Going back a few years, the predominant form of videoconferencing was room-based systems. Organisations would set up conference rooms dedicated to remote meetings, filling them with costly videoconferencing kit: multiple big screen TVs, purpose-built conferencing cameras and so on. These set-ups promised to reduce travel costs by allowing geographically distant high-level management types to convene, without hopping on a plane.
All too often the equipment didn’t match up to its promises of reducing travel and being easy to use. Instead, employees wasted hours trying in vain to initiate meetings, and usually had to drag the IT department away from other projects to assist in what should have been a simple operation.
“Everyone's got those bad memories of videoconferencing from 10 years ago where it took you 20 minutes to get it working,” says Scott Mason, Director, Strategy and Fixed Marketing at Optus Business, which offers full blown room-based systems as well as budget systems.
But according to Joseph Sweeney, analyst at IBRS, the problem was rarely with the hardware, which he says was actually quite capable. Instead, the problem was one of personnel: companies simply weren’t giving their staff adequate training, and when they did, they weren’t giving it to enough staff. So if the one person who knew how to start a videoconference was off sick, the system became useless until they returned.
A change in perception
These early experiences left a lasting and unfavourable impression of videoconferencing in the minds of its users. And this impression was still kicking around until around 18 months ago, according to Mason. But that’s all changing now.
“There's been a huge surge in interest over the last 18 months, and I think some of that's been accelerated by the financial conditions,” he says.
And as a result of that interest, Mason says the company has seen “a significant interest in videoconferencing sales”.
IBRS sees growing interest in videoconferencing across the board. Some companies are using room-based systems to completely replace senior executive meetings, which tend to require lots of costly international flights. Other organisations are using desktop-based systems - which offer a less immersive experience but are much cheaper and can run on your everyday office PC - to help office workers collaborate.
Early adopters of these desktop-based systems have run into some problems, however. Many organisations have deployed these systems without realising that they require the same level of attention to the network as a room-based system does.
“I have seen situations - including within vendors themselves - where they’ve rushed out and they’ve put in their new desktop-based system, using peer-to-peer systems, and they’ve brought down their networks,” Sweeney says.
This is due to what he calls the “viral effect” of desktop video: “A couple of people get it and then everyone wants it.” Within a few weeks of implementation, the network can get flooded by this influx of video traffic. But this can be remedied.
“We had a couple of people who hit that issue in Australia and they solved it very quickly, by prioritising traffic and doing the job right. The people who have got the network infrastructure right have actually been very happy with the results,” Sweeney says.
IBRS has also seen the emergence of a third class of videoconferencing systems in the past couple of years, which it labels ‘High Definition Desktop videoconferencing’. These are typically portable units that link users into room-based videoconferencing networks. In terms of the quality of experience, these units sit somewhere between room-based and desktop systems.
“There’s this realisation that if we’re going to put in place all this hard network infrastructure and planning for the desktop systems, we may as well give them really good terminals as well,” he says.
Why the change?
Sweeney says organisations are approaching IBRS regarding videoconferencing for a few reasons.
“[They often say] we want to save money, and we want to save money by reducing greenhouse footprint, reducing travel, and often, if they’re a bit more advanced, they might say we want to increase team collaboration,” Sweeney says.
Optus’s analysis looks similar. According to the company’s IP Index, companies are interested in videoconferencing again for a few reasons: reducing travel costs; recapturing man-hours lost to travel; an improvement in videoconferencing products; and a few others.
“Organisations are doing the math on what [travel] is actually costing. Not just in terms of direct travel costs, but also loss of productivity,” Mason says.
But while these financial pressures have helped some IT departments adopt videoconferencing - some have made the case for videoconferencing by transferring some money out of the travel budget into IT - others might find it difficult. This is because some organisations have completely cut travel budgets to zero.
“So if you’ve got a business case that says that your video comms is going to be paid for by savings in travel, and all the travel budget has been cut, your savings are zero,” Sweeney says.
*Andrew Collins is a freelance writer.