols presently in use on the network. No need to change physical connections, no need to change existing configurations. You can migrate existing services into the fabric at your pace in the most non-disruptive manner possible.

With the Virtual Enterprise Network Architecture, Avaya is improving network uptime by delivering the infrastructure that creates the private cloud and nearly eliminate user-error network outages. We are reducing the time to service with simple one touch provisioning and we are improving the data center efficiency with a tighter integration between applications and network virtualization. We are reliably connecting users and content, with the lowest Total Cost of Ownership in the industry.

Bottom line... With an Avaya data network, every dollar you spend helps you get more IT work done.

The Biggest Business Opportunity in Bring-Your-Own Device

Posted on November 24, 2011 by Ian Gallagher

There’s a lot of talk about the post-PC era, but the reality is many Canadian organizations are still managing a huge fleet of desktops and have not truly taken advantage of the opportunities in this mobile-driven computing stack.

At Cisco, the shift toward Bring-Your-Own-Device (BYOD) has brought a multitude of new devices, operating systems and architectures to the corporate world. But the biggest and most meaningful change these tablets, laptops and smartphones could have on your business is the complete transformation of the way your employees collaborate.

New tablets and smartphones launch just about every month – a trend that continues to push the bar higher and higher for mobile apps and HD video capabilities. But just allowing iPhone or Android-based devices into your business isn’t enough. Collaboration software and services need to fill in some key gaps.

Over the last few weeks, we have made a strong push to do this for businesses of all sizes, unveiling a plethora of upgraded products and services in our collaboration solution portfolio. All of our technology announcements aim to take collaboration mobile and beyond the desktop.

With our updated Cisco WebEx, users will now be able to engage in high-quality video meetings from their Cisco Cius, Apple iPhone and Apple iPad devices. WebEx users will also be able to access files and presentations in the cloud from their PC or mobile devices. The ability for users to connect to Cisco TelePresence meetings from their tablet or smartphone, means employees will finally have enterprise-grade collaboration away from the confines of their office. If you haven’t tried the Cius with built-in TelePresence yet, this video may change your mind.

We also upgraded our Jabber platform, adding a plug-in that gives users TelePresence capabilities on Apple, BlackBerry, Android, Nokia and Windows products.

For employees working from home, on the road or in a branch office, our WAAS offering has been optimized for Citrix XenDesktop and HDX technology to help deliver virtual desktop and apps to mobile devices faster and with less bandwidth than ever before. As collaboration tools rely more on HD video, rich media and voice, building out a strong IT infrastructure to do the heavy lifting is crucial to delivering media-rich content to tablets and smartphones.

Making it easier to communicate via video to your employees’ mobile devices, we also announced technology that will be particularly exciting for Canada’s crop of small and medium-sized businesses.

To mark the fifth anniversary of our landmark Cisco TelePresence product portfolio, we also released the Cisco TelePresence MX300, an affordable nine-person TelePresence system that can be set up in about 15 minutes. We’ve also upped the BYOD ante and integrated TelePresence with Cisco Jabber to allow users to join TelePresence calls from their desktop PCs, laptops and tablets.

In our dedication to provide professional solutions that enable BYOD and scale to small businesses, we also released upgrades to two IP telephony platforms in our Unified Communications portfolio. The Cisco Business Edition 3000 and Cisco Business Edition 6000 bring video, instant messaging and presence to mid-size businesses still using aging public branch exchange (PBX) systems. Seamless integration with Cisco Jabber for instant messaging and presence rounds out the new features.

While these products updates were the highlights, they are just a sampling of Cisco’s recent activity in the collaboration space. To dive deeper into our latest collaboration portfolio and check out new videos and technical briefings on key collaboration technologies, please visit the Cisco Collaboration Virtual Launch Experience site.

With the move to BYOD becoming a reality for businesses of all sizes, you need technology solutions that make it simple and secure for your employees collaborate and access the information they need on the device they want. For IT managers, opening up your environment to strange new devices might seem like a scary experience, but at Cisco we can help usher you into the era of BYOD worry-free. Besides, as the saying goes “you never want a serious crisis to go to waste.”

Utilizing the power of new endpoint devices to connect your employees together like never before can empower your business to become more mobile, social, visual and virtual.

Embrace the post-PC era!

Avaya IP Office 8 to be released on November 30th, 2011

Very soon Avaya IP Office, “Release 8” will be available to the public. Here are some of the highlights:

-It will now support Linux based operating systems
-New expansion module for Voice Mail Pro server.
-Avaya Flare integration (Video Conferencing + Collaboration)
-The OneX portal will now be web-based and easier to use

Avaya is planning to make many great enhancements for this version. Check back soon for more updates!

Update: now that it is released check out more information on Avaya IP Office Release 8.0

Polycom Adds Whiteboard to Video Collaboration Functions

With its UC Board, Polycom is adding whiteboard capabilities to its room-based video collaboration offerings.

Polycom is adding another capability to its room-based video conferencing solution, enabling participants to better leverage the whiteboards that are common in conference rooms.

Polycom’s UC Board, announced Oct. 27, is integrated with the company’s RealPresence Room HDX offerings, enabling users to write on a whiteboard in one room and have participants in other locations see what is being written.

According to Polycom officials, during meetings, some people will get out of their seats and start writing on a whiteboard. In a video conference scenario, there was no easy way for people in other locations to easily see what was being written, short of moving the camera to more closely see the whiteboard or to take a photo of it and project it to the other participants. Having to do this hampers the collaborative feel of a meeting, they said.

