Yesterday the Medill Reports Ben Shamisso penned a piece regarding the war of attrititon between the legacy deskphone and their looming replacements-smartphones and tablets. In the story both CounterPath's SVP Todd Carothers and I were quoted.
My view is centered around the concept of utility. People will simply get more use out of a tablet based communications hub than the standard desk phones. It one of the reasons why Cloud TC and Panasonic both are making desk phones based upon the Android OS. An iPad in a Gorrilla stand makes for a very good desk phone already. So will Android tablets too, as long as you have the right software, ala Bria from CounterPath or even Skype. Others will be in the fray soon too so watch this space for more on this emerging market sector.
Just as we're seeing Over the Top (OTT) in voice and data service impacting the legacy mobile operators and telcos, there's also a movement afoot thats going to challenge the legacy video conferencing providers like BT, Verizon, Glowpoint (I'm a shareholder) and the rest who have been in the business of white glove video conferncing services, operating exchanges or hosting bridging services.
Yesterday pal Larry Lisser, who is known in the telecom industry as the person to go to to revive sales, penned a post supportive of disruptive Silicon Valley startup, Vidtel (a Comunicano client) who are playing the channel game to open up the legacy room and desk based video conferncing system users of Polycom, Lifesize, Cisco/Tandberg gear to be able to go what founder and ex VP Marketing at Broadsoft Scott Wharton (who is now blogging) is doing with their "any to any'" video bridging service called MeetMe that is offered at downright disruptive prices that turns the whole market on its side. What Vidtel is doing is addressing the already turned on and tuned in video conferencing user base and making their rooms and desktop video systems easily accessible to CounterPath Bria and Bria mobile users, as well as those who are Skype or GoogleTalk centric.
In the post, that was aimed at getting channel oriented telecom resellers to understand why video is so important to them, Lisser points our reasons and rationale as to why the channel is now meaningful to the video conferencing market, a belief also echoed by client Telesphere who offers VideoConnect through their growing reseller partners to sell in to their enterprise customers. In the case of Telesphere they deliver Broadsoft/Polycom/Glowpoint powered video conferencing service that also offers point to point video calling on a range of devices and over the CounterPath powered Bria 3 for Broadworks softphone.
These are reseller channel sold solutions that show a deep understanding of the how to sell versus how to follow. CounterPath, Telesphere and Vidtel along with the established players in Cisco and Polycom, are all using the sales channel to sell through others, not only direct. This is not far different from how Logitech/Lifesize is taking the LifeSize Connections service, or what I call SightSpeed for Business on steroids, where they combined the best of both SightSpeed and Lifesize to bring a lightweight telepresence offering to market and are making it available through leading telecom vTailer (vertical etailer) VoIP Supply (also a Comunicano client) to reach into an already established customer base.
Larry's premise is further underscored by ClearOne's purchase today of Israel based VCon, thus showing the world that Polycom, long the audio turned video conferencing leader will have some new competition. ClearOne already sells through channel with companies like eBuyNow, operators of the Skype shop selling the ClearOne Chat 60, and VoIP Supply pushng both the Skype friendly consumer grade speakerphones and the more robust higher end models. Now they'll take those same channels and follow LifeSize/Logitech's lead and seek to propel sales through those vtailers like VoIPSupply and others.
All this leads to disruption. Skype started it, but they're clearly not the end game any longer. Cisco and Polycom aren't exactly sitting idle as Vidtel and Vidyo disrupt the market, nor are any executives rolling over and playing dead because of Google Hangouts. Companies like Citrix, with GoToMeeting/HD Faces are making great inroads, selling not so much through channel, but via a very strong direct marketing effort online.
What this all means is the traditional players have to change, adapt or die. It's survival of not only the fittest any longer, but also of the fast and nimble.
If you haven't read pal Martin Geddes latest post on the Future of Communications entitled Peak Telecom, you are missing something that is likely either something you have likely said, thought, heard someone say in private or really wished you had. It's a stunningly brilliant piece of writing that leads you to wonder, "what is Martin going to say next" as you read through it.
This post is every bit as important as Alec Saunders 2005 post entitled The Voice 2.0 Manifesto in my opinion as far as laying things out or the famed Pulver Purple Minutes post. It is worthy of your time as it may impact your work or livelihood.
