4-page Case Study - Posted 2/26/2008

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TANDBERG

Visual Communications Company Delivers Scalable Solution for Unified Communications

TANDBERG, a leading visual communications company and Microsoft® Certified Partner, provides video conferencing solutions and services worldwide. The company’s customers need solutions that work with their existing Microsoft infrastructure. To meet that need, TANDBERG designed its business-quality visual communications tools to work with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Communicator 2007. By sharing a common infrastructure for video conferencing and other communications, customers can move easily across different platforms and devices—from a mobile device to a personal computer to a room-based video system. As a result, TANDBERG customers can collaborate anywhere and anytime, whether at their desks, in a boardroom, or on the move. They can cut travel costs, streamline decision making, and get to market faster, while reducing their carbon footprint.

Situation

The interoperability of TANDBERG visual communications solutions with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 provides unified communications with exceptional scalability.  Petter Schatvet Director of Technology Alliances TANDBERG

TANDBERG, a leading visual communications company, is collaborating with Microsoft on its latest unified communications solutions, providing products that work together with Office Communications Server 2007 and Office Communicator 2007. Now TANDBERG customers can use the business-quality visual communications tools that they rely upon daily with Microsoft unified communications. By blending high-quality, high-definition video conferencing tools from TANDBERG with the scale and breadth of Office Communications Server 2007, users can collaborate in conference rooms and at their desks. This eliminates islands of communication, giving users the power to connect from wherever they are with whatever communications device they choose.

Based in Oslo, Norway, and in New York City, TANDBERG develops and manufactures video conferencing solutions available for any enterprise network. With more than 1,000 employees and reported 2006 revenues in excess of U.S.$400 million, it is the market leader and serves customers worldwide in commerce, government, healthcare, and education. 

With its experience delivering end-to-end visual communications solutions, TANDBERG has been face-to-face with its customers’ need for solutions that can easily interoperate their existing infrastructures. The demand is for a seamless experience across different platforms and devices. Andrew Reitter, Senior Technologist at TANDBERG, describes the need: “’How do I easily move from one tool to the next? From mobile device to a PC or a room-based video system? And how do I couple that with the business process?’ That is a big driver for customers.” A common infrastructure for video conferencing and other modes of communication enables customers to provide improved ease of use for their employees, along with simpler IT management.

Traditionally, video conferencing has been viewed as a way to save on rising travel expenses. But business customers today realize that they can achieve savings in other areas as well. TANDBERG video conferencing solutions help customers shorten time-to-market, speed decision making, identify and solve problems in the field, and reduce their carbon footprint―all of which positively affects the bottom line of any organization.

Furthermore, visual communications is a productive way for workers to collaborate, particularly work groups that are widely dispersed geographically. Another advantage is the ability to comply with environmental mandates, which require lower energy consumption and reduced emissions. A streamlined and inclusive environment for video conferencing helps companies realize these goals faster.

Solution

TANDBERG offers a range of endpoints, telepresence systems for boardrooms, personal telepresence for the executive desktop, and the latest in high-definition systems. In addition, award-winning infrastructure products from TANDBERG allow multiple parties from multiple locations to join in a single call. TANDBERG incorporates full continuous presence for all conferences, including those with a mix of both high definition and standard definition. Users can record and stream conferences. TANDBERG also offers the ability to easily and securely extend this experience beyond the corporate firewall, so users can connect visually with partners, customers, suppliers, and home telecommuters.

The full suite of TANDBERG video conferencing solutions interoperates with Office Communications Server 2007 and Office Communicator 2007. The Microsoft software provides instant messaging (IM), presence, and voice over IP (VoIP) communications. It also offers audio, video, and Web conferencing. Now TANDBERG customers can make video calls via Office Communications Server 2007, with a unified communications experience that reaches beyond the corporate firewall.

By interoperating with Office Communications Server 2007, TANDBERG solutions make it possible for users to move from a cubicle to a video-enabled conference room to a telepresence system. In time, they will use the same Office Communicator 2007 interface to find contacts and initiate a visually enabled communications session with remote participants, both inside and outside of the organization. With this capability, TANDBERG endpoints can conference with Office Communications Server 2007 endpoints, enlarging the pool of possible communications.