With the UC Board, what’s being written in one room on a whiteboard will appear on the screen of other participants.

"The Polycom UC Board is the first integrated video collaboration solution to make sharing whiteboard content as easy as picking up a pen," Sudhakar Ramakrishna, executive vice president and general manager of UC solutions and chief development officer at Polycom, said in a statement. "That's great news for organizations of all kinds looking to bring remote employees and customers in a sales presentation, brainstorm, planning meeting, or training class with clear access to all the visual content being presented and discussed."

The UC Board is the latest innovation from Polycom in the hotly contested video collaboration space, which includes not only Cisco Systems but also such players as Logitech’s LifeSize Communications business, Radvision and Vidyo. It’s a market that research firm Infonetics Research says will see double-digit growth at least through 2015, and one that Cisco is the leader with 52 percent revenue share, followed by Polycom at 25 percent, according to Wainhouse Research.

Polycom has been aggressive in building out its capabilities, including launching an ambitious software strategy and bringing its video collaboration capabilities to Apple’s iPads and Android-based tablets. In addition, Polycom this month bought video collaboration software maker ViVu.

Its rivals also are extending their portfolios, including expanding their technologies onto mobile devices. Cisco on Oct. 26 rolled out a number of new additions to its TelePresence line to grow the reach of the solutions to SMBs, which in the past have shied away from the vendor’s immersive video collaboration products due to price or the belief that it was a closed environment.

According to Polycom officials, the UC Board leverages a wireless stylus and receiver to enable meeting members to write on a whiteboard in one location that remote participants can view on their screens. A compact infrared sensor is attached to a whiteboard and stylus, and it’s plugged into the Polycom video communications system via a USB connection. As users write on the blackboard, the image is streamed to other participants. It works with any standards-based system, including tablets, according to the company.

Polycom officials said they see multiple applications of the technology, from doctors working with patients who are in another location to remote students doing class work.

The UC Board is available immediately, starting at $1,999.

Source: http://www.eweek.com/

Avaya Refocuses on Collaboration Value

October 31st, 2011 | Author: Larry Walsh

In terms of real news, Avaya had little new to say at its partner conference last week in Mexico. But what it did say about communications and collaboration could have significant impact on the channel and the market.

Avaya is putting much of the past two years in the rearview mirror. It’s fielded a number of new products, mostly around video and unified communications, and it’s placed an emphasis on partner-led sales engagements.

None of those are changing. In fact, Avaya is stepping up efforts to support partners in the delivery and execution of new technologies that enable communication and collaboration. It unveiled a number of new training, marketing and support resources to aid partners in reaching customers and deploying systems.

“Rapidly changing technologies and rising infrastructure costs have made it more important than ever to make smart technology investments. Customers need solutions that increase productivity and simplify complexity — that provide cost savings and maximize return on investment. This is what Avaya and its partners have been delivering and what we are committed to helping our customers realize — faster, smarter, better technologies that enable communication and make collaboration more seamless,” said John DiLullo, president of Avaya Americas International.

The new resources being poured into the channel are a continuation of Avaya’s “The Power of We” program, through which the company is promoting the utility and value of its communications and collaboration tools to business.

The reason no real news is a good thing is that the show of consistency. Solution providers are increasingly worn down by the continuous change caused by technology and the introduction of new channel programs. Avaya choosing to augment rather than change partner initiatives is a solid indication of a strategy that’s working and productive.

The focus on “communications and collaboration” is what deserves the most attention. No more is Avaya content to talk about telephony, PBX switches, routers and other networking gear. It’s not even talking about its software that powers and rides on these devices. The theme is more a recognition that the world is looking for quality of service, not just the service and applications that makes collaboration possible.

Avaya isn’t the only hardware vendors talking about collaboration. Cisco is pushing new, affordable versions of its TelePresence products to the SMB market and working with Citrix to make better quality video conferencing on thin clients. Microsoft is always talking about collaboration and is working with networking vendors, including Avaya, to make integration of its Sync server more seamless.

For years, we’ve heard about the network being the platform and the need for network acceleration. What’s coming to fore with vendors like Avaya is the advent that the user experience isn’t about the underlying technology, but rather the utility and benefit drawn from the actual applications. In this regard, Avaya is conveying an easily understood message of value with its communications and collaboration themes.

* * *

Lawrence M. Walsh is CEO and president of The 2112 Group, a technology business advisory service that specializes in optimizing indirect channels and partner relationships. He’s also the executive director of the Channel Vanguard Council. He is the former publisher of Channel Insider and editor of VARBusiness Magazine. You can reach him at lmwalsh@the2112group.com.

Schneider Electric to Deliver Transformational Energy Management Capability With Cisco

Collaboration Provides Innovative Solution That Manages Energy Use Across the Entire Building Portfolio

LAS VEGAS, NV–(Marketwire – Jul 11, 2011) – Schneider Electric, a global specialist in energy management, today announced at Cisco Live, Cisco’s annual IT and communications conference, that it has teamed with Cisco to provide an innovative comprehensive energy management solution that monitors and manages energy consumption across all building domains. With this combined solution, building owners and managers, architects, contractors, and IT managers will now be able to optimize energy efficiencies and business operations to save energy.

