By Michael Chetner, vice president, Asia Pacific, Polycom
Several business trends are converging and new technologies are emerging, evolving the human collaboration experience and dramatically enhancing the way we work together. Our appetite for increased connectedness is driving innovators to create new ways to bring us closer together. These new technologies, such as social business, mobility, and cloud-delivered services, are the driving forces behind a whole new paradigm for communication that is focused on the power of video collaboration.
According to the 2011 Frost - Sullivan NZ Unified Communications market report, New Zealand's unified communications sector was worth $113.3 million in 2010 and is forecast to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 9.3% between 2011 and 2017. Strong growth in the video conferencing and collaboration sector is expected due to increased demand for video conferencing solutions. The video sector is forecast to grow at a CAGR of 15.6% in the same period, driven by its effectiveness at reducing travel costs and improving business productivity.
So what key drivers are changing the video conferencing industry while simultaneously solving the challenge of being there through the power of video collaboration?
1. Software delivery to mobile devices
With most of us needing to be remote or mobile at some time, there is a growing demand for extending video collaboration beyond the office and conference room as executives embrace mobility and tablets to improve business productivity. With embedded HD video conferencing software now on many tablets, users enjoy a similar experience while on the move as they would in the office or boardroom.
2. Web-based delivery to social apps
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.2 As consumers and knowledge workers rapidly adopt social business and video collaboration, seamlessly integrating the two technologies addresses a clear market need. Video-enabled social platforms including Facebook and YouTube give people a powerful communication vehicle to engage deeply with others in their social circles.
Video collaboration promotes richer conversations, more effective discussions, faster decision-making, and improved creativity and brainstorming. Additionally, with Generation ‘Z' entering the workforce, the first generation to have grown up with the internet, their communication expectations are vastly different to previous generations. They are the knowledge workers who will expect video to be part of their business life.
3. Cloud-based delivery of Video-as-a-Service
With enterprise spending on cloud infrastructure and services growing four times faster than overall IT spending2, and technology and standards maturing, the "video cloud” is set to explode in 2012. Companies like Polycom are providing cloud solutions designed specifically for service providers, equipping them with carrier-grade infrastructure, endpoints and services to offer businesses of all sizes subscription-based solutions for video collaboration.
4. Embedded software on computing device
In January 2012, Lenovo was the first PC manufacturer to announce plans to embed video collaboration solutions on Lenovo computing devices including tablets and laptops. This trend is set to continue as video conferencing becomes increasingly normalised within office culture.
5. Open-standards-based interoperability
As more companies adopt video communication strategies there is a movement towards eliminating silos caused by systems that don't talk to each other and adopting open standards to drive interoperability across all elements in a communications environment. This includes multiple solutions, vendors, networks and connection protocols. It gives customers the ability to choose best-of-breed solutions, promoting collaboration no matter where they are or what network, carrier, protocol, application or device they use.
Video is now at a major inflection point – expanding from its traditional enterprise role as an on-premise system to more people, more places and more devices that are transforming the way companies work.