According to The Financial Times, recent research has found that a third of US conference rooms will be telepresence-enabled by 2020.

Furthermore, a report and survey by American Express Business Travel revealed that over 40% of C-level executives said they’re willing to spend on new virtual meetings technologies.

Paul Robin, event director at Business Travel Market, told The Financial Times: “New technologies have advanced sufficiently for video conferencing to be a real alternative to travel in certain circumstances - for example, for regular sales meetings of colleagues in different countries or a quarterly board meeting of directors of a global business.”

In fact, Stewart Harvey, client management director of Hogg Robinson group, agreed that telepresence and video conferencing works well for business, especially when people know each other well. He said: “The attitude is: ‘If I’m not speaking to my customers, someone else might be’.”

Telepresence and video technology has become so popular that deciding how to hold meetings is no longer about cost, despite the technology presenting a significant opportunity to make serious savings on business travel. ”Our role as travel managers now is not to find the cheapest fare, but to decide what is the best way to conduct the meeting,” concluded Mr Harvey.

Scottish businesses are to take part in a simultaneous global business conference with expert panels in Hong Kong, Mumbai, New York and Toronto via video conferencing, reports the BBC.

This week, the annual Global Ambitions Conference will bring together business representatives from across the world using video conferencing services and Cisco’s Telepresence technology. Members of the expert panel will include senior executives from HSBC, Standard Life and Diageo, whose life sized high-definition images will be presented to 200 or so delegates at the facility at the University of Edinburgh’s School of Informatics.

Organised by the Scottish Council for Development and Industry (SCDI), the event aims to showcase the opportunities of digital communication in accessing business expertise and insight, as well as to promote the use of video conferencing solutions to the problems of doing business in emerging markets spread around the globe.

According to the BBC, this growth in emerging markets has made the need to easily communicate and collaborate with overseas businesses even more important. Additionally, firms all over the world are looking to “go green” and cut down on carbon emissions and video conferences are seen as playing a major role in this effort.

Cisco says that since making its telepresence conferencing system the cornerstone of its internal company meetings, it has saved $615m on travel alone and more than 332,000 tonnes of emissions. Donald McLaughin, director for the firms Scottish branch, said that “By levelling the global playing field, Scottish organisations can compete just as effectively as local players.”

“Even the smallest businesses can now access a wide range of tools which allow communication and collaboration across locations at a very low cost.”

A new study exploring how the UK can cut back on its annual carbon dioxide transmissions by focusing on the transport sector has been published, predicting how the use of technology such as video conferencing as well as financial and behavioural changes could help create a near 100% reduction in CO2 emissions from transport.

“Towards a Zero Carbon Vision for UK Transport”, written by researchers at the Stockholm Environment Institute, looks at what steps can be taken to cut back on the 27% of the UK’s CO2 emissions that stem from transport. This number is predicted to grow faster than any other sector of the economy with increased use of cars, road freight and aviation.

The report compares the predicted outcome for carbon reduction by 2050 under a “business as usual” scenario, where little to no changes are made, with that of a “Maximum Impact (MI)” scenario. This is a slightly implausible scenario where all possible interventions are made to achieve a target goal of “near zero carbon” transport system for the UK.

Whilst many aspects of the report are concerned with freight and local travel, section 4.4 “Aviation” details how the substitution of information technology can help contribute towards reducing the 14% of all travel conducted by business, in turn reducing the amount of overall air travel.

One report cited, Pamlin & Szomolanyi 2008, suggests that if European companies cut their business travel by 20% and used video conferencing in its place, “We would save 22 million tonnes of CO2 each year, equivalent to taking one third of the UK’s cars off the road.”

Another survey cited, ‘Travelling Light’, by the WWF-UK found that many companies have a “green” corporate policy that incorporates the use of telepresence and video conferencing services in place of business travel. This same survey indicates that the major obstacle to greater use of video conferencing is a lack of interoperability between different systems and a need for investment in broadband infrastructure.

In the “Maximum Impact” scenario detailed by the researchers based on these previous reports, aviation business travel activity is assumed to have fallen by 20% by 2050. 2.8% of this – a statistically significant figure equivalent to 1.7 million tonnes of CO2 - is due to video conferencing being used in substitution of air travel.

Also, though the report is clear that video conferencing and other technological substitutions could only lead to a small reduction in CO2 emissions from the aviation industry in and of themselves, they are an important part of an overall strategy. When taken together with other measures such as railway substitution, air traffic management and improvements in aircraft technology, the overall reduction in the MI scenario is -56% relative to the 59.9 CO2 emissions seen in the 2050 ‘business as usual’ scenario.

