The bottom line value of video collaboration

However these business models are adding distance into the workplace and this can have the effect of lowering productivity and efficiency by preventing people from coming together to collaborate, to discuss and to innovate. Decisions are slower, and the ability of the organization to react to changing market conditions is damaged.

It is clear that in modern day business, providing a culture of teamworking, collaboration, knowledge reuse and thereby efficient innovation provides real benefit. In his book The Culture of Collaboration[1], Evan Rosen reports “Collaborative cultures are breaking down silos, changing business models and the very nature of the way we work. They are a hallmark of the most successful global enterprises which realize real-time, interactive video is essential to collaboration”. The industry analyst IDC [2], in their recent whitepaper on video collaboration reported on how the modern, multinational corporation has developed these silos of expertise, with little sharing and reuse of information, leading to inefficiencies and the inhibition of innovation. Fostering a spirit of information sharing, teamwork and collaboration will enhance productivity, supplier and customer relations and if executed properly improve sales and profitability.

However, fostering this spirit is a necessary but insufficient condition to getting the benefit of collaborative working, as the organization must move to provide its teams with the tools they need to communicate effectively. Today many people report on how they are swamped with information via email, intranets and databases, so much so that you can’t recall the data when required. On the other hand, human, face to face interaction is reported as the most effective means for learning, understanding and recall.

Polycom's suite of tools, from the lowly telephone handset, to the splendid Polycom RealPresence™ Experience (RPX), and all points in between, have a part to play in overcoming this barrier of distance whilst maintaining the human element required for memorable communications. The Polycom mission is to help organizations create top and bottom line value by improving performance in today’s globally dispersed companies. Our aim is to encourage teamwork, allow better decisions, enable better customer and supplier relations, deliver faster time to market and increased sales and provide a sustainable competitive advantage, whilst ensuring that the organization travel related carbon footprint is not spiraling upward. According to Melanie Turek of Frost and Sullivan “More and more companies are deploying unified communications and collaboration technologies, recognizing that such tools can make the difference between success and failure in today's global marketplace”.

CIOs report their top four priorities are improving business processes, reducing enterprise wide operating costs, attracting and growing customer, relationships, and supporting competitive advantage. Their budgets are primarily going to security enhancement tools; mobile workforce applications and collaboration technologies. Polycom delivers market leading solutions for secure collaboration and mobility that address all four of these IT priorities. In fact, two of the top three applications driving future investments in company data and telephony network budgets are remote teleworker solutions and video conferencing solutions.

Customer successes

W.R. Grace is a leading supplier of specialty construction chemicals and materials with $2.5 billion in revenue and over 6,000 employees in 40 countries. W.R. Grace relies on remote collaboration from Polycom to leverage employee expertise and respond to changing market dynamics. R&D collaborates over video to decrease development times, while virtual all employee meetings over audio and video connect 2,000 employees on a single call to save the company over a million dollars annually. At W.R. Grace, video collaboration reduces meeting times and enables faster decisions by 50 percent. In one year alone, W.R. Grace saved $8 million from increased productivity and lower outsourcing and travel costs.

SABMiller is the one of the world’s largest brewers, with headquarters in the U.K. They use Polycom video collaboration solutions throughout the company, from Board meetings to interviewing job candidates and training staff to targeting specific brands in local markets. SABMiller reports easier and faster decision making with video. A collaboration pilot project that involves moving video to the desktop is expected to deliver an overall 35 percent increase in collaboration efforts. Video collaboration enables the general staff to cut travel costs and, more importantly, to cut lost productivity due to the time it takes to travel.

Heineken, another world leading brewing multinational, recently reported [3] the use of Polycom tools to power many thousand of hours of meetings, discussing new campaigns and processes with worldwide teams, and even extending its use into recruitment and selection campaigns. Their experience is that the meetings held with these high quality Polycom systems were more focused, preparation was better, meetings were shorter and more efficient and the follow up process was much improved. The summary results are a better exchange of knowledge, more quality and quantity in their team’s communications and a positive impact in the achievement of project teams.