Schneider Electric’s comprehensive EcoStruxure^™ active energy management architecture portfolio offers a single point of access that connects five domains of business expertise — power, data centers, process and machines, building control, and physical security — all within an open and flexible technology framework. The EcoStruxure architecture integrates with Cisco EnergyWise^™ embedded on the Cisco network infrastructure to provide a holistic building management solution, managing all energy-consuming building assets, such as HVAC, lighting, security and, for the first time, reduce energy waste generated from IT/IP assets, including PCs, phones, Catalyst switches, Power-over-Ethernet (PoE) endpoint devices and other IT devices.

With rising energy costs in buildings accounting for 42 percent of energy usage worldwide, there is an impetus to find ways of reducing energy consumption with these IP/IT devices within buildings and across the network.

“Looking for innovative ways to increase energy efficiency and enable business performance within buildings is what Schneider Electric does every day with thousands of customers worldwide,” said Chris Curtis, president and CEO, Buildings Business, Schneider Electric. “Combining Schneider Electric’s EcoStruxure architecture and Cisco EnergyWise provides organizations with the capability to go one step further and manage the energy consumption of IT/IP devices and PCs in the building management system domain for the first time. We are very excited about this opportunity and what our joint innovation will mean for reducing energy consumption in buildings across the globe.”

For example, two schools in Europe used the combined solution from Schneider Electric and Cisco in a pilot project and are currently saving approximately 30 percent of their IT energy, resulting in an overall reduction of close to 6 percent of their overall energy spend. Delivering a rapid, measurable return on investment (ROI), the combined solution provides users with the ability to reduce overall IT operating costs by up to 30 percent and overall building costs by close to 9 percent; to meet regulatory and compliance mandates; and to accomplish corporate sustainability goals.

In addition, the new combined solution enables organizations to:

• Monitor, report and manage energy usage across the entire corporate network or real estate infrastructure
• Create a more energy-efficient architecture for the IP/IT domain outside of the data center
• Better control where and how energy is being used to more intelligently and efficiently respond to smart grid signals
• Realize a new source of energy savings to fulfill corporate sustainability requirements, free up capital resources and quickly improve an organization’s overall bottom line

“Cisco EnergyWise is the leading solution in the industry that allows customers to monitor and control the power of their networking equipment and end devices connected to Cisco switches and routers,” said Jeff Reed, vice president of Cisco’s Unified Access Business Unit, Cisco. “By working with industry leading companies like Schneider Electric, we are providing building owners and managers the ability to monitor, report, and control their buildings’ entire energy usage, including IT infrastructure, through a single pane of glass resulting in greater operational efficiency and higher savings.”

Schneider Electric and Cisco have worked together for more than a decade and provide organizations with the tools to help reduce energy consumption up to 30 percent by taking advantage of the network as a platform for energy management. This relationship has extended from collaborations of unified communications in the data center and network closets to video surveillance and IP security. This expanded relationship further extends Schneider Electric’s established global leadership in energy management with Cisco’s industry leading IT energy management solution delivered via its Catalyst switch platforms to provide sustainable energy reduction, workforce efficiencies and overall improved business performance.

To learn more about Schneider Electric’s EcoStruxure approach for intelligent energy management solutions, please visit the EcoStruxure homepage located here.

The high cost of Cell Phone usage

ARE YOU PAYING TOO MUCH FOR YOUR CELL PHONE?

Today many businesses are looking for cost-saving measures especially when it comes to their cell phone usage. Paying too much for Cell Phones is a common problem we hear.

There are a multitude of solutions being offered out there today. With the advent of Wi-Fi calling customers can now deploy software on their smart phones which allows them to jump off the cellular network and use their cell phone data package to make and receive calls.

By integrating their cell phones to the customers office IP PBX Telephone System, customers can now utilize their office phone system as a tool to provide cost savings as well as improved functionality and enhanced productivity.

To learn more contact TRC Networks at 416.398.4448 or 1.800.398.4044

Collaboration is a mindset

By Jon Alperin | 21 Jun 2011

This week, Gartner issued a press release in support of their recent PPM and IT Governance Summit entitled "5 collaboration myths." Number one myth on their list? "The right tools will make us collaborative."

Perhaps this sounds heretical from someone working for Avaya, especially as we significantly increase focus on collaboration technologies and solutions, but I wholeheartedly agree with Gartner's statement.

A couple of months ago, I took part in some Avaya leadership training, and we spent a good bit of time discussing corporate norms and behaviors that had the potential to limit our success. A lot of this dialog centered around increasing the value and effectiveness of collaboration across Avaya organizations, our customers and our channels.

You've undoubtedly heard the adage "You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make him drink."

Most businesses should have a similar saying -- "You can provide collaboration tools, but you cannot make 'em collaborate."

Effective collaboration (and the key word here is "effective") requires more than just putting powerful, intuitive tools in the hands of your users and customers. It requires a mindset to commit oneself to exploiting the benefits of these tools, and doing so consistently and with purpose.

As an example, I have a peer who refuses to use instant messaging tools, viewing them as intrusive. This individual doesn't want to be bothered by ad-hoc, distracting messages from anyone and everyone, demanding instant attention to their questions and interruptions.

I can understand that. But there are times, particularly when we are on a conference call with customers, channel partners, or peers, that instant messaging and multi-party chat capabilities can be a powerful back-channel, testing proposals and verifying facts before speaking publicly.

The fact that my peer is simply unwilling to use the collaboration tools put in front of them under any circumstances, simply because there are certain circumstances (many circumstances, perhaps) where they find the tool to be less than ideal, means the overall collaboration experience in which they participate is certainly less than ideal. And, in turn, that makes everyone involved in the collaboration effort less effective.

