Tandberg brings mobility to videoconferencing

Tandberg today extended telepresence to the road warrior, announcing a new mobility video solution that can tie laptop PCs into existing high-definition  standards-based videoconferencing systems. The Tandberg Movi will deliver video over broadband connections in hotel rooms or airport lounges, and thousands of individual units can be centrally managed using Tandberg’s Management Suite.

“This is a PC-based solution that brings mobility to video,” said Mike Roussey, product marketing manager for Movi. “We look at it as an extension of Tandberg’s total solution to the PC. We really think that is the selling point – this is not on an island.”

Tandberg already introduced high-end telepresence gear and also mid-range videoconferencing intended to extend videoconferencing to more locations cost-effectively. The Movi would become part of a managed telepresence or videoconferencing service that a telecom service provider could offer using Tandberg gear or could work with a Tandberg channel partner to support. Tandberg’s Management Suite and Telepresence Server enable centralized management of the multiple endpoints.

The Tandberg Movi can support HD video if the bandwidth is sufficient and the end user has an HD Web cam, said Pete Nutley, director of global product marketing for Tandberg. At high-volume pricing, the Movi can cost as little as $93 per user for the client software.

And while it is primarily intended as a mobile solution for videoconferencing, there are other applications, Nutley said.

“In the higher education market, this could visually enable a very high number of students,” Nutley said. “It is architected for very large deployments and can  support thousands of PCs being visually enabled. With the Tandberg Management Suite, there is centrally controlled multipoint conferencing, authentication and bandwidth control, and this becomes like any other endpoint.”