It’s QoE not QoS!!!

But the transforming power of Polycom isn’t in the technology – it’s in the quality of the experience (QoE) the technology enables. The Polycom experience is like no other. Whether you are on a Polycom Voip handset, an enterprise wireless phone or conference phone, desktop video application, a large conference room video system or in even one of our RPX suites – the result is truly "just like being there." So lifelike, so immersive, so natural, so easy to use that the distance melts away, the technology becomes invisible, and all that remains is what people are saying, the importance of their ideas, and the collaborative decisions they make.

Travel related carbon footprints

In a world where carbon emissions are on the rise and global warming is now a well established fact, shareholders, executives, customers and employees demand organizations to be globally responsible, as well as productive and competitive. Innovative companies are now aligning their business goals with lowered impact to the environment in order to deliver a more intelligent future for their customers and for the planet. Polycom is committed to being at the forefront of this effort both in the solutions we provide our customers and in the reduction of our own carbon footprint.

Conservation International (CI) is a pioneer in the use of video conferencing for non-profit ecologically focused organizations. CI uses Polycom video to connect its scientists, economists, communicators, educators, and other professionals with hundreds of partners across more than 40 countries to identify and overcome threats to biodiversity. CI’s Manager of Information Technology Adoption and Outreach Kate Hughes believes, "Every time a person takes a trip, be it by car, train or plane, damage is done to the environment. It would be hypocritical for CI to tell people not to cut down trees if we were harming the environment ourselves by traveling to get that message out. We are practicing what we preach when we use video conferencing instead of traveling”.

Immersive telepresence with Polycom RPX

Winner of the Best New Conferencing product at Infocomm 2006, The Polycom Real Presence Experience (RPX) is a truly immersive telepresence solution. A room within a room, the RPX is designed with every detail in mind, such as camera and microphone placement, personal content displays, sweeping cinematic screens, and tiered seating alignment, to make you believe that you and your remote colleagues are literally sitting in the same conference room. The Polycom top end HDX video systems, patented Eye Connect™ technology, and 22 kHz Stereo Surround sound deliver a richly detailed, virtually 360 degree experience that differentiates the Polycom telepresence solution from those of our competitors. Based on open standards, the Polycom RPX telepresence solution can also call the other million plus standards-based video systems that are already installed in the world today.

For the mobile workforce

Polycom also ensure that whether workers are on a retail or manufacturing floor, on rounds in a hospital, or road warriors calling in to join virtual meetings, they all enjoy the same quality communications and collaboration experience.

Backed up by superior service worldwide

Polycom’s world class partners are trained and certified to plan, design, deploy, integrate, operate, maintain and optimize these wired and wireless solutions into your networks. Together, we deliver consultative IP networking, bandwidth and performance assessments, seamless and secure standards based integration of our solutions into leading environments, maintenance and diagnostic professional services and best practices for communications and collaboration.

About Polycom:

Polycom, Inc. is the worldwide leader in unified collaborative communications (UCC) that maximize the efficiency and productivity of people and organizations. Polycom’s high quality, standards-based conferencing and collaboration solutions are easy to deploy and manage, as well as intuitive to use. Supported by an open architecture, they integrate seamlessly with leading telephony, workplace wireless telephony, and presence-based networks. With its market-driving technologies, best-in-class products, alliance partnerships, and world-class service, Polycom is the smart choice for organizations seeking proven solutions and a competitive advantage from on-demand communications and collaboration.

For additional information on Polycom and how these solutions can drive improved business performance please call us on 00 800 00 33 44 55.

References
1) Rosen, Evan. The Culture of Collaboration, 2007.
2) IDC Whitepaper, Seeing is Believing, Understanding the value of video collaboration, Jan 2007.
3) Talk and Vision Visionary, Oct 2007.