Gartner explains that "Technology can make it easier to collaboration when applications mirror a more intuitive, fluid work style, but selecting a tool without addressing the roles, processes, metrics and the organization's workplace climate is putting the cart before the horse."

Or, as I said at our leadership team discussion, "Collaboration is a mindset, not a toolset."

So as your organization considers the metrics and KPI's you'll use you measure the value of investments in collaboration technologies, take time to also assess your organizations mental fortitude and attitude to make collaboration itself work effectively. It could make a major impact to your ROI calculations.

Avaya & Nortel Phone Systems now support BlackBerry

RIM recently announced plans to make BlackBerry Mobile Voice System 5 available to more corporate phone systems and unified communications applications. BlackBerry MVS 5.1 with voice over Wi-Fi calling will be available this summer for Avaya Aura 6.1, Avaya CS1000 Communication Server, as well as legacy phone systems such as Avaya Communications Manager and Nortel Communication Server. It is currently available for Cisco Unified Communications Manager, Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express version 6.1 or later. They are tailored to suit your PBX environment, so you can enjoy one caller ID, unified voice mail, and advanced security features for BlackBerry smartphones. This will unify desk phone features with BlackBerry smartphones and Wi-Fi networks to optimize costs and coverage, and make users more reachable.

Avaya’s strong market position with legacy Nortel systems, BlackBerry gains access to a huge market, while Avaya and Nortel users gain access to a great mobile application that gives them cost savings and enhances functionality.


BlackBerry MVS 5 is integrated directly into the BlackBerry smartphone client and supports calls over cellular or Wi-Fi networks with seamless handoff. A user can make or take a call over the office Wi-Fi network office, walk outside, get in the car and drive home, with the call automatically and completely seamlessly switched over to the cellular network and then back to a SOHO Wi-Fi network at home. BlackBerry MVS offers the convenience of single number reach and supports phone system features like hold, transfer and ad-hoc conferencing.” Calls are routed through the enterprise phone system, so least-cost routing offers savings on outbound long-distance and international roaming charges.

Watch the video

by Ray Horak, Technology Editor, Telecom Reseller. Edited By Scott Camball

Collaborate Anywhere: Getting Down to Business

By Wilson Korol | 1 Jun 2011

Those who read this blog regular know well my interest and passion for Avaya web.alive. The virtual world is a significant upgrade in collaboration, makes work more fun and productive. A virtual world is also many orders of magnitude more resource and energy efficient. Today, I am turning the blog over to a guest author, Joe Rigby, marketing director at MellaniuM Inc. MellaniuM is a virtual worlds design firm specializing in the Avaya Web.alive platform, and today Joe is writing about the work his firm is doing to create dynamic web.alive environments, both from the current world and from past time periods. With these environments, you are able to add a fun and engaging element to your web.alive experience.

A reminder, you can join me in web.alive for Avaya sustainability office hours at demo.avayalive.com every Thursday at 11 am EST.

Getting Down to Business
Joe Rigby, marketing director at MellaniuM Inc

With a feature set designed originally for the enterprise, web.alive is a web browser plug-in that integrates with your existing network, security and business applications to enhance communications, collaboration, and employee or consumer engagement. In this way, web.alive minimizes operational overhead, dramatically increases accessibility to your users, and delivers face-to-face interaction at the low cost of Web collaboration. Avaya web.alive represents the future of communications and offers the best of publicly and privately accessible immersive Web conferencing.

MellaniuM has leveraged this platform to produce unique and innovative environments scaled to up to 10 km. square containing high polygon modeling. These environments can be developed from both existing 3D mesh models compiled from any CAD software or geo-referenced terrain maps using the latest UAV scanning techniques. For example, it is entirely possible to create scaled replicas of long gone masterpieces of the Industrial Revolution or entire archaeological reconstructions or the lost civilizations of ancient Egypt. This customization means you can add a unique spin to your next meeting in web.alive.

Examples of MellaniuM environments include
The Titanic

The Temple of Horus

How does the design take place? Joe writes on his blog,

Now I know that most of you are waiting -- almost in rapture with anticipation -- for the soon-to-be-released timeline for the eventual introduction of the gridwide capability of the importation of meshes into the Second Life and OpenSim architectures. Web.alive is fully functional in this regard and 3D models with millions of polygons in almost any format can be recompiled and imported through the Web.alive editor. How does this impact in any way the potentialities of the Web.alive platform? To put it bluntly it makes all the difference in the virtual world.

At MellaniuM, we have taken their 3D Studio Max OBJ file format aerial scans -- with over 400,000 polygons -- and imported them into Web.alive. The geo-referenced Google Map image was combined with 320 scans of the 3D terrain scanned by the unmanned aerial vehicle utilized by PIX4D. We imported the textured model into Web.alive. As an attempt at proof of concept it was flawless. The entire dimensionally accurate replica of the mine can be visited by anyone on the planet to plan and designate resources or discuss the financial viability. The next step is to further extend the capability and develop higher resolution virtual replicas of everything and anything that can be commercially valuable.

Avaya Evolves Business Collaboration for Mobile Workers

As the second day of the International Avaya User Group conference got underway in Las Vegas, Avaya announced the next step in the evolution of unified communications solutions for mobile employees that expand flexibility, enable more efficient collaboration and reduce the cost of supporting a growing mobile workforce. The latest Avaya one-X soft client solutions enable higher levels of productivity for workers in any location through a consistent user experience delivered by Avaya Aura unified communications applications to the broadest range of mobile consumer devices.

