Size Matters: Conferencing Vendors Tailor Solutions for SMBs

By Tara Seals

Phone Plus Magazine

8/1/04

Conferencing has been a popular and necessary service for large businesses and enterprises for years. Meanwhile, small and medium businesses have suffered from a lack of offers that fit their needs. Most SMBs don't need a fully integrated system with unified messaging, morphing Web presentation Windows and Webcast capability, and they definitely don't need a room-based video conferencing system. A simple Web or video conferencing offer would be useful, however.

“Small to medium-sized companies are rapidly adopting conferencing across all aspects of their businesses, increasingly using conferencing as a way to manage travel expenses. They're realizing that conferencing is a powerful tool that is actually very affordable and ultimately scalable,” says Chuck Mancini, president and CEO of ECI Conference Call Services LLC, which has a wholesale program.

Video is a particularly pent-up market. “Until recently, the video conferencing industry focused primarily on the enterprise market,” says Ira Weinstein, a senior analyst at Wainhouse Research. “Innovative and cost-effective solutions... will play a key role in the growth of the conferencing and collaboration industry.”

Glowpoint Inc., an IP-based video communications service provider, has expanded its “All You Can See” unlimited video calling plans to meet the needs of smaller businesses, including telecommuters, home offices and corporate satellite offices. It is part of GlowPoint's new Individual Video Access service class (IVA), which uses the H.264 video transport protocol to improve call quality at lower bandwidth. IVA costs about $299 per month.

“By offering a suite of services and support for smaller businesses normally found only in enterprise grade, business-class products, GlowPoint has opened the doors to incremental business and further adoption of videoconferencing,” says David Trachtenberg, GlowPoint's CEO.

The solution is available on a wholesale basis: SoHo Video Solutions will integrate GlowPoint's offer in a video conferencing bundle that includes a Sony PCS-11 video endpoint, a 32 inch monitor and a three year maintenance program, including SoHo's “One-Call” customer service.

Not to be outdone, Polycom Inc. has launched the Polycom V500, a video calling system for small and medium-sized businesses and telecommuters. The system delivers natural, enterprise-quality video communications at 30 frames per second and Polycom Siren14 wideband audio, also using H.264 video compression. The solution is available for under $2,000.

“What we're seeing is a wider usage model for video conferencing for businesses that didn't consider it before,” says Polycom's Maggie Smith, director of video communication product marketing. “We wanted to provide something that was simple yet provided the essential video conferencing, but also affordable: For the price of a new laptop, you can add a video system. You simply hook it to a TV, connect the Internet interface and you're ready.”

The V500 is available via Polycom distributors and wholesale partners. The first service provider to market and sell the Polycom V500 is AT&T Corp. “The Polycom V500 is an exciting product for AT&T's small and medium- sized business customer base and is a natural complement to AT&T's end-to-end class of service network, IP gateways and bridging services,” says Jim Stapleton, marketing director for AT&T Select Accounts. “This is a significant move toward driving the mass adoption of video, with a solution that fits within every business budget without sacrificing video quality and gives small and medium-sized organizations a great business application for increasing collaboration and communication.”

Polycom also has partnered with IVCi, which launched the “Free Every 3” program that offers small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) a turnkey solution for interactive video communications. Free Every 3 combines IVCi's IntelliNet IP managed video conferencing network service and the V500, for a flat monthly fee. Program users receive a new V500, or its most recent Polycom equivalent, every three years at no additional cost.

“For many companies with fewer than 500 employees, cost and technical complexity have been barriers to the adoption of video as a viable communication solution within their organizations,” explains Chris Bottger, vice president and general manager of IVCi.

Audio and Web offers for SMBs are also becoming more cost-effective and getting easier to use. “We're branching out into new markets and penetrating heretofore unserved markets,” says NetworkIP's Scott Walters, director of conferencing sales and development. “What I've seen is there's a trend towards product diversification, and that means simplifying products and not always enabling them with so many bells and whistles. Along those lines, there's a push towards serving SMBs and even consumers with these audio/Web products.”

For a simplified approach, the Conference Group has introduced the Real-time Account Provisioning system, an on-demand customer interface that can issue instant Web/audio conference passcodes, tailored for the smaller, ad hoc conferencing user. Partners can put a link on their Web sites to an online portal where users can purchase a passcode with a credit card. Customers instantly receive passcodes on a confirmation screen and by e-mail. The partner is then credited for the sale.

Available to agents now, the functionality will be rolled out in a privately branded capacity for resellers later this year, says Greg Plum, the Conference Group's alternate channel manager. “Or perhaps we'll give them 1,000 codes and they can go ahead and provision at will, and we can replenish those codes as needed,” he says.

“We have opted to use a tool that doesn't require reservations,” Plum notes. “It has the application-sharing functionality, you can pass controls among users and you have the ability to transfer files as you see fit. But we kind of stayed away from the type of product that has whiteboarding and video embedded, simply because the resources required on the end user side are a little bit greater and we've run into issues with firewalls. So this is streamlined from a resource standpoint, for the SMBs.”

PAETEC Communications Inc. has added enhanced audio and Web-based conference calling to its portfolio, available via the company's resellers and agents. Tailored for customers with no need for frills, the service gives customers a bridge number that can be used at any time and free Web-based conferencing with desktop sharing capabilities, allowing the conference chairperson to share any application via a simple Web-based interface. While full-featured, operator-controlled conferencing also is available from PAETEC for large, formal conferences, the real target is the SMB crowd, according to John Chapman, PAETEC's vice president of marketing. “There's a real need here,” he says. “They need something robust, but not too complicated or too expensive, and that's what we've tried to deliver.”

That said, there are some features that appeals to SMBs. “We're...seeing a shift to more advanced feature utilization on automated conferencing, such as call recording and moderator dial-out and an increasing use of Web conferencing to get the effectiveness of a face-to-face meeting without the associated expense,” says Karen Verelley, senior director of marketing communications and public relations at ECI.

For additional information regarding IVCi products and services, or to speak to a representative, please contact IVCi at 800-224-7083, or click here to have an IVCi Representative contact you.

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