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Sales
0118 9740125
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About
the Evolving Marketplace
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In the early 1980's,
when VideoConferencing began to make its mark
on the business community, manufacturers were
few and the cost and size of the systems demanded
some long, hard thinking by prospective customers.
As a result, the dominant players of the day,
GEC, CLI, BT, VTEL, SAT are no longer the companies
which spring to mind when making a purchase.
During the 90's, the industry
was revolutionised by the introduction of hardware
cards for installation in standard desktop PC's.
Picturetel, VCON and Zydacron led the race and
although still costly in comparison to most PC
hardware, complete desktop kits were a fraction
of the cost of the large, dedicated room systems
that went before them. |
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Over time, several suppliers
developed software versions of videoconferencing codec's,
most notably Intel with the introduction of the Intel
ProShare series. This combined both a hardware network
card and a software videoconferencing codec.
Unfortunately, the power of
PC's severely limited the capabilities of such
products and eventually they were withdrawn leaving
VCON as the clear leader at the desktop with Picturetel
(rebadged Zydacron) and Sony (rebadged VCON) filling
the rest of the sales in this sector. |
| Now, we have a much more
diverse marketplace and a growing demand for video clips
and streaming over the internet, software codec's are more
common and some can be downloaded on the web for free. PC's
are much more powerful, lending some semblance of usability
to these products, although they still demand a great deal
of the PC's resource and always will. The primary driver
for such products is audio and video streaming, but you
will see by reading on and examining our products and solutions
that one-way streaming is much more effective if it is replaced
by two-way interactive streaming, especially if that is
also combined with traditional interactive conferencing. |
| A new breed of hardware desktop
system has now emerged - the "appliance".
Rather than cracking open the PC to insert a PCI codec
card (something not permitted by many large organisations)
a USB add-on is hot-plugged into the PC or laptop.
Being able to be shared by a number of users its flexibility
and price attractiveness are obvious. Business quality
systems range from glorified web-cams at the lower
end of the scale through to professional packages
with lots of extra functionality and flexibility (eg.
VCON ViGO). |
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Hardware
codec's in the form of set-top devices have become
the most popular SME business tool, ie. stand alone
systems that connect directly to a TV and an ISDN
or IP network. Having been introduced by Picturetel
in the 90s the Swiftsite was ousted from its dominant
position by the new market leader Polycom (Polyspan
in Europe), who is itself now coming under pressure
from new entrants Sony, TANDBERG and VCON. Large
studio systems still exist, but are reserved for
the large corporate buyer who is perhaps more interested
in the finish of the fitted furniture rather than
the actual capabilities of the technology. Flexibility
and functionality are better provided by modern
PC based systems or Set-Top Systems at less than
25% of the price.
Most notably however, another
revolution has taken place in the market place -
the explosion of the Internet and the predominant
use of IP as a network protocol. The videoconferencing
industry has not been slow to react, with the introduction
of the H.323 protocol to transport video and audio
media across packet based networks. Systems with
this capability as well as traditional ISDN (H.320)
are known as "dual-mode" offering the
buyer the best level of future proofing. The features
we take for granted in our telephone network today
are simply not available in the traditional world
of ISDN videoconferencing. PBX features such as
divert-on-no-reply, receptionist answer and mailboxes
are only available through Video-over-IP.
As the number of devices
continues to grow, network management tools
become more important and again, IP is the
protocol of choice to achieve such control.
Your Company will one day make the transition,
sooner or later the evolution will happen
and at that point you will reflect on your
investment decisions of today. Don't be
misled by those who say that it is too early
for IP (they probably just don't understand
it or maybe they are just trying to sell
you something more expensive !). Let VideoCentric
help you make the right choice of equipment
and network connection. We have selected
our vendors carefully and we have the knowledge
and experience to guide you properly at
a price that's affordable and competitive.
If you are already working
with equipment that doesn't appear at first
sight to be supplied and supported by VideoCentric,
then still talk to us. Through our knowledge
and association with Distributors and Resellers
in over 50 countries worldwide, we'll put
you in touch with the right Company for
the best pricing and service whatever the
product and wherever you are. |
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