When a product does exactly what it promises and more, it can develop almost a cult following. Think iPhone, 3 Series, red soles. You almost don’t need the company brand to know what I’m talking about. OK, so maybe the Cisco SX10 doesn’t quite stir the same emotions as a sleek BMW or a pair of Christian Louboutin shoes. But I can tell you that people are buying into the promise we made when we launched this entry-level video conferencing solution:  “High quality, simplicity, and affordability come together to create a practical and powerful business class solution for video ubiquity – all at about the price of a PC.” Over the past 18 months since we launched the SX10, customers have validated our product positioning with their wallets and their feedback. But we know we’ve hit a home run when some of our toughest critics also agree. Take for example, the recent independent review from Wainhouse Research: “Evaluation of the Cisco TelePresence SX10 Quick Set Group Conferencing System.” It is testament to the strength of our design and engineering teams that the review aligns with our product promise. I’ve pulled out some of the report’s key findings against the SX10 positioning, which not-surprisingly, is also what we’ve been hearing from customers. Excerpts from the Wainhouse report: Affordability:  “It is not just the SX10’s low cost that makes it interesting … low cost doesn’t mean a loss of manageability.” Experience: “Without exception, the SX10-powered call experience was very strong … sometimes far better, than that of competing systems – many with much higher price tags.” Ease of use: “… the SX10’s UI is almost identical to the UI on the SX20 and SX80 systems, the MX-series systems … The result is a simplified and consistent user experience.” Design:  “… the SX10 is based on an advanced industrial design. The WR test team was impressed by the careful attention to detail on the unit.” Installation: “Such creative workflows not only reduce installation cost, but also enable the use of less experienced / trained staff.” So if you are in search of a great, entry-level video solution and you haven’t experienced the SX10 for yourself, you have nothing to lose. The SX10 has been validated enough to just about remove all the guesswork. Give it a try and let me know how you do. ... View more

Sometimes when the essence of something is so eloquently captured, there’s no need to say it any differently. That’s how I felt when I read Gartner’s latest Magic Quadrant for Group Video Systems report. In it, we feel Gartner confirms Cisco’s position as an established leader in the group video systems market who offers “a clear and differentiated set of devices, with form factors now available for virtually any meeting space.” I have a theory on how we achieved a “clear and differentiated” product set – by finding the sweet spot between feature innovation, beautiful design, ease of use and deployment, and cost effectiveness. Concurrently, we’ve enhanced our infrastructure to make multiparty conferencing easier and more affordable. And we’re continuing our work to enable video interoperability in the cloud, especially with Cisco Collaboration Meeting Rooms. These are the hallmarks of our current portfolio and instrumental in our ability to gain market traction in large-scale deployments. But beyond strengthening our own competitive position, I believe our strategy – bringing to market video solutions at the right quality and value – helped to encourage video adoption and growth for the industry overall. As we reported last quarter (FYQ3), we saw a 60 percent year-over-year unit growth. This is in share gained and also market expansion. That’s great news for Cisco, but it also serves as a good bellwether for the video market as a whole. The appetite for visual communications is clearly growing, and that’s good news for everyone. What we’re seeing in Gartner’s most recent report has also been validated to me over the past 18 months since we’ve refreshed our entire video endpoint portfolio. Customer feedback has been overwhelmingly positive about the design, capabilities and direction of our product portfolio. So, between these two points of validation, it feels really good to know we’re delivering products that are having a positive impact on the market. Let me know how our video products have positively impacted your work life – especially in clear and differentiated ways. This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document. The Gartner document is available upon request. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. ... View more

