2012 Prediction: Avistar

2012:  Videoconferencing in VDI Environments Comes of Age

Over the past 24 months, a lot has changed for businesses and the videoconferencing industry. Desktop videoconferencing has become an important business tool; virtualized desktop infrastructures have become an essential strategy for reducing operating costs, securing data and supporting distributed workers, and the cloud has emerged as a way to provide scalable services on demand.

In 2012, vendors such as Avistar are ready and meeting the need for virtualized videoconferencing solutions (while other vendors are scrambling to do the same). Some VDI vendors such as Citrix are leading the charge by integrating videoconferencing support into their products (Citrix recently licensed the Avistar virtualized videoconferencing platform). Cloud vendors are starting to provide cloud-based videoconferencing services.

It always difficult to predict precisely where any market will go, but we hear from our customers that virtual desktop strategies and cloud computing are here to stay. Businesses now have no choice but to adopt solutions such as desktop videoconferencing in order to be competitive and increase productivity. Some businesses are already demanding virtualized mobile tablets that are videoconference-enabled. And cloud vendors are offering more and more services on a weekly basis.

No doubt, 2012 will be a dynamic year as more businesses and vendors gear up to be virtual videoconference ready. Could it mean the end of the “non-virtualized” video endpoint? Probably not. But as businesses come under more pressure to perform, and virtualized videoconferencing solutions become more reliable, efficient and pervasive, the writing may be on the wall. 2012 could be the start of something very interesting.

Happy holidays. Hope to virtually see you in 2012.