Feature

Virtual meetings

Given the economic slump, the Swine Flu pandemic and an inherent need for boosting employee productivity, companies are evaluating video conferencing technology to reduce operational costs related to traveling while boosting productivity By Manjari Juneja

Video Conferencing (VC) enables geographically dispersed people come closer to collaborate effectively on a real-time basis—it essentially makes the world a much smaller place by connecting colleagues, stakeholders, customers, friends, prospects across the world in real-time on a daily basis. Indian enterprises have begun to realize the inherent advantages of video conferencing and collaboration. The Indian video conferencing industry continues to be on the growth path especially in these troubled times as these technologies help in reducing operational costs and increasing employee productivity.

These solutions have entered the mainstream and are no longer limited to the boardrooms of large corporates. Even SMEs have started to explore and benefit from the deployment of visual communication solutions.

Here, the concept of one-size fits all doesn’t work. The effectiveness of the VC and AV solutions in a live customer environment depends on the thorough evaluations of solutions available in the market today and the SI’s capability to execute a solution optimally in an enterprise scattered across multiple locations.

The Indian scenario

The need to collaborate 24x7 is driving the adoption of video conferencing and its applications are going beyond acting as a substitute for travel. There is an inclination towards open standards and interoperability to ensure flexibility and ease of use. Advances in video conferencing technology, the economic slump coupled with enterprise demand to cut costs and yet boost employee productivity as well as falling bandwidth prices have spurred the growth of video conferencing in India. This trend is evident across different verticals and enterprise segments.

Rajesh KK, Business Development Manager, TelePresence Systems, Cisco India & SAARC, said, “Traditional video conferencing was done in a conference room equipped with a television-set type unit, where employees had to use remote control keypads to set up meetings. Even the desktop applications had their own limitations in offering quality of interaction. To overcome these problems, Cisco has launched TelePresence applications that deliver real-time, face-to-face interactions between people and places in their work and personal lives, using advanced visual, audio, and collaboration technologies.”

The adoption of collaboration solutions has grown significantly with India becoming a key component of the global technology industry. In addition, other businesses with global interests or regional offices of multinational corporations are also investing in these systems to aid collaboration and to speed up decision making.

Market Growth

Videoconferencing grew by a healthy 23% plus in CY 2008 for VC endpoints as per Frost & Sullivan estimates. The segment is expected to grow at a CAGR of nearly 24% over the next five years. In India, VC adoption has increased significantly in the government vertical in SWAN networks, other e-Governance initiatives, judiciary etc. IT/ITES, BFSI, Manufacturing and Education (distance learning initiatives) also saw strong adoption of this technology. This trend is likely to continue in the coming quarters. Large SIs in India are also looking at providing the complete VC experience including scheduling and managing the entire VC experience for their customers.

Anshul Dhingra, Senior Marketing Manager, Polycom India & SAARC, said, “We are witnessing a much higher espousal in the Indian market across verticals, as organizations are realizing the vast benefits of visual communication technology. Besides the growing adoption amongst newer verticals and organizations, the average usage of existing video infrastructure and enhancement is growing significantly across organizations. While we cannot comment on our market share, according to a recent research report titled Asia Pacific Video Conferencing Endpoints Market, 2008 by Frost & Sullivan, Polycom is the largest videoconferencing solutions provider in India commanding over half of the market. Polycom was also recognized as the Best Vendor (Video Conferencing) at the F&S Awards 2008.”

Reduced Operational Cost

With the slowdown and Swine Flu hitting businesses worldwide, there is growing demand for VC since it can help cut travel-related costs. VC provides effective solutions to reducing travel costs. It also improves employee productivity innovatively by bringing closer two or more individuals separated by physical distances and allows them to collaborate and take informed decisions. It also greatly reduces the risks of exposure to epidemics etc. for employees. With India becoming a key component of the global technology industry, solutions such as VC have found tremendous acceptance amongst companies in the vertical.

The ability to conduct real-time, face-to-face meetings over the network is changing the way that companies do business across many industries, helping them streamline processes, make decisions faster, and conduct more business without leaving the office.

V Praveen Kumar, Head - Unified Communication Business, Avaya GlobalConnect Ltd, said, “Video Conferencing is an effective way to cut down travel costs and also to avoid other issues like stress related to travel, increased exposure to epidemics such as Swine Flu and increased pile up of work while you are away from the office.”