I’ve been on a journey with my team over the last 18 months to redefine our approach to video collaboration. Vowels form the nucleus of any word, so I call this the A-E-I-O-U approach as it represents the core principles of video collaboration. Every product we introduced this year has these principles as its backbone. If a product idea doesn’t meet this requirement, it doesn’t even make it to blueprint. The feedback we’ve received from customers and partners tells me we are exactly on the right track. So what does A-E-I-O-U stand for? A – Affordable E – Easy I – Innovative O – Outstanding Design U – User Centric Sounds pretty rudimentary, but it’s not easy to do in reality. It’s like producing a performance engine that’s easy on the eyes with do-it-yourself sensibility, a bunch of really cool features and pragmatic pricing – all in one product. A handful of companies have been able to do this, and Cisco has joined that short list with our latest video collaboration products. How do we know A-E-I-O-U is working? Affordable: I know we’ve hit the mark on this because I haven’t had a single discussion about price in the past 7 to 8 months. If you recall, every product we’ve rolled out since March 2014 has come to market with more features than its predecessor and a list price that’s 20% to 40% less. That’s pragmatic pricing, so people know they’re getting a great deal. No haggling needed. Easy to sell, buy, install, use and service: We’ve made significant improvements on the install and use part: touch control, no-brainer cabling, WebEx integration, and less than 10 minutes from box to call. People really love this last one. We saw proof of it recently with a customer, a mid-sized country, who chose Cisco because our products allowed regional embassy staff to install the equipment themselves rather than sending specialized staff around the world. That’s resounding testament to our easy strategy. The other parts of easy – sell, buy and service – are equally important to us, which is why we’ve significantly simplified our portfolio as the first step. We’re still hard at work at the others to make “easy” the fabric of our complete product life cycle. Innovation: We’re still talking about technology, so we can’t skimp on innovation. The latest Cisco video collaboration products demonstrate state-of-the-art video technology: H.265 for bandwidth savings Intelligent Proximity to incorporate mobile devices Intelligent Audio lets users hear just what they see and canceling out what’s superfluous SpeakerTrack to give the active speaker the prominent view Craftsmanship for great design and cost-effective production We’ve delivered the best technology the market has to offer across the board, and the proof is in the pudding: The vast of majority of our customers have ordered speaker-tracking technology as part of our high-end room systems. Outstanding Design : What we mean by “outstanding” is making our products so approachable that people are drawn to them and are driven to collaborate. We did this with fine craftsmanship and a maniacal focus to detail. For example, we paid as much attention to the back of our products as we did to the front …  so much so, that we call it “the second front.” And the industry congratulated us for this. We received the Red Dot design product across our new product line earlier this year. User-centric : Our approach to building products is user in; we start with trying to meet what the customer expects. My 7 and 9 year-old daughters are often the toughest customers. They’ll tell me something is “broken” if they can’t use it the way they would expect to.  The SX10 is my favorite user-in product, because it’s almost dummy proof. We have a customer who prefers to put the SX10 on the table instead of on top of a flat-panel display, the way it’s intended. But if you happen to place the unit upside down, the camera is smart enough to correct the image for you … because an upside down video image would be a communications fail. So there you have it – the A-E-I-O-U approach to video collaboration – elegant in its simplicity, just like our latest line of products. This formula has been working great for us on the development side of things and for our customers. How is it working for you? This is just the beginning. Tune in to our webcast on Nov. 17, 2014 for a special announcement. ... View more

Business Internet #videoconferencing projected to grow more than 30% annually.  Plus 87% of young business leaders believe #videoconferencing has a significant & positive impact . Check out my NetworkWorld article for more information on what to c onsider when evaluating #videoconferencing. ... View more

Over the past decade, I’ve worked on a number of different projects aimed at improving communications using video conferencing and telepresence. In that time, I’ve been fortunate to be involved with key innovations at first Tandberg then Cisco that have had great impact on video collaboration: Forging life-like experience with immersive telepresence Extending the power of in-person all the way to the desktop Enabling a consistent and intuitive user experience with a revolutionary touch-enabled device Playing a pivotal role in driving video formats like H.264 and H.265 to standardization Growing the video calling circle beyond the enterprise with technological advancements like software video clients, cloud deployment models and firewall traversal that enable cost-effective B2B and B2C calling With the spirit of innovation ingrained in both company’s DNA, the merger of Tandberg and Cisco’s video businesses in 2010 proved to be a major win for the industry and for the customer. Since then, we’ve focused our efforts on delivering next-generation video collaboration solutions that are enabling organizations to collaborate easily and efficiently, and allowing them to foster innovation within their own businesses. Why is all of this so important? As time marches on, we see video becoming pervasive. Roberto De La Mora recently called video a business imperative, not a nice-to-have, and shared the five steps to success for deploying a business video strategy. The key to helping our customers prepare for the pervasive video future is through a flexible, scalable and interoperable approach. And others agree… Wainhouse Research recently stated: “For organizations that embrace pervasive video, success no longer depends on where their resources are located. Success now depends on bringing the resources to bear to make a difference for the customer and provide a competitive edge for your organization.” Today, video is everywhere we look – virtually on every pane of glass. This is why Cisco is working hard to make it easier than ever for customers to fast-track their pervasive video strategy through a new promotion that helps stretch their investment dollars. I’m excited to be a part of Cisco and look forward to keeping you informed on the latest news and trends as we lead the industry into the future of video collaboration. I’ll be speaking about this topic in June at InfoComm 2013; be sure to catch my session if you’re there. In the meantime, I encourage you to discuss what you think the top innovations of the past were and what trends the future holds. ... View more

