Early in the development of videoconferencing, manufacturers made units with proprietary algorithms. This meant that each end point could only connect to the same equipment from the same manufacturer. This was all right if a company with multiple locations and only needed to meet with participants within their own geographic footprint. Over time this became impractical. It would be like having your phones connect only to parties within your company.
It’s critical that any communication technology needs to connect outside of your network. Imagine if email, cell phones, instant messaging, texting and faxes only worked within the company’s network. This company would quickly go out of business. If you call, email and text outside of your network wouldn’t make sense to meet customers, investors, suppliers, partners and others critical to your company’s success in a videoconference?
Today the good news is that companies making videoconferencing equipment all build to the ITU, International Telecommunications Union, standards. This makes it simple to connect anywhere in the world to any equipment including some of the new videoconferencing mobile apps. The only constraint a company has in videoconferencing outside of their network is the firewall, which is very simple to work through by adjusting firewall settings.
This brings us to the ever expanding videoconferencing applications — Here are some real world videoconferencing applications where companies are connecting outside of their network every day:
- A medical college is using a standards based mobile app to meet with interns in hospitals statewide.
- An aerospace engineer meets with clients in Europe to present schematics from his computer.
- Doctors routinely meet with patients in a nursing home outside of the hospital’s network.
- One law firm is using a standards based mobile app to connect to conference rooms for depositions.
- A recruiter interviews job candidates all over the world by connecting to public videoconferencing rooms.
- A not for profit substance use organization counsels clients in local jails outside of their network.
- A technical service company gets support from vendors using a standards based mobile app on an iPad.
- A national distributor trains resellers outside of their network on new product offerings.
- A construction company has safety training from headquarters to 9 remote job sites simultaneously.
The list of applications is growing every day. Standards based videoconferencing is changing the way we communicate and the way we conduct our daily business – All outside of our networks.
J.W. Hornyak Videoconferencing & Telecommunications
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