Results from the IDC Worldwide Enterprise Videoconferencing and Telepresence Qview show Q1 2013 videoconferencing equipment revenue declined 13.2% year over year and 21.9% quarter over quarter. Total worldwide enterprise videoconferencing and telepresence equipment revenue was $563.4 million in Q1, its worst result since the second quarter of 2010, according to IDC.

“Despite another weak quarterly performance in the worldwide enterprise videoconferencing market, we still see video adoption being driven by interest in doing video integrations with vendor UC&C portfolios and business processes, as well as the increasing use of video collaboration for small workgroup, desktop, and mobile users, says IDC.”

From a market segment perspective, endpoints declined 10.7% year over year (that includes multi-codec immersive telepresence, single-codec telepresence, and personal videoconferencing) while video network infrastructure decreased 20.5% year over year in Q1. Read more...

Polycom releases a free whitepaper in collaboration with Aragon Research on the subject of enterprise video-- The Perfect Storm in Enterprise Video: Act Now or Get Left Behind.

The paper discusses the major video on the network shifts currently taking place in enterprise, with insight on key trends and how enterprises need to keep up in order to avoid losing competitive advantage.

It also talks on VEBAs (video-enabled business applications) enterprises must embrace today unless they want to risk getting left behind.

The paper covers Read more...

by Michael Doyle, Executive Director of the Virtual Edge Institute

In 2012, Cisco Live Australia captured 35 sessions with video, audio and slides. In 2013, they stepped up the program and captured 160 sessions – 100% of the content being delivered at the physical event. Cisco Live Mexico and London also captured 100%.

“That was always our stretch goal, even many years ago,” says Dan Gerson, Cisco Live 365 Content Manager. “We always wanted to capture all this great content. It was just always cost- prohibitive in the past.”

Using Cisco technology, the team built a remote video capture system that allowed just two people to monitor, make adjustments and capture 18 rooms simultaneously. In the past, this same solution would have required at least one person per room manning the cameras and equipment. With the new solution, the camera is set at the back of each room and controlled in a remote monitoring room. The technician can pan, tilt or zoom the camera, and also listen to the audio feed or view slides.

Each room is connected to a network using Cisco’s Telepresence infrastructure (one server can record up to ten rooms). C-Series codecs are deployed in each room with the cameras. No additional lighting was used as the cameras are good in low light. (Pay a little more for better cameras and save on lighting.) Read more...

Citrix announces the general availability in Europe of GoToWebcast, a low-cost, self-service webcasting tool for up to 5000 attendees.

With the launch of GoToWebcast, Citrix delivers a simple-to-use, self-service webcasting solution to help organizations of any size save money and extend their communications globally.

A subscription-based webcasting tool, GoToWebcast allows users to broadcast unlimited audio and video presentations to live and on-demand audiences of up to 5,000 viewers, including mobile devices.

GoToWebcast provides a feature-rich, scalable, solution for hosting town hall meetings, financial briefings or multimedia entertainment events. Attendees can view webcasts from a computer or mobile device, giving speakers the flexibility to reach audiences irrespective of time or location. Read more...