Broadband Infrastructure Driving Telepresence Growth

Zinnov Management Consulting has released the key findings of a study on ‘Opportunity Landscape for Telepresence in India’. According to the study, conferencing market has undergone a paradigm shift with the emergence of telepresence as the business solution for real time communication. This market is estimated to grow at a rapid CAGR of 53 percent and reach $40 million by 2012. The current telepresence market is pegged at $7.2 million.

Over the years, the conferencing market in India has evolved a great deal from Audio Conferencing (PSTN / ISDN) to Audio Conferencing (VOIP), followed by Video Conferencing (VPN/Leased line) and finally Telepresence. Key factors that have led to this growth so far and moving forth, would in-turn take the industry to the next level are improvement in broadband infrastructure, increase in travel cost, going green initiatives and globalisation.

While segments like IT and ITeS would typically become early adopters of telepresence in India due to growth in the number of R&D captives and shared service centres at multiple locations, other sectors where telepresence can truly make strong inroads are education, government and BFSI, according to the study. Leading professional institutes in the future could migrate to telepresence for guest lectures and classroom discussions, while the government is already investing in conferencing solutions for efficient administration and reduced travel cost; and large banks have plans to invest in conferencing to manage their widespread operations across multiple branches, states Zinnov.

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Pari Natarajan, CEO, Zinnov Management Consulting, said, “The importance of telepresence needs to be reinforced through specific marketing initiatives as it is the next big wave in conferencing. Customised efforts targeting sectors like education, government, BFSI and even SMEs can significantly increase telepresence adoption in India. Various factors like increase in broadband penetration, the rollout of 3G services, government efforts and initiatives by the BFSI, IT/ ITeS sectors paint a very bright picture.”

The study goes on to state that initiatives by TRAI and competition amongst large ISPs are adding to improvement in broadband infrastructure, which is the backbone for telepresence. The broadband infrastructure in India is improving at a fast pace with the number of subscribers growing at a CAGR of 71 percent; 3.8 million subscribers were registered in the month of March 2008 alone. Introduction of 3G network in the Indian market will further boost up the infrastructure and availability of high speed bandwidth.

According to Zinnov, telepresence vendors could explore new segments which have great untapped potential like:

Entertainment

Celebrities from entertainment industries have a tight schedule. They need to be present at various award functions, chat shows, film premiers, music release functions. Telepresence vendors could target them / their producers as a possible solution.

Spiritual Leaders

Spiritual leaders have to give public discourses across the globe. With the help of telepresence, they could be present at multiple locations in different countries at the same time.

NRIs

NRIs often travel to India to meet family/ friends and for matrimonial purpose. Telepresence vendors could tie up with matrimony service providers like shaadi.com to set up public rooms in different countries.