Moreover, TANDBERG visual communications solutions also work in concert with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 and Windows Server® 2003, and they will soon interoperate with Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. As a result, employees can schedule video resources and invite participants to a video conference from the Microsoft Office Outlook® messaging and collaboration client.

Finally, because video conferencing participants sometimes discuss confidential matters and because sessions may include people outside the corporate firewalls, security is a top concern for both TANDBERG and Microsoft. As a result, both companies are focused on providing integrated security that will allow encrypted video sessions between TANDBERG visual communications equipment and Office Communicator 2007.

Benefits

We allow users to schedule meetings in Microsoft Office Outlook like they are used to, and they can add resources like video systems. People just need to show up at the location, and the meeting starts automatically.  Petter Schatvet Director of Technology Alliances TANDBERG

Widespread Access to Rich Communications Tools

Customers running Office Communications Server 2007 with TANDBERG video conferencing systems can offer their employees the ability to join a video session from either an Office Communications Server 2007 endpoint or a TANDBERG endpoint by using familiar tools. This brings the full features of video conferencing to the larger work force more easily and affordably than in the past. “The interoperability of TANDBERG visual communication solutions with Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 provides unified communications with exceptional scalability,” says Petter Schatvet, Director of Technology Alliances at TANDBERG. “It’s scalability that extends from the personal computer to the boardroom.”

Simplified User Experience

Over time, mutual TANDBERG and Microsoft customers will be able to take advantage of the full range of Office Communications Server 2007 capabilities, including multipoint conferencing (the ability to connect three or more conferencing systems together simultaneously in a single call), as well as the security features. “We allow people to use Microsoft products and have the exact same user experience and take advantage of our technologies without having to be trained on them,” Schatvet says.

The interoperability with Exchange Server 2003 provides further efficiencies. “We allow users to schedule meetings in Microsoft Office Outlook like they are used to, and they can add resources like video systems,” Schatvet explains. “People just need to show up at the location, and the meeting starts automatically.” In addition, with the TANDBERG Content Server hardware, companies can easily share and archive video sessions on portal sites, such as those based on Microsoft Office SharePoint® Server 2007.

The interoperability that the TANDBERG solutions have with Exchange Server 2003 is unique in the video conferencing industry. TANDBERG spent extra development time to work effectively with Exchange Server. This capability is an advantage to IT staff, because it means there is no extra client software to install. The user simply uses the familiar Office Outlook tools as they were designed.

More Efficient Collaboration

TANDBERG and Microsoft have established a federation link to provide streamlined communications between research and development employees in Oslo and Microsoft colleagues in Redmond, Washington. Using the presence capabilities within Office Communications Server 2007 through a federated connection, TANDBERG employees can quickly locate colleagues by seeing their availability within Office Communicator 2007. The result, according to Schatvet, is higher-quality product development—despite the nine-hour time difference between Oslo and Redmond. “It's much easier to work with partners when you have an open line of communication,” he says.

Reduced Costs and Faster Time-to-Market

When employees access video conferencing from their own PCs, a company can save significantly on travel costs. Decision-making becomes streamlined, and as a result, business processes can be shortened to reduce the time-to-market.

One TANDBERG pharmaceutical customer was able to improve time-to-market by one month for each of four products it develops annually through heavy use of video conferencing during product development, according to Jeff Wilson, Corporate Marketing Manager, Global Programs at TANDBERG. With an average of $40,000 earned per day per product, the customer also expects to gain up to $4.8 million in added revenues.

Improved Environmental Practices

In addition, companies can address the impact of regulations and growing industry pressure for environmentally friendly business practices. In regions where environmental legislation has taken effect, Wilson says, companies can obtain credits for emissions by implementing “green” technologies like video conferencing, which help reduce carbon dioxide emissions related to commuting and travel.

For More Information

For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:
www.microsoft.com

For more information about TANDBERG products and services, call (212) 692-6500 (United States) or 47 67 125 125 (Norway), or visit the Web site at:
www.tandberg.com

Unified Communications

Unified Communications bridge the gap between telephony and computing to deliver real-time messaging, voice and conferencing to the desktop environment. For more information, go to:
www.microsoft.com/uc

This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.

Document published February 2008