Polycom Wows Wall Street, Adds to HD Telepresence Lineup
Polycom is one of those companies whose offerings seemed ahead of their time — a few years ago, who’d have considered desktop telepresence? But rather than force the industry to adopt its solutions — and possibly experience utter failure as a result — Polycom kept a low profile, waiting for the marketplace to catch up. Now that unified communications technology is gaining in popularity, Polycom’s strategy has paid off well — Polycom’s first-quarter net income increased almost sevenfold to $34 million, compared with a paltry $5 million in net income a year ago. Wall Street is impressed with its earnings, customers are impressed with its technology and partners are impressed with its recently reworked channel program and its emphasis on video solutions.
The VAR Guy pegs Polycom as a formidable force against the likes of its competitors in the unified communications and collaboration space, most notably Cisco and Avaya. And its latest telepresence offerings serve to bolster that idea — the Polycom EagleEye Director camera, HDX 4500 executive desktop telepresence and m100 mobile telepresence solutions fulfill Polycom’s “UC Everywhere” ethos of making telepresence ubiquitous and easy to use, no matter where it’s happening. (Let’s not forget Polycom’s recent partnership with Motorola to add its telepresence solutions to the Xoom as a perfect example.)
The EagleEye Director camera takes care of the “long-shot stare” common in many boardroom telepresence conversations, using voice triangulation and smart camera technology to zoom in on the speaker during the conversation, making the experience seem much more natural and personal. Polycom calls it the solution to the “lost in a big room” feeling that other videoconferencing solutions can sometimes have.
Executives who would prefer to conduct telepresence meetings at their desk, meanwhile, now have the HDX 4500, an all-in-one UC video solution featuring an HD-quality picture that uses 50 percent less bandwidth than other HD video solutions. A 24-inch LCD display houses the all-in-one unit. The HDX 4500 comes complete with standards-based interoperability with technology from Microsoft, HP, IBM, Juniper and Avaya, as well as others. Plop the screen on the desk, plug it in and start chatting. (The VAR Guy likes the easy setup this solution purports, but is too camera-shy to ever test it out himself.)
What might be of most interest to the growing legion of road warriors, however, is the m100 portable PC-based telepresence solution. A client installed on a user’s computer enables point-and-click ability to make video calls remotely over a company’s UC network. The m100 software works with most USB and embedded webcams, making it an ideal solution without large hardware investments.
Polycom seems to be making the right moves to advance both its product set and the adoption of UCC in general. The VAR Guy is becoming ever-more intrigued by the notion of ubiquitous UC, and will be watching as Microsoft and other competitors move deeper into the space to see whether this technology truly changes the way we communicate.
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