Tandberg solution at the forefront of seamless video integration into any unified communications platform

With Frost & Sullivan predicting the global video market will reach $4.7bn by 2014 the technology will bring even greater benefits for business as video conferencing expands from conference rooms to the individual - strengthening distributed workforces and supply chains. However, the ROI for both group and "personal" video will be further realised through seamless integration into a unified communications (UC) platform. The Tandberg (TAA.OL) end-to-end solution delivers unrivalled H.323/Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) dual stack capabilities to bridge the world of existing telepresence and video conferencing solutions with VoIP and UC so businesses can make the most of their investments.

"Unified communications is transforming the way companies work, allowing people to communicate and collaborate from virtually any place and any device," said Yancey Smith, director of unified communications product management at Microsoft Corp.

"Microsoft is advancing unified communications with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2, using SIP to deliver complete messaging, voice and video communication across the applications and devices people use daily. With the integration of video conferencing and telepresence in the Office Communications Server 2007 R2 environment, Tandberg is helping its customers make the most of existing video infrastructure investments."

With the ability to support richer features such as presence, messaging, and advanced telephony features, SIP is the most widely used signalling standard to bring business tools together in a UC environment. However, with many video conferencing products using either H.323 or proprietary signalling protocols, integrating video with UC platforms and UC desktop video clients can be costly and challenging. Tandberg has solved this issue with its Video Communication Server (VCS), which enables SIP and H.323 interworking without any investment in additional hardware or software. This allows seamless interoperation of all Tandberg products with third-party vendors and tools such as Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 and VoIP PBXes.

"The Tandberg solution is the most elegant solution available, with the Tandberg VCS being able to bridge the worlds of H.323 and SIP. That is a real differentiator for our customers," said Hakon Dahle, Tandberg Chief Technologist. "The migration from H.323 to SIP can be done in a seamless manner by leaving existing H.323-based endpoints and infrastructure in place while using SIP to integrate with VoIP or unified communications platforms. For the CIO, this means video conferencing and telepresence are not islands, no network change is required for video-enabled UC, and common ground with line of business owners demanding video is now easily reached."

Tandberg has long encouraged open standards supporting interoperability among all vendors' products and services. With this focus, the company has built the industry's broadest and easiest to use telepresence and video product solution set, which supports both H.323 and SIP protocols at the same time. This enables third-party, legacy, and future video products - as well as other business critical tools - to work together on a UC platform without a heavy investment in upgrade costs. With no hardware to replace for future upgrades, customers can be assured that the infrastructure they deploy today can remain in place to support future SIP deployments.

"Working with Tandberg, Vodafone has not only made video an integral part of our unified communications strategy, we have unified our organization," said Dr Armin Hessler, Head of Customer & Service Operations - IT, Vodafone Group Services.

"We've deployed video to 35,000 employees by utilizing Tandberg solutions in conjunction with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2, and soon this number will increase to 70,000. This new way of working, where all employees have easy access to video, has enabled a higher level of global cooperation by fostering trust and improving understanding across geographies. It has also already helped us reduce travel costs by 30%."

"As the role of video in unified communications becomes increasingly critical, IT architects need to plan for a SIP-based future for all of their video conferencing systems. It is important that they understand the limitations and challenges of migration so they can develop a strategy focused on integration of existing protocols rather than one that requires a rip and replace approach," said Irwin Lazar, Vice President, Communications Research, Nemertes Research.