So everyone knows it was Martin who first suggested me and my agency to Nokia back in 2005 to help them decipher "social media" long before many knew what "social media" and blogging was really all about. That led to my development of the Nokia Blogger Relations program, and in turn gave birth to Nokia's Social Media efforts, something I'm now finally allowed to admit after getting permission recently.
It was Martin's clear cut thinking back then that foresaw the changing landscape of how media would impact the mobile world. Now in his post he's laid it all out pinpointing where the changes are coming from, and further pinning the operators into the dumb pipe corner.
There's one reason I'm excited about IT Expo. It's called Startup Camp.
Startup Camp is perhaps the most relevant example of what is really happening in the telecom and tech world today at the twice annual confernence. For the past four StartUpCamp they have had standing room only crowds, and key speakers iincluding startup luminaries and legends Craig Walker (GrandCentral), Bob Metcalf (father of Ethernet, 3COM), Jamie Siminoff (Simulscribe, Unsubscibe) and Jeff Bonforte (Gizmo, Yahoo Voice, Xobni). This year will have Sir Terry Matthews (NewBridge Networks, Mitel) as the keynote offering a neat perspective from years of experience nurturing and building companies.
But the event is more than talk. It's about the baby companies getting their start. One of the former presenters to graduate via exit was GroupMe, which was bought Skype, and other forward thinking companies like Twillio, OpenTok have all supported the event as sponsors to help make it a success.
Ok. In my rush to pack for a trip to Cartagena, Columbia for a wedding I forgot to pack my SIM cutter. That meant the ease of finding a micro SIM for the iPhone and iPad would make it an adventure and given I wanted more rest than work these few days before the upcoming trade show and conference onslaught--three in four weeks in February for me, I decided to leave the i devices in the safe or use them on WiFi.
Instead I used the Smsung Google Nexus that's pentaband and workes very well on Telefonica's Movistar network here.
Sadly battery life isn't that great. Still I had connectivity. It was cheap I think I paid less than $20.00 for a weeks worth of data access, and when I needed to, I was able to teather to the Nexus.
I guess that's the best reason. Gosh I missed the iPhone.
Yesterday eWeek broke the news about CounterPath and Vidtel announcing interoperability between Bria softphones, including the recently released iPhone client, and Vidtel's MeetMe service. Jim Courtney, who authors VoiceOnTheWeb.biz has been testing Bria and Vidtel for a few weeks chimed in as did the folks over at OnSip.com. In each case effusive with praise came to mind. Like Jim I've been using the combination as far back as the beta builds of Bria for iPhone with Video started to circulate having similar high-quality experiences as both Jim and the OnSip folks saw.
What excites me though is the forthcoming Bria on iPad and Android tablets, both of which are in development now. At Showstoppers last week, CounterPath showed the iPad beta off, along with the iPhone client, demonstrating that software on an iPad for video conferencing makes the Apple tablet a far better investment than say a Cisco E20 or the Polycom desk phones with video capabilities for those who want greater flexibility in where they connect from.
In my view, we're only scratching the surface of where this all will go. With CounterPath's massive distribution relationships with Broadsoft, Genband, MetaSwitch and hundreds of telecom operators, service providers and an already deep installed user base inside the Enterprise, the ability to see others just got a lot easier, so the opportunity for Vidtel to broaden their reach was their win here. The win for CounterPath is they now can point customers and carriers to a Video as a Service platform that's priced affordably, and which is standards based, the same point that the OnSip folks have been making for years.
While Skype and GoogleTalk are both interoperable with Vidtel, most enterprise size businesses don't really "endorse" Skype or GoogleTalk or even the very simple to use Hangouts. With Vidtel's MeetMe and the suite of CounterPath Bria clients, there's now an enterprise ready, carrier grade and often approved softclient that can connect to a multi-standards based video conferencing bridging service so anyone can see and be seen. Add in the cost efficiences of both offerings, and all of a sudden the IT buyer has the budget for iPads or Android tablets and alot more software vs. those desk phones or room based video systems.
This is also an example of why some conferences matter. It was last year at eComm in San Francisco that I was able to arrange for CounterPath's SVP Todd Carothers and Vidtel's founder Scott Wharton to sit down and talk about what was an obvious fit for both companies, especially surrounding Vidtel's "any to any "MeetMe conferencing platform that connects just about any video client or endpoint hard or soft.
In the words of The A Team's fearless leader, Hannibal T. Smith, "you gotta love, when a plan comes together."
(For transparency sake, both Vidtel and CounterPath are clients of my agency, and I sit on advisory boards for both companies)
