A View From The Road – Vol. 5, Num. 3 – InfoComm 2011

Observations on technology trends from the latest conferences and seminars.

June 17, 2011

In This Edition:

• A Hot InfoComm 2011
• Blockbuster Consolidation Kills a Keynote
• What are they Thinking?
• IMCCA’s TelePresence Day
• New And Notable Products
• My Pick Hit Of The Show – Wireless Interference Detection and Avoidance

Greetings from a very hot Orlando, Florida at the end of a very hot tradeshow (InfoComm11) in a very, very hot industry.  It was clear to the more than 33,000 estimated attendees of the 72^nd annual InfoComm that the convergence of AV and IT is a flashpoint of buyer interest and manufacturer and integrator activity. 

Everyone was expecting a lot of excitement in the weeks before the show with Microsoft’s blockbuster $8.9 billion purchase of Skype, but then Polycom’s purchase of HP’s video business completely trumped that news.  HP’s stunning withdrawal from their video initiatives – including their Halo Telepresence studios and HVEN network,  just one year after announcing a commitment to OEM Vidyo’s SVC products in this space - rocked this event in more ways than one.  Firstly, it punctuated Polycom’s recent tremendous climb in industry prominence (and stock price.) Secondly, it killed the planned keynote presentation by Rob Scott of HP.  Not only would it have been awkward for the soon to be ousted HP video team to present to those gathered here, it would probably have violated the prevailing regulations regarding keeping quiet before a merger or acquisition.  So instead of this very anticipated presentation, HP’s Kate Swanborg – the head of DreamWork’s Enterprise Marketing showed a relatively small audience some truly exhilarating and exciting scenes from that classic of the American cinema - the new Kung Fu Panda movie.

(Ok, I should say to her credit that she honestly gave a very interesting and informative presentation, but it was akin to a really good piece of broccoli when you’ve had your heart set on ice cream for the last few months.)

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The M&A activity is only one indicator of how hot the telepresence and video conferencing space is.  There were many others here at the show.  For one, the IMCCA’s Unified Collaborative Conferencing Pavilion was bigger and better than ever.

www.Vaddio.com                                    www.Radvision.com                                    www.Stampedeglobal.com

For another example – but this one squarely in the “what are they thinking” category - both LG and Panasonic introduced new video conferencing products to sell with their displays.  Clearly the extreme popularity of video is encouraging these and some other manufactures to try to get “some of the available pie.” 

Now both of these are excellent firms and probably would capture some market share with cameras and codecs built in to the bezel of their displays, but stand-alone codecs that need a bunch of wires to hook up, look like they are ten year old throwbacks, and come with no ecosystem, infrastructure and/or management products are not going to fly. IMHO they should spend some time looking to build relationships with the existing providers instead of further diluting the market.

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The IMCCA again hosted a number of successful and well attended events at this year’s InfoComm.  Their fourth annual Telepresence Day was the highlight of the show for many attendees.  It was opened by Cisco’s Snorre Kjesbu and Rick Snyder, presenting their thoughts about where networks and collaboration are headed.

This was followed by a lively panel discussion of industry experts.  Included were Bob Romano of Radvision, Duffie White of TelePresence Tech, Clinton Gatewood of Vu TelePresence, Ann Earon of Telemanagement Resources International, Marcio Macedo of HP, Darren Prodrabsky of Glowpoint, David Phillips of York Telecom and Jeff Nicholl of KBZ. 

The first question (which has been asked every year) was “what is telepresence?”  The answers ranged from the traditional “an immersive experience” to the marketing speak dictated “everything in new video.”  The IMCCA had the opportunity to record this discussion (with special thanks to KBZ) and this video will shortly be made available on our website (IMCCA.org).

The morning was concluded by Polycom’s Dr. Craig Richardson.

He gave an excellent presentation on Unified Communications and the big picture of how everything will work together.

The attendees then went down to the exhibit floor to visit the manufacturers and try some of these TP systems first hand.

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There were a number of interesting new products and features shown at this year’s conference:

• Polycom’s booth always had a large crowd around their new Eagle Eye Director system.

It is a set-top camera system with two cameras and a microphone array that is able to use sound and facial recognition technology to zoom the second camera in on any person speaking and cut to it, repeating the process with the other camera.  The result is an automated “TV crew” experience, with much better views of those speaking.

• This show featured the birth of the StarLeaf, a new firm started by many of the former Codian employees. 

They call their new product a Telepresence PBX, claiming to have “re-imagined enterprise communications–delivering the only single solution for voice and video collaboration at the desktop and in the meeting room.”  Certainly a new PBX built from the ground-up to be video friendly is a good idea, but it is hard to imagine that any large customers would go with a start-up for such a critical function, and just “neighboring” it with an existing PBX sort of kills the point.  Time will tell…

• The ratification of the AVB standard (Audio Video Bridging) by the IEEE was big news here this year.  A number of manufacturers came out with new AVB based products that were impressive.  Most notable was BiAmp’s Tesira system, which takes the audio routing and processing game to a whole new level.

