From hospitals and classrooms to factory floors and courtrooms, secure HD video collaboration connects people and places far beyond the conference room
PLEASANTON, Calif. - Apr 30, 2012 : At several industry conferences this week, Polycom, Inc. (Nasdaq: PLCM), the global leader in open standards-based unified communications, is showcasing the transformational power of secure HD video in healthcare, education, manufacturing and other industries like government, financial, retail, and entertainment. From medical specialists who now can consult with more patients in more locations, to teachers and scientists who are teaching students in multiple countries simultaneously, to judges and courts who are accelerating court cases while reducing court costs, Polycom® RealPresence® video solutions are inspiring and enabling new business models, new services, new collaborative relationships, and significant competitive advantages, while creating a video culture where collaborating face-to-face with anyone is the preferred and increasingly default mode.
“In every industry, video conferencing is increasingly recognized as a mission-critical business solution,” said Randel Maestre, vice president of Worldwide Field and Industry Solutions, Polycom. “Today, it’s not just about video conferences in office environments; it’s about delivering the ability to meet face-to-face in any environment. This transformation is due in large part to the integration of video collaboration into day-to-day operations such as mobile inspection on the factory floor, crisis response centers in government or video-enabled kiosk banking. Companies globally are now seeing the value of video collaboration beyond simple travel savings. Video collaboration is reducing time-to-market, increasing customer service, accelerating emergency responses in government, and streamlining decision making.”
Transforming Healthcare
Increasingly more healthcare organizations use secure Polycom HD video to fuel innovation through new and emerging healthcare applications, business models, and patient/physician relationships. Eight of the top 10 hospitals and the top 10 pharmaceutical companies in the world use Polycom video solutions to bring people in the healthcare field together for improved face to face collaboration from anywhere. For example:
- In Erie, Pennsylvania, Polycom video solutions help support a collaborative healthcare model focused on prevention and wellness, and patient-centered community-based care, which is critical for decreasing the rate of unnecessary hospital readmissions. Saint Vincent Health System is helping people with chronic diseases such as diabetes by pairing patients who have a pattern of being readmitted to the hospital with a coach who can instruct and educate them over a 12 to 16 week program. Meeting participants can connect over live video or patients can watch recorded trainings securely over the Web, which are made available through Polycom® RealPresence® Media Manager software solutions (watch the related video).
- The United Kingdom's NHS (National Health Service) telestroke services saves over £8 million (over $12 million) a year in clinician travel and after-patient care by bringing stroke specialists to the patient via video to enable timely life-saving diagnosis by the specialists. Fifteen stroke consultants have laptops equipped with Polycom software, which they use to connect to any of six hospitals via a Polycom Practitioner Cart at the patient's bedside. Controlling a camera remotely, the specialist can see the detailed clinical examination performed by the clinician at the bedside (watch the related video).
- The Beijing Ditan Hospital, an international infectious disease prevention and treatment hospital, often treats patients who require quarantine to ensure full recovery. The hospital uses a large telemedicine network for consultations between doctors and patients, which helps to prevent the spread of disease, while also saving time and travel resources (see the related press release).
Transforming Education
Around the world, schools are using Polycom video collaboration for distance learning, including all of the world’s top five colleges and universities. Polycom’s vision of collaborative education includes bridging teachers, instructors, students, and content providers around the world to help people learn. Video technology provides rich, interactive, visual solutions that impact all facets of education from student administration to course development to curriculum delivery to content management. A few examples include:
- In Kentucky, as part of Polycom’s growing network of educational institutions and partnerships, Polycom announced its work with Western Kentucky University to enhance video collaboration solutions. For students in smaller towns or rural areas with careers and families, access to curriculum is more challenging due to their geographical distance from the main campus. By leveraging the video solutions, WKU provides a fully collaborative environment for students to enroll in the university’s programs (see the related press release).
- At Australia’s Reef HQ Great Barrier Reef Aquarium, the world's largest living coral reef aquarium, scuba divers who join from underwater can connect with children around the world in live, interactive video meetings so that youth can learn more about the delicate marine ecosystem at the Great Barrier Reef.
Transforming Manufacturing
Polycom helps manufacturers around the globe, including the world’s top five auto manufacturers and top three aerospace companies, use video collaboration to reduce time-to-market for new products by bringing distant teams together for remote design; knowledge management and transfer; quality assurance inspections; and remote troubleshooting of products. A few examples include:
- In Brazil, Petrobras, one of the largest oil companies in the world, uses Polycom video solutions to ensure project success. Many of the company experts are often required to travel away from the drill sites. To help employees connect with their teams while they are away, the experts can join meetings by Polycom® RealPresence® Mobile on tablets and smartphones. Cameras hooked up to underground robotics can also send images of the drilling in progress, enabling the experts to assess situations in real-time. For offshore oil platform-based employees that may need special medical care, a preliminary session with a medical practitioner over video can help save on time and travel costs without compromising quality of care for the patient.
- On the assembly line of the factory floor, major automotive manufacturers use Polycom® HDX® series-based practitioner carts with camera-wand peripherals to conduct in-depth inspections of the car interior, even after the aluminum body encases the engine. Employees at the assembly line can also easily meet “face to face” with other colleagues who are in other locations by connecting through the video conferencing unit on the HDX to any other video-enabled standards-based video endpoints, such as tablets or smartphones running Polycom RealPresence Mobile.
- In Poland, Polycom also recently announced that LOTOS Group, a major producer and supplier of oil products across Poland and abroad, uses video collaboration to help speed decision making for its 5,000 dispersed employees (see the related press release).
