Poly

 

ENTERPRISE CONNECT 2012, ORLANDO, Fla. - Mar 26, 2012 : Polycom, Inc. (Nasdaq: PLCM), the global leader in open standards-based unified communications (UC), today announced two new interoperable solutions with HP and Microsoft that combine Polycom® RealPresence® video solutions, HP Networking technology and services, and Microsoft Lync with joint reference architectures. Together, they make it easier to deliver, scale, and manage UC environments that keep employees connected via video, voice, and other communications apps from anywhere. The solutions bring together the key elements of UC and video collaboration, from the networking and UC platform to high-quality video infrastructure and systems, enabling businesses to reduce total cost of ownership and allowing end users to participate in face-to-face meetings anytime, across any environment.

 

The solutions reduce the time and resources required to create and maintain an end-to-end UC and video collaboration environment. By leveraging open-standards to ensure interoperability, the solutions work with existing infrastructure, reduce complexity, and simplify migration of existing systems and endpoints to the new enterprise solution. The combined solutions simplify purchasing and provide a best-of-breed approach to deliver high-quality enterprise video collaboration. The HP FlexNetwork architecture creates a low latency, high-performing network optimized for video by combining with the Polycom® RealPresence® Platform with H.264 High Profile technology that uses up to 50 percent less bandwidth than competitive solutions. When coupled with Polycom® Constant Clarity™, with patented Polycom® Lost Packet Recovery® technologies to protect video and voice performance despite bandwidth disruptions, the solutions deliver a truly HD video experience despite fluctuations in bandwidth.

 

"Together with HP and Microsoft, Polycom is delivering interoperable solutions that are greater than the sum of their parts: they combine best-of-breed video collaboration capabilities and tested interoperability from three industry leaders to make it easier to deliver, scale, and manage all the disparate applications and components of unified communications," said Sue Hayden, executive vice president, Strategic Alliances, Polycom. "We're hearing from organizations around the world that video collaboration is a mission critical part of how they run their businesses. Whether it is speeding time-to-market for a manufacturing company, consulting with a specialist over telemedicine, or supporting distance learning, our compelling solutions are changing how people collaborate and work."

 

The solutions can be delivered via:

The new solutions provide reliable, high-quality video and UC collaboration across the enterprise with a lower cost than single vendor offerings. The Polycom RealPresence Platform offers dynamic resource allocation and interoperability to further drive savings. Polycom solutions use open standards to ensure all the elements in a UC environment can seamlessly work together. This gives customers the freedom to choose best-of-breed solutions for instant messaging, presence, call control, web conferencing, video collaboration, and mobile video with the assurance they'll not only work together but also with existing systems and new ones.

 

"As a large organization with many international partners, we needed to connect our diverse communities with technologies that would help save time and costs," said Steve Grive, director, Information Communications Technology, University of the West of England. "With HP's help, we were able to use Polycom video solutions and Microsoft UC to transform communications across our global network, as well as between students and staff for an enhanced learning experience."

 

"Video in multiple forms is driving network traffic growth as clients increasingly use video on laptops, smartphones, and tablets in addition to room-based videoconferencing," said Mike Banic, vice president of Global Marketing, Networking, HP. "The joint Rich Media Communications solution from HP, Polycom, and Microsoft provide clients a scalable, open architecture for easy deployment and simplify management across the UC environment, lowering their total cost of ownership."

 

"Customers are increasingly realizing the benefits of virtual meetings. Polycom and HP are delivering rich communication and productivity-enhanced video and UC solutions that help customers avoid expensive upgrades and enable functionality. Customers can now further reduce complexity and costs, utilize an open platform, and more rapidly tap into the power of visual collaboration," said Giovanni Mezgec, general manager for Lync at Microsoft Corp.

 

Today's news builds on the companies' existing alliances, which includes product interoperability, resale, and services. Polycom offers more than 40 solutions that are interoperable with Microsoft Lync (some pending testing and qualification), including the Polycom® CX7000 unified group video collaboration system – the first room video solution custom-built and optimized for full integration with Microsoft Lync. The Polycom CX7000 changes the game with ease of scheduling, connecting, and managing video calls for distributed work groups. It has plug-and-play set-up, and users can connect to a video conference simply by one click. Microsoft and Polycom together have won hundreds of deals based on integrated solutions. Polycom is an exclusive partner for certain video collaboration solutions for HP's internal use and resale to its broad customer base, and HP can deploy and manage the extensive portfolio of Polycom solutions for customers. Polycom is an HP AllianceONE Premier Partner and a Microsoft Gold Unified Communications Partner (named 2011 UC Innovation Partner of the Year); HP and Microsoft are both Polycom Strategic Alliance Partners.

 

At Enterprise Connect 2012, March 26-29, Polycom will demonstrate a vari