The first virtual dance rehearsal between Shanghai and New York was held last month, thanks to telepresence technology.

According to an official statement from Cisco, young dancers from the Children’s Palace in Shanghai, and young dancers in New York, held a virtual rehearsal to prepare for their joint performance in the U.S.

“Dance allows these students to express themselves fully through both music and movement,” said Jacques d’Amboise, former principal dancer of New York City Ballet and founder of the National Dance Institute, which is spearheading the joint performance.

He added: “As they have performed with some of our dancers here in New York, these dancers embody two beautiful stories – one story they tell through their movements on the stage, and the other story is the one that they will tell their family and friends about this journey.”

“TelePresence technology lets them begin sharing that story before they even return home,” concluded d’Amboise. “They share it through their smiles and laughter and pictures – elements of expression that would be limited by other forms of communication.”

“Today’s technology has the power to connect people in ways that were unimaginable 10 years ago, and Cisco TelePresence offers users and unparallelled real-time video collaboration experience,” explained Benny Lee, managing director of Unified Communications and Collaboration, Greater China, Cisco.

It’s part of Cisco’s initiative to reunite families separated by distance through telepresence, which will allow families into telepresence studios for two Sundays in Shanghai so they can have virtual exchanges with relatives living abroad.

Cisco has added two new video conferencing facilities to the network of inter-operable telepresence systems, as the company introduces video conferencing to Casablanca and Tunis.

According to ITP.net, a Middle East technology news site, this is the first time that video conferencing services across Cisco’s telepresence platform have been available in both countries. The new facilities are based at Cisco’s own offices and according to Cisco’s North Africa division, are a key step to increased deployment of telepresence technology in the sub-saharan African region.

The telepresence studio at the Casablanca office is perhaps slightly more impressive than that at the Tunis office. Cisco’s Casablanca office has been equipped with a Cisco Telepresence System 3000, which has three 65-inch plasma screens and a stand-alone lighting array in addition to the cameras, microphones, speakers and specially designed table which form key components of a video conference system. 

Meanwhile the Tunis office has been equipped with the 1300 series, a smaller system which has one screen, three cameras and a built-in lighting system. The set up at both facilities allows up to six participants to virtually collaborate and conference with up to six participants at any of the other Cisco telepresence studios around the world.

Anthony Vonsee, managing director for Cisco North Africa said that the use of video conferencing in the region was likely to see rapid growth over the next few years with the arrival of submarine broadband cables, which offer higher bandwidth at lower prices than previously seen in the region.

Video conferencing and networking giant Cisco surprised many at its recent Las Vegas conference by unveiling its latest product – an enterprise focused tablet computer.

The Cisco Cius aims to extend the productivity benefits of the company’s collaboration applications to a mobile platform. Running on a variation of the Android operating system, the tablet offers mobile computing and content sharing capabilities as well as full interoperability with Cisco’s Telepresence technology.

An open platform, the Cius is targeted at linking individual employees more effectively with central departments over a real-time, secure connection. Although users will be able to video conference through the small tablet device’s HD camera and audio pickup, the tablet also has the useful ability to physically dock or connect via Wi-Fi to existing video conferencing facilities, as well as a desktop PC.

This means that users could record videos and photos or work on files or documents on their Cius tablet, then share them with other participants directly during a video conference held at a Cisco Telepresence Studio. The device will go on trial with customers in the third quarter of 2010 with a view to becoming generally available in the first quarter of 2011.

Tony Bates, the senior VP and general manager of Cisco’s enterprise, commercial and small business arm said:”Cisco Cius epitomises how the network is changing the way we live, work, learn and play.”

Cisco’s latest business video conferencing package aims to bring video conferencing solutions to the global events industry, helping event planners and executives extend the impact of trade shows and conferences.

Announced last week, Cisco’s ‘Collaboration for Events’ takes the companies Telepresence video conferencing technology and enterprise social software to help the events industry reach beyond the physical limitations of an events venue. The company hopes that these network based technologies will help organisers conduct interactive events on both physically and virtually.

One key benefit of video conferencing for the events industry will be the ability to circumvent the problems of traditional in-person events. By using high definition Telepresence suites to conduct keynote speeches and discussion panels, events planners will be able to overcome scheduling problems for both speakers and attendees.

Cisco also claims that the new package will help the events industry measure and increase its Return On Investment (ROI). They say that not only will the technology help streamline pre and post-event planning by sharing material and schedules to agencies and providers, it will also help drive interactions between speakers and attendees in multiple ways as well as offering the potential for significant carbon reductions associated with business travel via virtual participation.