“Today, Avaya gives mobile users the broadest range of choice to seamlessly integrate consumer devices into their enterprise toolkit. Further, Avaya UC Mobility solutions provide a consistent experience across multiple devices, simplifying access to people and information and freeing users from the limits of their location or situation,” saidAnthony Bartolo, vice president and general manager, Unified Communications, Avaya
cost of ownership.

Among the enhancements to Avaya’s industry leading portfolio of unified communications soft clients for mobile workers:

• Support for new devices including: Android-based devices such the Samsung Galaxy II; Apple MAC OS, Apple iPhone 3GS and 4G, and RIM/Blackberry touchscreen devices in addition to Symbian and Windows-based operating systems
• A new SIP client for Apple iOS on iPad, iPod Touch and iPhone enabling UC and voice over wifi or cellular networks
• Presence status of team members available across Avaya endpoints and soft clients – including Microsoft OCS – and mobile devices
• Unified call logs, contact lists and voice messages across all endpoints and soft clients
• Consolidation of mobile UC client applications, management and administration onto a single, virtualized server reduces IT support requirements and operating costs for low total cost of ownership.

Jongshin Kim, Vice president of Media Solution Center at Samsung Electronics said, “As the leader in Android-based smartphones, Samsung sees a huge benefit to our customers being able to access all capabilities of their business communications systems while mobile. We are delighted to deliver the first Android-based smartphone to offer Avaya one-X Mobile, a world-class unified communications and collaboration solution, on our enterprise ready devices including the Galaxy S II. Together with Avaya, we can provide simplified, seamless access to powerful business communications and collaboration anywhere in the world.”

For more information, please visit www.avaya.com.

Study Reveals Quantitative and Qualitative Benefits of Video Collaboration for Workers Worldwide

By Mae Kowalke, TMCnet Contributor

Just about everyone in the business world agrees that video collaboration has great potential to help people work more efficiently and reliably when virtual meetings or remote teamwork are necessary or beneficial. Yet this technology is not utilized as much as it should be given its potential.

Why should this be the case? Is the technology itself the problem? Perhaps its capabilities are over-touted and it is not yet ready for primetime. Or, are perception and business practices the problem? Perhaps there is an unwillingness to try something new, or to adjust processes to allow video collaboration technology to shine.

Last year, Cisco (News - Alert) set out to answer those and related questions by commissioning a worldwide study of video collaboration technologies (telepresence, video conferencing) in the business environment. Representative samples of workers in 12 markets around the globe were polled about the well known and lesser-known benefits of video collaboration, and asked about usage to uncover trends.

Results from the study reveal two broad findings: the differences in perception and work habits between those who use video collaboration and those who do not, and why the “soft” benefits of this technology (e.g. improved work-life balance) are important.

The biggest barriers to adoption of video collaboration, the study found, are not technology limitations but rather lack of experience and/or lack of understanding about how benefits outweigh costs. People who regularly use this technology are generally eager to extol its benefits, and overwhelmingly say it is worth the cost. Yet those who do not use it have a hard time understanding why it would benefit them. It truly is a case of seeing-is-believing.

“Ninety percent of those who use video conferencing technologies once or more per week say video collaboration technologies save them at least 2 hours of valuable work time a week—yet only 33 percent of nonusers believe they could save any time using the technology,” Cisco said in a report about the study.

Closing the gap between users and nonusers, therefore, is a critical challenge. It is usually most effective if adoption occurs from the top down—starting with executives.

“A much higher percentage of executive-level workers perceive time savings from video collaboration (79 percent) as compared to nonsupervisory workers (36 percent) who need to travel less,” Cisco noted.

For skeptical nonusers, it is often the case that justification for giving this technology a try is simply a quantitative numbers game—saving money on travel costs, improving productivity, and the like. Yet, for video collaboration users, some of the most compelling benefits are qualitative (increased competitive advantage, bringing people together).

Qualitative benefits of video collaboration highlighted by users include enhanced experience when working from home, helping businesses maintain continuity if a disruption occurs, helping organizations project a forward-looking view, improved group collaboration and reduced confusion.

There is also a big variance in how video collaboration is perceived, and how much it is used, in different places around the world.

“Significant gaps exist in the perception and use of the technology among nations, with online workers in China consistently ranking high in terms of usage and perceived benefits,” Cisco said in its report. “More than half of respondents in China use video collaboration technology (56 percent)—more than double the respondents of any other country.”

Other countries would surely benefit from following China’s lead in this area.

“These communication tools are helping workers build strong relationships with their clients and with colleagues who work at other locations,” Cisco said. “Using solutions such as telepresence and video conferencing in the workplace can also positively affect the personal lives of today’s workers by helping them achieve a better work-life balance.”

Given all its benefits, the good news is that usage of video collaboration technologies is growing, and will continue to do so.

“More workers are using video collaboration and telepresence more frequently, and more than one-third of nonusers worldwide intend to use the technology as soon as it becomes available to them,” Cisco reported. “Costs for video collaboration and telepresence solutions are on the decline while quality is improving exponentially, so workers who do not yet have access to the technology, or have the opportunity to use it only occasionally, may not need to wait long to experience the many potential benefits of the visually enabled workplace.”

Inspiring Freshmen - HD Video in University

By Craig Wilson | 5 Apr 2011

I just spent an hour or so, listening to brief lectures on TED. TED (www.ted.com) provides a forum for interesting speakers to talk about their work, passions, and potentially unorthodox propositions.

