Developed by HP, the HP Halo Video Collaboration Service will be available for the full range of TANDBERG conferencing systems, including TANDBERG Total Telepresence offerings. HP and TANDBERG also are expanding their reseller agreement to give more customers additional flexibility and choice in purchasing collaboration products and services.
With these announcements, made at HP’s 2008 Annual Imaging and Printing Conference, HP and TANDBERG are offering customers one of the most robust portfolios of collaboration products and services on the market today, ultimately helping customers increase enterprise-wide productivity and realize total resource savings.
“Our new managed service offering allows traditional video conferencing customers to experience a level of service and return on investment that other vendors only promise,” said David Murphy, senior vice president, Imaging and Printing Group, HP. “HP and TANDBERG are offering the industry’s highest level of managed services to support video collaboration globally across the enterprise, from a single source.”
As part of the HP Halo Video Collaboration Service, video conferencing endpoints will be hosted directly on the Halo Video Exchange Network – a global fiber optic network designed for video collaboration that, unlike other networks, can easily allow company-to-company connections, has true worldwide reach and does not require bandwidth scheduling.
The Halo Video Exchange Network and TANDBERG’s network infrastructure technology allow users to enjoy increased reliability, flexibility and improved video and audio quality. These improvements in the overall video collaboration experience can drive significantly higher usage rates that can increase productivity at the workplace while decreasing travel costs and carbon emissions.
“This extension of the relationship between TANDBERG and HP will allow our customers to take full advantage of the strengths we both bring to telepresence and visual communications,” said Fredrik Halvorsen, chief executive officer, TANDBERG. “We are best placed to define a universal standard for telepresence, which can protect an organization’s investments.”
According to Andy Sanctuary, General Manager, Middle East TANDBERG, “ This latest announcement between TANDBERG & HP will provide our customers in the region with a comprehensive service level offering that they can use to help manage their video infrastructure and derive maximum productivity out of it.”
The Halo Video Collaboration Service provides management and support from HP, including technical support, directory management and auto meeting initiation. The service also includes the capability to connect to other video conferencing solutions, both on and off of the Halo Video Exchange Network, enabling customers to collaborate even more effectively with colleagues, partners, vendors and suppliers.
The HP Halo Video Collaboration Service, which complements the HP Halo Telepresence Solutions portfolio, is expected to be available for customer installations in the first half of 2009.
