posted by: Mark Cortner
The same week Cisco announced an agreement to acquire Tandberg, another interesting and potentially disruptive development occurred in the visual collaboration market—LifeSize announced a new high-definition videoconferencing product that may redefine and expand the market for telepresence solutions. The product, LifeSize® Passport™, is approximately the size of a netbook and delivers a personal “telepresence” experience at a price point below $2,500 USD.
Lifesize’s Passport supports 720p HD video at 30 frames per second and HD audio and requires only 1 Mbps of bandwidth. The current release of Passport supports point-to-point HD video, although one would suspect that a multi-point version is in its future. In addition, and other evidence point related to the growing acceptance of Skype in the enterprise, Passport supports Skype as an audio source enabling the product to directly connect with any Skype user worldwide. The product also connects with other LifeSize and standards-compliant enterprise videoconferencing systems.
LifeSize has broken some new ground with Passport—including form factor, integration with Skype, and price point. I suspect that other industry players will follow quickly and further dilute the telepresence category (by positioning high-definition video and telepresence as one and the same). With that said, new videoconferencing products such as Passport will undoubtedly continue to add value by enabling the proliferation of and expanding the use of videoconferencing by enterprises. The support for Skype audio is a great step forward though this would be enhanced further with the ability to interoperate with Skype video too …
The same week Cisco announced an agreement to acquire Tandberg, another interesting and potentially disruptive development occurred in the visual collaboration market—LifeSize announced a new high-definition videoconferencing product that may redefine and expand the market for telepresence solutions. The product, LifeSize® Passport™, is approximately the size of a netbook and delivers a personal “telepresence” experience at a price point below $2,500 USD.
Lifesize’s Passport supports 720p HD video at 30 frames per second and HD audio and requires only 1 Mbps of bandwidth. The current release of Passport supports point-to-point HD video, although one would suspect that a multi-point version is in its future. In addition, and other evidence point related to the growing acceptance of Skype in the enterprise, Passport supports Skype as an audio source enabling the product to directly connect with any Skype user worldwide. The product also connects with other LifeSize and standards-compliant enterprise videoconferencing systems.
LifeSize has broken some new ground with Passport—including form factor, integration with Skype, and price point. I suspect that other industry players will follow quickly and further dilute the telepresence category (by positioning high-definition video and telepresence as one and the same). With that said, new videoconferencing products such as Passport will undoubtedly continue to add value by enabling the proliferation of and expanding the use of videoconferencing by enterprises. The support for Skype audio is a great step forward though this would be enhanced further with the ability to interoperate with Skype video too …
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