I'd like to point out two things about the TED lectures. First, I never attended a TED conference, I've enjoyed these online. The second is that they were delivered by passionate people, who found the opportunity to present exciting, cared and had thought through their subject of discussion to make each lecture compelling. Occassionally, I happened on a lecture that wasn't interesting to me, and the lecture was still enjoyable, but when the subject was of interest, the lecture was gripping.

Cast back to my undergraduate years at university. Five courses per year for 4 years, equals a potential of at least 20 lecturers. Some enjoyed teaching; others saw it as an obstacle to their research. Three of them stood out as TED type lecturers. - passionate, informative, invigorating. Through my undergraduate program, one professor got (and it wasn't the first time) a standing ovation at the end of his 2nd year course delivery. Surprisingly, that was a course in social theory - Hobbes, Machiavelli, Rousseau, and Marx - not exactly most student's main stay. However, Cyril Levitt, was a compelling speaker. The point is, three in 20 is not the best ratio, for getting an undergraduate excited about an academic program.

Look today. This is a sample of the findings from www.ratemyprof.com. The courses and schools are relatively speaking irrelevant - at the highest cost schools there are poor professors, and at the smaller public schools there are highly acclaimed speakers. In this subject, 21 professors were rated:

• 5 Star professors, 7
• 4 Star professors, 5
• 3 Star professors, 0
• 2 Star professors, 4
• 1 Star professors, 5

Separate the politics of academic freedom from the reality that students (the customers) are paying the university (the vendor) to educate them, and you quickly realize that from a vendor perspective, there is ample room for improvement. An examination of 10 entry level courses across disciplines revealed that while 56% of students ranked their teachers 5 out of 5, 32% ranked those teachers as 1 or 2 out of 5. From a classical business to consumer perspective, 32% of customers found dealing with the vendor unsatisfactory.

The focus on entry level undergraduate courses is deliberate. For the most part a freshman course's content is fairly standard. The courses are preparatory or introductory in nature, building the foundation on which more advanced studies can take place.
As a student, what would you prefer; to take the course via video with an interesting, engaging professor, or have a near 50% chance of a poor teacher in a live setting? If my experience with TED (and the less than interesting prof's that were inflicted upon me) is an indication I'd rather have the video opportunity.

What if universities collaborated to provide freshmen with the most motivating, captivating and exciting teachers at their disposal? For example, school A delivers Introductory Political Science / Anthropology / Linear Algebra / Organic Chemistry lectures using videos of School B's more engrossing professor. Or even more simply, the introduction to psychology course is delivered to all students via video on-demand by the Professor with the highest student rating last year.

Live video in an HD environment with lower bandwidth requirements carried over the university's network can make this a reality. And it could generate significant benefits.

From a university perspective:

• Lower per student cost for freshman course delivery.
• Distance based learning expansion.
• Student choice.

From a faculty perspective:

• Decreased teaching burden for those not particularly adept at teaching.
• A more motivating work environment, by removing unenjoyable work tasks.
• Differentiated compensation streams for education and research contribution.

From a student perspective:

• More captivating lecturers.
• Distance support.
• Replay of recorded lectures.
• The potential for a lower cost price point for courses attended via video.

If one of the educational goals of a university is to inspire students to reach higher, then delivering excellent classes assumes importance. If I look back, even at my graduate courses in Social Theory, the value of a motivated teacher remains clear. And, conversations with faculty have only reinforced that point of view.

With the availability of lower bandwidth, high definition video, to an array of end-points using standard protocols, rethinking how best to serve the educational needs of freshmen becomes reallity.

Collaboration is Hot … Very Hot (How Collaboration at Cisco Resulted in Email Reduction – A Case Study)

By Sheila Jordan | April 13, 2011 at 12:34 pm PST

Picking up on my blog last week about how Cisco’s own collaboration solution, our Integrated Workforce Experience or IWE, is showing tangible results of business value, I’d like to talk today about another great example at Cisco. This particular case shows how IWE significantly cut down email volumes.

My colleague Lance Perry, who leads Customer Strategy and Success IT, has been an active user of IWE in his organization. Lance has been well ahead of the collaboration curve. When IWE was launched, he instructed his team to use IWE exclusively in place of email through the establishment of two IWE communities.

The results were impressive. IWE effectively replaced mostly internal email messages that were sent and received, with the result being nearly an 82 percent reduction in overall email traffic within this group. In addition, there was a significant drop in the total email size within Lance’s team.

Like many active work groups, Lance’s organization regularly sent massively-sized PowerPoint documents back and forth for review in preparation for executive presentations. This volume dropped almost completely. Presentations and documents are now stored within the community instead of being attached to email messages. As you might imagine, this allows for more knowledge sharing and discovery, and less email storage of multiple copies and versions.

Lance says it best: “Things that took seven steps take two. Things that took five steps take one. It’s getting so simple.”

The benefits are telling: increased productivity, faster document sharing, improved connecting with colleagues, and collaboration on document content.

So, while this is a small organization within Cisco, it nonetheless demonstrates the business value of IWE:

• Cost avoidance
• Time to capability cut to more than half

What’s also impressive is how Lance managed to get his team to radically change their behaviors – that is, to stop using emails for document sharing!

If you’d like to read more, check out this link.

I’ll blog more next time about how other Cisco functional groups are using IWE to make our operations more streamlined and efficient. I’d love to hear your stories as well.