At Enterprise Connect in March, we announced a number of collaboration innovations, including a new telepresence concept called high-intensity collaboration. High-intensity collaboration describes a meeting environment where people can interact with content in ways not previously possible during a telepresence meeting, while still maintaining the highest degree of visual immersion. These features include the ability to annotate on content, move content to any of the three main screens, share content from multiple sources, and whiteboarding on the big screens (future software development). In March, we unveiled the Cisco TelePresence TX9000 Series, our next-generation, fully immersive room-based system.  At the time, we previewed new features, with a promise that high-intensity collaboration would be fully realized over the next 18-24 months. With the soon-to-be released TX 6.0 software update, we’re about to deliver on some of these exciting new capabilities across the TX9000 and TX1300 product lines, our triple-screen and single-screen immersive systems, respectively. Annotation is the first of the high-intensity collaboration features to become available.  It allows customers to annotate on the 12 inch user interface for the TX Series (Touch 12), and have it appear on the main display screen. Annotation, along with other TX 6.0 updates, will be delivered in the second half of this year and will be available to TX Series customers with existing service contracts.  Over time, we expect future features to deliver even more powerful visual impact. The TX 6.0 software update also delivers a number of new enhancements to the TX9000 and TX1300 Series, including 1080p60 video, 1080p30 content sharing and Medianet intelligence.  Where competitive systems force customers to choose between video and content quality, the TX9000 customers can offer both simultaneously with three streams of high-definition (HD) video and one stream of full HD data.  Cisco offers the best video and content quality of any product on the market with no sacrifice because of a fourth codec built into the TX9000. The TX series is Medianet-enabled which allows the TX Series to support media tracing and metadata. With Media tracing, the network can trace the path of video data packets from TX Series endpoints for troubleshooting and network performance optimization. Metadata allows the marking of video traffic traversing the network which helps provide analytics so network managers can prioritize and allocate bandwidth for the greatest efficiencies. Medianet intelligence will assist customers to provide the best video experience possible for their users. We’ve also made making telepresence calls easier.  We’ve added the Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) dialing feature  to this latest TX 6.0 release.  This feature allows users to have a name-based video address versus a number, which is a key usability enhancement for customers and provides a consistent addressing schema across the Cisco TelePresence product portfolio. Finally, we’ve added ten more languages to the previously English-based Touch 12, which is great news for our global customer base. Stay tuned as we continue to roll out new products to support high-intensity collaboration. Tags: Cisco TelePresence, collaboration, high intensity collaboration, Snorre Kjesbu, TelePresence, TX6.0, TX9000 ... View more

Many things need to be taken into consideration when choosing a collaboration endpoint technology:  what’s the experience you want to create, how you plan to use it, what environment must it accommodate? The analogy I like to use is "it’s like shopping for a car.” There are many considerations to be made when buying a car:  It must meet your lifestyle, your transportation needs, the number of passengers and type of cargo you intend to carry. A single person is more likely to choose a different type of car than people with families. Active people may choose an SUV to carry  all their sporting equipment, or for the adventures they take on rugged terrain. This thought process also comes into play when choosing a collaboration solution. The ultimate goal is to have the right communications tool for the right task. Cisco TelePresence has taken this decision making process into account and created endpoints ideally suited for each use case:  From Jabber Video for the mobile warrior, to personal TelePresence units  for the knowledge worker or executive offices, multipurpose systems for team collaboration, to fully immersive three-screen systems for strategic and high-intensity collaboration meetings -- Cisco has thought of every possible scenario.  Whether you are on a 1:1 call with a colleague or in a strategic meeting with your most important customers, you want to create an in-person experience.  To create an in-person we create an environment where technology fades into the background and allows you to interact as if meeting participants were all in the same room. Throughout the course of the day, the average worker might go through each of these use cases. They may have an early morning telepresence call through their PC or tablet taken from home, join another call from their office latter, and then host a team meeting from a multipurpose or immersive telepresence system. What has remained consistent is the user experience. Just as in the car analogy, whether you choose an SUV, a convertible, or mini-van, the way you operate the vehicle is the same. Similarly, Cisco TelePresence delivers a consistent user experience, you start a call and share content the same way across the entire portfolio - from the software client to our three-screen immersive system. At Cisco we put people at the center of our collaboration solutions; we humanize every interaction to make it easier for our users. ... View more