“With recession and sporadic occurrences in form of the Swine Flu pandemic etc that have forced many companies to revise their budgets and cut costs, corporate travel has taken a hit due to the same. In India, travel fares have also gone up over the past couple of years, so all these and other factors are contributing towards a more favorable environment where videoconferencing is being given a more serious look,” added Sanjay Virnave, President Sales, Tulip Telecom.

Video conferencing is emerging as a great business tool; it is helping organizations work faster, smarter, cheaper and more effectively across distances. Organizations can rationalize their real estate and operating costs by encouraging Tele Working.

Sanish KB, Research Analyst, Gartner, said, “The global economic downturn forced many enterprises to either postpone their new UC investment plan or to review UC plans and direct money to a different or to a specific set of UC solutions such as audio, video and Web conferencing solutions, since it would be a more justifiable investment that would show a better return on investment (ROI) during this budget constrained period.”

Challenges in adoption

A challenge faced in the adoption of VC is the high bandwidth required for it to function efficiently. In India, bandwidth is still not universally available, and performance gaps in service are often glaring. Another factor is that higher bandwidth in India is available only on wired networks, a luxury that only the metros can boast of.

Internet-based connections are increasing in popularity and many public rooms have come up in India, which allow conferencing over an IP network. Bandwidth issues at the backend also need to be addressed to ensure that participants can avail of the full benefits of videoconferencing.

Fortunately, broadband is more readily available than it used to be. Bandwidth availability and the price of bandwidth will also be driving the adoption of videoconferencing. India is a growing economy and there is immense competition amongst Indian companies. The pressure to be more productive at lower costs, with a shorter time to market and being able to reach people are pertinent for these companies to gain a competitive edge, and these requirements are driving the adoption of videoconferencing in the country.

Mass adoption and use of video conferencing is still relatively low, with the following often claimed as causes:

• Complexity of systems: Most users are not technical and want a simple interface. In hardware systems an unplugged cord or a dead battery in a remote control is seen as failure, contributing to perceived unreliability which drives users back to traditional meetings. Successful systems are backed by support teams who can proactively support and provide fast assistance when required.
• Perceived lack of interoperability: Not all systems can readily interconnect, for example ISDN and IP systems require a gateway. Popular software solutions cannot easily connect to hardware systems. Some systems use different standards, features and qualities which can require additional configuration when connecting to dissimilar systems.
• Bandwidth and quality of service: In some countries it is difficult or expensive to get a high quality connection that is fast enough for good quality video conferencing. Technologies such as ADSL have limited upload speeds and cannot upload and download simultaneously at full speed. As Internet speeds increase, higher quality and high definition video conferencing will become more readily available.
• Expense of commercial systems: A well designed system requires a specially designed room and can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to fit out the room with equipment, integration and furniture.
• Self consciousness: Participants are sometimes self-conscious about being on camera, especially new users and older generations.

Looking to the future

The future of video conferencing looks bright because companies are attracted to less costly methods of communication that lead to faster decision-making through virtual interaction. Face-to-face communication via video conferencing is a powerful tool. One study has shown that around 55% of your impact on someone comes through in your body language, while 38% of the impact is on how the message is said. Only 7% of the impact is related to what is actually said.

The market for communication conferencing services is continuing to grow rapidly worldwide and is expected to reach $240 Million in sales by 2015. A portion of this growth can be attributed to the corporate desire to reduce capital and operating expenses, and lost productivity of business travel. However, many organizations that initially invested in conferencing solutions for such short-term, tactical reasons are finding that conferencing (audio, Web and video) delivers significant, long-term, strategic business values far beyond initial expectations.

Businesses are aggressively expanding the use of conferencing throughout the enterprise. In the last few years, changes in the business environment have made it difficult for organizations to manage time and business relationships effectively and efficiently. Markets have become more global, with significant activities in manufacturing and services being outsourced and offshored. Companies of all sizes have continued to expand internationally. Strategic alliances, partnerships, and joint ventures are ubiquitous. With 1.2 billion mobile subscribers globally, workers are more mobile than ever. Telecommuting and remote working are an everyday reality, and the population of road warriors is growing.

“As video conferencing technology grows, so will the need to educate new users on how to act in front of the camera to achieve desired results. Perhaps there will be a greater number of college and community college courses teaching technology etiquette and applications. Children are more likely to pick up on new technologies, since they will be using video conferencing in class and for homework assignments. This technology is changing the way with communicate with each other and in five years, as the current trends demonstrate, it will be just as commonplace as cell phones and Internet access,” concluded Girish Bhandarkar, Head of Pre-Sales, BT India.

manjari.juneja@expressindia.com