Happy Collaborating!

74% Of SMBs To Increase Cloud Software Spend

More than half of smaller firms plan to boost their 2011 budgets for collaboration software, according to Egnyte.

By Kevin Casey , InformationWeek

Nearly three in four (74%) small and midsize businesses (SMBs) will increase their spending on cloud-based software in 2011, according to a recent survey conducted by Egnyte.

Over half -- 51% -- of SMBs, meanwhile, will bump up their budgets for collaboration software this year. Egnyte, which sells storage, backup, file sharing, and other Web-based services, polled 125 of its resellers on the 2011 spending plans of their SMB customers. The survey was conducted online earlier this year by Zoomerang.

Those rather rosy outlooks for the year ahead could turn even brighter: 44% of respondents to the collaboration software spending question said "I don't know," while just 6% answered a definitive "No." (Egnyte rounded up the final percentage breakdowns in its report, which results in a total of 101% for the collaboration question.)

To exploit the natural synergy of smartphones and tablets with the cloud, first nail down solid mobile and cloud strategies.

Cloud and Mobile Computing: Better Together

Likewise, only 2% of respondents said no when asked about spending increases on cloud-based software overall. Although it goes by many names -- Web-based, online, software as a service (SaaS) -- cloud, in this case, refers to software hosted off-site and online.

The survey's results come on the heels of Parallels' recent $8.6 billion valuation of today's overall SMB cloud market. That study, which included all hosted IT functions, projected an additional $13 billion of future growth for the SMB market. Other reports released earlier this year have signaled increased IT spending overall in the SMB sector.

The apparent loosening of the IT purse-strings at smaller companies could be the result of repeatedly delaying tech refreshes during the recent recession. Analysys Mason analyst Steve Hilton made note of that broader trend in a recent interview, saying: "The global economy is turned around, so in the developed markets of the world, small businesses are starting to see their businesses grow again." As a result, it would appear SMBs -- though always focused on costs and realizing quantifiable returns on their technology investments -- are ready to update.

A rather specific -- and just a bit leading -- question in Egnyte's survey asked: "What portion of your customers (SMBs) who operate virtual businesses or have remote workers and offices could benefit from cloud storage services?" A full 38% said "all of them." The poll also asked if hybrid cloud storage services are viable replacements for file servers at SMBs; 79% answered yes.

While the news would appear good for cloud providers that target smaller businesses, those that sell their products through third-party partners may need to temper their excitement somewhat. When asked if cloud computing vendors "adequately address the needs of resellers" today, 68% said no.

Avaya Transforms Business Collaboration

Innovative Video Solutions Make Real-Time Collaboration More Accessible and More Effective for Enterprises and End-Users

BASKING RIDGE, N.J. – Avaya, a global leader in enterprise communications systems, software and services, today announced a family of real-time enterprise video communications and collaboration products and services that deliver a simpler, more compelling end user experience. Highlighting this next wave of Avaya's innovative, fit-for-purpose solutions is the Avaya Flare™ Experience, the industry's first, next-generation user experience that delivers unique collaboration capabilities across video, voice and text.

The new solutions, which range from personal desktop to multi-screen room systems, make high definition, low bandwidth video collaboration accessible for more employees in more enterprises at one-third the cost and using significantly less bandwidth than competing solutions. Avaya Aura™ – the first true Session Initiation Protocol-based, unified communications architecture for multi-vendor, multi-location and multi-modal communications – makes video calls and conferencing as easy as making a telephone call by using the same platform for both. Businesses integrate real-time video into their core Avaya Aura infrastructure for better control of costs, quality of service, administration and management. Adding video functionality to the network is as simple as adding video-capable endpoints since no overlay network is required.

Today's announcement marks an important milestone in the 10-year history of Avaya as it transforms how companies communicate by providing open, flexible collaboration applications that help businesses streamline processes, make faster decisions and compete more effectively. The rollout is the latest delivery against the multi-phase product roadmap that Avaya first introduced in January. Since then, Avaya's Innovation Series has delivered advancements in unified communications and collaboration across its Small and Mid-Size Enterprise, Data Solutions and Contact Center portfolios as well as the Avaya Agile Communication Environment and Avaya Aura 6.0 communications platform.

Real-time, unified communications is at a crossroads as employees and IT departments spend too much time juggling and managing siloed applications, networks and directories that dictate the behavior of the user. According to Kevin Kennedy, president and CEO, Avaya, current enterprise video solutions further complicate the picture.

"To be fully productive, employees need to simply connect via easy-to-use, fully integrated video, voice and text capabilities," Kennedy said. "This is the heart of Avaya's people-centric approach to collaboration and the means to faster, better results with less effort and a lower total cost of ownership. We're delivering a more potent collaboration experience at one-third the cost using substantially less bandwidth over other solutions on the market today."