The company’s own use of the package at its Cisco Live! event saw more than 5,000 people from 28 countries attend virtually. When used at it’s internal annual global sales meeting, Cisco says that it resulted in the cost per attendee dropping from $4050 to $520, with the company predicting that if fully implemented it could see overall attendance costs at corporate events drop by 78%.

“Today’s global technology-savvy audiences, coupled with rising economic pressures are driving the need for radical transformation in how we think of meetings, events and trade shows,” says Rick Hutley, vice president of Cisco’s Internet Business Solutions Group.

“By applying collaboration technology capabilities to events, organisations can reduce costs, boost attendance, enrich the attendee experience and greatly increase the event’s impact and all while reducing environmental impact.”

Cisco, the leading name in video conferencing technology and network services, has lauded an agreement between BT and Tata Communications as a “major step” towards interoperability between telepresence services.

Under the agreement customers of both Tata Communications and BT will be able to establish a video conference with their counterparts on the other companies video exchange. This intercompany service will see the number of connections possible to each video conferencing facility hosted by the BT or Tata exchanges expand dramatically.

BT has more than 350 Cisco Telepresence systems connected to 1,000 endpoints around the world. Tata Communications meanwhile has exchange hubs in Mumbai, New York and London, with 15 video conferencing facilities in locations across North America, Asia Pacific, India, London and Johannesburg.

The agreement is a significant development towards the overall goal of complete interoperability between telepresence systems. For some time Cisco has been working to create a common, interoperable standard for the video conferencing sector to allow its own systems to seamlessly communicate with those of third party providers.

These efforts took a significant step forward last month as Cisco announced its plans to integrate the in-house Telepresence Interoperability Protocol (TIP) on its newly acquired Tandberg Telepresence Server. This support now enables interoperability between multiscreen telepresence units from different vendors as well as between the full line of Tandberg products.

A new report has shown that the majority of people in the UK expect businesses to take up widespread use of video conferencing technology by the end of the year.

Techworld reports that new research from Cisco, one of the biggest names in video conferencing solutions, shows that 61% of people in the UK expect to be able to conduct work and business meetings via video conference by the end of 2010. This figure may seem striking as currently many companies are missing out on the benefits of video conferencing services, yet other findings from the survey reveal that the British public has an optimistic belief in the possibilities of modern technology.

The report also identified what the public believes are the main barriers to more widespread use of technological innovations.

The availability of the proper technology, such as broadband access, was seen as the major barrier to wider use of video conferencing by most of the public (24%). This may soon change though, as 65% of respondents said that by 2015, improvements to the UK’s communication infrastructure would make internet connections of 100mbps a possibility for users across the UK.

One video conferencing solution that the public were less confident about was the use of telemedicine – visiting a GP through a teleconference facility. Only 11% think they will be able to do this by the end of the year, though 52% believe that it will be possible within the decade, with 68% saying it will definitely be possible within their lifetimes.

The disruption caused by volcano ash in April is one factor which pushed telepresence up the priority list for large and high-value business, according to CRN.

A series of in-depth interviews by market analyst Frost & Sullivan also found that, whilst the recession has dampened telepresence adoption, it also served to refocus business minds on cost control and return on investment.

Another reason behind the increasing adoption of telepresence technology was the “increasing globalisation and vitalisation of business”, according to the report. An increasing awareness of climate change “and the need for businesses to pro-actively demonstrate corporate social responsibility and mitigate carbon emission” were also labelled as influencing factors.

Dominic Dodd, principal analyst at Frost & Sullivan, explained that there has been a continued rise in demand for telepresence technology. Talking of the reasons behind the rising popularity of the technology he said: ”It is an overused phrase, the ‘perfect storm’, but what we have is the need there and the network infrastructure is now in place – and a couple of years ago it wasn’t. The network was still not really reliable for long-distance, end to end calls. So it is about all those things coming together.

The research found that smaller but high-value firms, such as the legal or financial services sectors, were increasingly looking to telepresence to help them communicate more effectively, whether that is in-house or across the world.

“We spoke to a lot of companies in the IT space … and people may be getting into these types of services for the first time,” explained Dodd. “All the feedback was very strongly positive. Obviously you have to take what you hear with a certain pinch of salt, but there was a consistent view that [telepresence] is a good opportunity to get into.”

The senior vice president of emerging technologies at a telepresence company told CRN: “We strongly believe that telepresence – along with our entire rich collaboration portfolio, powers this new way or working where everyone, everywhere, can be more productive through the pervasive use of video and face-to-face collaboration.”