Leading Analyst Firms Forecast Increased
Spending
on Video Conferencing
Nefsis predicts cloud computing
will play an increasing role; identifies critical
components for successful cloud-based video conferencing
implementation as it grows beyond the boardroom
SAN DIEGO — August 25, 2011 — Global analyst firms
have identified an uptick in video conferencing spending, as SMBs and
enterprises embrace the benefits of real-time visual communications
technologies. Infonetics predicts enterprises will spend $5 billion
on videoconferencing and telepresence systems by 2015, and Frost &
Sullivan forecasts the Web conferencing and collaboration market
will reach $4.12 billion by 2014.
Video conferencing software developer Nefsis has
seen its product mix shift from 50% on-premise in 2008 to 90%
cloud-based software-as-a-service delivery (SaaS) today, and as a
result, predicts an increasing role played by cloud-based solutions
in the next few years. To assist companies in the decision-making
process, Nefsis has identified the critical components businesses
should evaluate when deploying video conferencing to get the maximum
cloud-enabled benefits.
“Cloud
computing and video conferencing are more popular than ever, but
there are fundamental differences that set the leading cloud-based
solutions apart,” said Tom Toperczer, Nefsis Vice President
of Marketing. “Be sure to look for multiple points of presence
and real-time, distributed workload balancing — a centralized
data center or a single hosted video router is not exactly in the
spirit or technical meaning of the word ‘cloud.’
”
A globally distributed network of servers that reacts in
real-time to conference events and network conditions power the
automated load-balancing, fail-over, and high-scalability benefits
of cloud computing, elaborated Company officials.
“SMBs today are looking for
enterprise-class communication capabilities like high-quality
video conferencing, at a price they can afford. Taking the cloud
approach is a great way to provide these capabilities, but not
all cloud video conferencing solutions are the same,” stated
Robert Poe, Principal Analyst at VOIP Evolution and author of the
recently released report SMB Video Conferencing: Getting
Beyond Clouds & Interoperability.
“To be truly useful, cloud-based video conferencing
solutions have to perform well even over unreliable network
connections, and offer sophisticated collaboration tools in
addition to video conferencing,” added Poe.
Nefsis lists the following as critical components for meeting
forecasted demands as video conferencing grows beyond the boardroom:
• Virtualization in a true cloud: A
video
conferencing cloud should provide physically distributed
resources where conference sessions are virtualized and
load-balanced in real-time. Load balancing, automated fail
over, and high scalability are foundational capabilities.
• Low latency: A good system should
virtualize conference sessions closer to participants.
• Multipoint HD: Good 'cloud'
implementations should leverage parallel processing software
and should easily encode/decode multipoint HD video to the
physical limits of the video peripheral and bandwidth
availability.
• Dynamic scalable video: Some form of
variable bitrate encoding or scalable
video is also important for ensuring smooth operation
over existing networks and variable network conditions prevalent
in desktop and on-the-fly video conferencing. Customers may elect
to dedicate bandwidth for HD 1080p, but should not be required to
do so.
• Advanced collaboration: The cloud is a
platform for software delivery. A good cloud-based implementation
should provide seamlessly integrated collaboration tools. As an
example, over 95% of Nefsis customers use at least one
web
collaboration feature beyond simple screen sharing.
• Includes advanced IT features: Built-in
network diagnostics, Quality of Service (QoS) compatibility,
firewall and proxy traversal, and industry standard SSL/TLS
security
for all web, VoIP and video data are crucial components to
ensure video conferencing runs well over existing customer
networks and the networks of those they wish to conference with.
The cloud-based advantages listed above are standard features of
Nefsis Professional, available now. For a free 14-day trial of
Nefsis Professional, visit www.Nefsis.com.
About Nefsis
Headquartered in San Diego,
California, Nefsis is a technology specialist in video conferencing
software and cloud computing online services. The Company’s
global cloud provides multipoint HD video and advanced collaboration
tools to business, government and educational customers in more
than 45 countries worldwide. As compared to previous generations of
infrastructure hardware solutions such as video routers, MCUs and
gateways, the Nefsis cloud-based offering is less expensive,
automatically maintained, and easier to expand.
For more information, please browse the Nefsis website or call
+1 (858) 715-0970 in the Americas or +44 (0) 870 224 0415 in the
UK and Europe.
Media Contact
Xenia Moore
Public Relations Manager
Phone: (858) 715-0970
[email protected]
Nefsis is a registered trademark of Nefsis Corporation. All
other trademarks mentioned are property of their respective
owners.