 "HP, TANDBERG Strengthen Partnership With Managed Service Offering")
In the last quarter of calendar 2008, HP and TANDBERG announced a global managed service offering designed to provide traditional videoconferencing customers with greater quality, reliability and productivity, while decreasing travel costs.
Developed by HP, the HP Halo Video Collaboration Service is available for the full range of TANDBERG conferencing systems, including TANDBERG Total Telepresence offerings. The service is also available for videoconferencing offerings from other vendors.
HP and TANDBERG have also expanded their reseller agreement to give customers additional flexibility and choice in purchasing collaboration products and services.
With these announcements, HP and TANDBERG are offering customers robust portfolios of collaboration products and services, ultimately helping customers increase enterprise-wide productivity and realise total resource savings.
“Our new managed service offering allows traditional videoconferencing customers to experience an enhanced level of service and return on investment,” said David Murphy, senior vice president, Imaging and Printing Group, HP. “HP and TANDBERG are offering a host of managed services to support video collaboration globally across the enterprise, from a single source.”
As part of the HP Halo Video Collaboration Service, videoconferencing endpoints are being hosted directly on the Halo Video Exchange Network – a global fibre optic network designed for video collaboration that can easily allow company-to-company connections and does not require bandwidth scheduling.
The Halo Video Exchange Network and TANDBERG’s network infrastructure technology allow users to enjoy flexibility and improved video and audio quality. These improvements in the overall video collaboration experience can drive significantly higher usage rates that can increase productivity at the workplace while decreasing travel costs and carbon emissions.
“This extension of the relationship between TANDBERG and HP allows our customers to take full advantage of the strengths we both bring to telepresence and visual communications,” said Fredrik Halvorsen, chief executive officer, TANDBERG.
The Halo Video Collaboration Service provides management and support from HP, including technical support, directory management and auto meeting initiation. The service also includes the capability to connect to other videoconferencing solutions, both on and off of the Halo Video Exchange Network, enabling customers to collaborate even more effectively with colleagues, partners, vendors and suppliers.
The HP Halo Video Collaboration Service is expected to be available for customer installations in the first half of this year.
Through the HP and TANDBERG alliance, both companies will offer customers greater access to products and services that can unite globally dispersed teams and enhance the communication experience.
As a part of the alliance, HP will resell TANDBERG telepresence and high-definition visual communication products to enterprise customers, who also purchase HP Halo managed service offerings. TANDBERG, on the other hand, will provide HP’s managed service and global network solution, the HP Halo Video Collaboration Service, as an option for its global customer base. HP will also continue to manufacture and sell its current line of fully immersive telepresence hardware solutions. Additionally, HP will continue research and development of future telepresence products and services.