Voice and Video Convergence

What is voice and video convergence? Why is it currently utilized more in the business world? And will video calling succeed at a consumer level in the future?

Voice and Video convergence has made a huge impact on business users over the last few years. Before convergence, separate data (IP Network), voice (Local PBX and PSTN connection) and video (ISDN/PSTN) networks where required to allow communications between companies. These were expensive to implement (separate cabling infrastructure) and difficult to support as the different technologies traditionally required a different support team i.e. IP for the Data network and PBX engineers for the voice and possibly a mixture of both for the video. Now, that all devices have become IP, there are a few major benefits:

• An immediate saving on cabling as only a CAT 6 cabling infrastructure is needed for all devices.
• If they already have a WAN infrastructure between their offices, they can now make free calls across that instead of paying a normal phone call charge for each call. Also, they can implement least cost routing between sites i.e. a call from the Dublin office to a London number can go across the companies WAN and break out at the London office so they only pay for a local call
• Large residential broadband bandwidths mean that companies can extend the offices services (email, IP phone, Web Cam and instant messaging client) to employees at home. If users can now work as effectively from home as from the office then they can be made permanently a remote user which has huge all-round benefits:

1. Smaller Office spaces required
2. Reduced light and heat bills saves money and is more energy efficient
3. Less traffic on roads with people travelling to work means less pollution
4. No travel time to and from work gives employees more time to themselves and reduces stress

• Having all these devices on the IP network makes it much easier to integrate them together so that one application or client can be your email, IM, virtual IP phone and video conferencing point.

Cisco are the current market leaders in providing IP network solutions to the corporate sector (wikinvest.com 2010) with their Business Video, TelePresence and Unified Communications products.

On a consumer level, where the possibility of spending large sums of money on specialised hardware and software is not so viable the combined use of voice and video has been slower to take hold. Products such as skype have brought video calling to the consumer to a certain degree. Simple to use free software and the possibility to make free or cheap video calls has proven to be a winning combination. However video calling is still only used for a tiny fraction of calls at consumer level

Hardware limitations may be a small part of the problem, but smart phones have had the functionality to make video calls for years. New products such as IP Television, the Panasonic VIERA Cast™ IPTV for example, which allow Skype on Your TV will also encourage average users to move towards video calling (Parkes 2010). The Videophone Touch AiGuru SV1T for Skype from ASUS also removes the need for a separate pc microphone and speakers (Humphries 2010).

One of the main reason video calling has not taken off, as stated by David Sims, TMCnet Contributing Editor “We usually don’t want the other person to see us, what we’re wearing -- or not wearing” may be a more difficult one to overcome (Sims 2010). The privacy afforded by keeping calls to voice only is something people may not sacrifice easily. The ability to answer a call and say were at home while were actually in the pub watching football is no longer available when a video call is used.

In my opinion however the single biggest driver behind the future success of consumer video calling may be the recently released iphone 4. Face Time Calls are one of the major features being pushed by Apple for this iphone release(apple.com 2010). The technology used may be nothing that hasn’t been seen before. Sceptics of the system criticise the ability of Face Time to only work when a wifi connection is available. This however may increase the chances of video calling thriving in the future. The quality of the video over wifi connection will be far superior showing users its full potential and it does not use up carrier minutes, which is always a bonus.

Apples marketing ability coupled with their market saturation has the potential to make video calling more socially viable and acceptable. Apples ease of use “it just works” will also bring video calling to the less technically savvy. And most importantly once the ball starts rolling millions of iphone 4 owners worldwide will start to use Face Time Calls. This will most lightly be followed by all the other major smart phone companies, who constantly try to produce “iphone beaters” following suit.

With all of these aspects considered I feel that while video calls will never completely replace voice only calls, in the future a much higher percentage of average consumer correspondence will involve voice and video convergence.

 

Bibliography

apple.com, 2010. Apple - iPhone 4 - One-tap video calling with FaceTime on iPhone 4. Available at: http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/facetime.html [Accessed November 11, 2010].

Humphries, M., 2010. Asus release Videophone Touch AiGuru SV1T for Skype – Computer Chips & Hardware Technology | Geek.com. Available at: http://www.geek.com/articles/chips/asus-release-videophone-touch-aiguru-sv1t-for-skype-20090921/ [Accessed November 11, 2010].

Parkes, P., 2010. Skype - The Big Blog - Get Skype on your TV. Available at: http://blogs.skype.com/en/2010/01/skype_on_your_tv.html [Accessed November 11, 2010].

Sims, D., 2010. Will Video Calls Finally Take Off? Available at: http://unified-communications.tmcnet.com/topics/unified-communications/articles/111649-will-video-calls-finally-take-off.htm [Accessed November 11, 2010].

wikinvest.com, 2010. Stock:Cisco Systems (CSCO). Available at: http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Cisco_Systems_(CSCO) [Accessed November 11, 2010].