This system sports matrices of up to 420 by 420 with very low latency, and with powerful DSPs doing processing at the edge / IO module - negating the need to bring signals back for processing and then re-distribution.  It also means Tesira can scale for entire multi-room / multi-floor / multi-venue projects instead of needing one processing engine per system.  It is by necessity a very complex system, but it has the potential to be a game-changer.

• Announced just prior to InfoComm and shown here for the first time was Vidyo’s new Panorama system.

It’s not really immersive telepresence (which as I mentioned earlier is completely subject to one’s opinion) but rather a niche application sporting multiple screens or images in any modality – from mobile to office to room.  It looks like a great choice for things like command centers.  (In any case it took some of the sting out of the reversal of last year’s HP OEM announcement.)

• Also new at this year’s show was Revolabs new Flex [FLX] speakerphone system.

Think taking an axe to the traditional tabletop speakerphone – separating the speaker, microphones and dialer – and then connecting them all wirelessly.  This allows for the system components to be placed anywhere in the room that would optimize the needed performance.  It also helps a lot that the speaker driver pushes the sound out sideways instead of up to the ceiling.

• Cisco (I gotta keep telling myself - say Cisco but think Tandberg, say Cisco but think Tandberg, say Cisco but think Tandberg…)  had an impressive booth showing a number of products that integrate the CTS platform into the legacy Tandberg infrastructure – like showing a CTS-3010 and it’s CUCM being managed by TMS (which will be available toward the end of the year.)  One interesting new product they launched is their MX-200 or “Profile Express.”

This is a stand alone system intended for small to medium sized rooms that comes either wall-mountable or with a table or floor stand.   They say it is an easy to use, easy to assemble system that goes from shipping box to making calls in just minutes.  The interesting thing about it is its market position.  Not wanting to get into the politics around Cisco’s TelePresence distribution and marketing let’s just say that it is a product we can expect Cisco to price aggressively.  This is clearly an effort to bring to market a simple, scalable solution they can sell in bulk.

• On the digital signage front I should highlight the availability of a number of new flat panel displays based upon a 55” LCD engine with LED backlighting. (It’s really edgelighting?  Is that a word?) 

Pictured here is the Planar Clarity version.  Placed edge to edge there is only a 5.7mm mullion between images.  These are much more energy efficient and easier to service than anything before in that size range.

• And then there was the Christie display…

Nothing new to report about them since I covered their products in the past, but wow – just look at the display they put together for their booth.  Honestly, no signage has ever looked that awesome on the show floor…nothing even close.

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Finally, my “pick-hit” for this show has to be Shure’s new Axient Wireless [Microphone] Management Network.    

This is a breakthrough concept in wireless audio.  It includes a device that constantly sweeps the RF spectrum looking for interference.  When it finds some it logs and quarantines the frequency – creating an always updating the list of preferred frequencies.  If it detects a transient signal on a channel in use it contacts the transmitters and receivers and seamlessly switches them to the next best free frequency, adding the one with the noise to the quarantined list.  By using dual frequency transmitters (or redundant belt-packs) it can switch to the “b” channel for audio, and then change the frequency of the “a” side to the new choice.  All of the components speak to each other on their own custom network hub in the rack, and via WiFi to the transmitters.  This system is a candidate to change the world of “road worthy” wireless production systems forever.  Of course, until they encrypt the audio it will have little use in corporate settings where it would be of immense value in high-touch, high floor event rooms that typically have big windows facing the maelstrom of RF around big city skyscrapers.

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That’s it for this edition of A View From The Road (with my thanks to Mike Sinclair and Steven Artsis - two terrific industry professionals that helped me identify a few of the items in this report.)  Look for the next report from The Wainhouse Research Collaboration Summit in July, happening for the first time in the City of Brotherly Love.   

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A View From The Road is written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal opinions. David has spent 33 years in the audio visual and broadcasting industries. He has designed facilities for firms such as AT&T, Bloomberg LP, FNN, Morgan Stanley, NYU and Lehman Brothers. He recently joined JPMorgan Chase & Company and is the IMCCA’s Director of Emerging Technology. Email David at David.Danto.IMCCA@Danto.com

About the IMCCA

The Interactive Multimedia & Collaborative Communications Alliance (IMCCA) is a not-for-profit user application and industry focused association with membership comprised of service and product providers, consultants, and users. Members benefit from the understanding and the use of various interactive and collaborative

For further information please contact Carol Zelkin, IMCCA Executive Director, at 516-818- 8184 or czelkin@imcca.org. Visit the IMCCA web site at www.imcca.org