Findings in a recent survey by Webtorials indicate use of video is expected to grow rapidly as the cost, ease of use and quality improves, with respondents projecting the number of users who will make frequent use of videoconferencing to explode by 400 percent over the next two years. For that to happen however, four most commonly noted obstacles need to be overcome: the high cost of equipment and bandwidth, the need for a special room, lack of integration with other applications and data sources and frequent, disruptive issues during videoconferencing sessions.(1)

The solutions Avaya announced today solve these challenges and more. The company's real-time communications portfolio now includes the following collaboration technologies and services:

The Avaya Flare Experience breaks down the barriers between today's communications and collaboration tools with a distinctive user interface for quick, easy access to desktop voice and video, social media, presence and Instant Messaging, audio/video/web conferencing, a consolidated view of multiple directories, context history and more. The Flare Experience features a central spotlight that highlights active or in-progress communications: Initiating a communication session is as easy as moving one or more contacts from the directory into the spotlight. For text messages, a pop-up keyboard appears when a user taps a text-based icon under a contact's photo. Developed on the Android™ operating system, the Avaya Flare Experience provides employees with:

• An intuitive, 'touch and swipe' user interface from which employees can communicate in any mode, check messages, schedule meetings and appointments, and receive alerts or reminders
• Drag-and-drop voice and video calling and conferencing, with the ability to separate from a call for sidebar interactions via voice, email or IM, and subsequently rejoin the conference without interrupting the call in progress
• A virtual 'Rolodex' that provides a singular view of multiple directories, including corporate and personal, Facebook, Twitter and others. Users flip through to find the person with whom they want to collaborate, see their availability, select the preferred mode of communication and launch the connection
• The ability to download productivity and business applications, including the ever-growing set of Android-based tools

The Avaya Flare Experience is initially sold with the Avaya Desktop Video Device but will soon be made available for other environments, including PCs, laptops, tablet PCs, and smartphones. The Avaya Flare Experience leverages the Avaya Aura 6.0 solutions announced in July, including Avaya Aura Conferencing and Avaya Aura Messaging.

The Avaya Desktop Video Device has been developed especially for the Avaya Flare Experience as a cost-effective, video-enabled desktop collaboration endpoint for executive desktops or power communicators that can also perform as a customer kiosk. The Avaya Desktop Video Device features a large 11.6" HD touch screen with video and audio capabilities supported by a HD 720-pixel camera and HD-quality voice supported by built-in dual microphones. The device will enable campus-wide mobility via SIP and WiFi. The device also offers USB connectivity for an optional keyboard or handset, 3G/4G access or a thumb drive. Upcoming versions will support remote access over VPN connections and 4G access.

The Avaya Flare Experience for Avaya 9600 Series Deskphones provides voice, conference control, instant messaging and presence capabilities plus desktop integration with Microsoft Outlook for contact management. These latest capabilities bring new value to the desk phone, enabling the user to have a sidebar chat while talking on the phone or to find experts from a variety of directories.

The Avaya Collaboration Server provides all of the Avaya Aura 6.0 core functions on a single server, enabling businesses to quickly take advantage of the Avaya Flare Experience, Avaya Desktop Video Device and Avaya Video Conferencing Solutions over existing, multi-vendor H.323 and/or SIP communications systems with support for up to 50 endpoints.

Avaya Video Conferencing Solutionsrange from individual employee desktop video to small group systems to large, multi-screen conference rooms. The videoconferencing solutions are easy to deploy to any location with centralized operation and management via Avaya Aura, which offers bandwidth control and eliminates the need for an overlay video network. Cost and bandwidth requirements are a fraction of most competitive offers on the market today. Avaya Video Conferencing Solutions include:

• Avaya one-X® Communicator Desktop Video Soft Client, which provides cost-effective SIP-based video in a comprehensive UC desktop interface that offers tools such as IM, presence, click-to-video conference and integrates with desktop environments from Adobe, IBM and Microsoft.
• Avaya 1010 and 1020 video systems for workgroup or small conference rooms, which provide high quality, simple-to-use video in a small, cost-effective footprint suitable for two or three people.
• Avaya 1030, 1040 and 1050 video systems for mid- to large-size conference rooms, which are dual-screen systems allowing content-sharing along with the face-to-face video conferencing experience. The 1040 and 1050 also include integrated, multi-party conferencing bridges for connecting multiple sites.
• Avaya Videoconferencing Manager 6.0, which provides a breadth of management tools, including conference scheduling, configuration and monitoring accessible from Avaya Aura System Manager.

Avaya Professional Services for Video offer a menu of consulting services to help ensure success with smooth, on-time, on-budget video implementations that deliver maximum ROI and user requirement assessment and business case development; design and planning; video readiness assessments; implementation and integration with SIP or existing H.323 environments, and optimization services.

Avaya Managed Video Services offer help desk and end user support for setting up and managing video that includes scheduling, quality-of-service active monitoring and H.323 integration for internal or external videoconferences. The managed video service is ideal for companies that want to take advantage of video but lack the day-to-day management and expertise in their IT organizations.

Avaya web.alive is now available via software-as-a-service. Avaya web.alive is a virtual reality, meeting space business communications platform that uses personalized avatars and rich, spatial audio and visuals to bring a new dimension to training and distance learning, business meeting collaboration or role-playing that improves event outcomes, customer engagement and sales opportunities. Avaya web.alive is simple to learn and use, features rich analytics to help measure ROI and can integrate with and leverage current enterprise software.

"This is a significant announcement from Avaya," said Roopam Jain, Industry Director, Conferencing and Collaboration, Frost & Sullivan. "I am very impressed with the user interface of the new video device. It seems intuitive and easy to use. We have been waiting for Avaya to provide their end-to-end video strategy and what I have heard is well defined."

LIVE WEBCASTAvaya will be demonstrating the Avaya Flare Experience and Collaboration Device in a live webcast today. To participate in the webcast, please click on the following link: http://bit.ly/bCgD2L

Additional information, photos, demos, etc. are available in the Avaya News Room at: http://www.avaya.com/gcm/master-usa/en-us/corporate/pressroom/index.htm