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For the last 5 years, Wainhouse Research has been conducting an on-line end-user survey focusing on enterprise video conferencing. Subscribers of the Wainhouse Research Bulletin (which I strongly recommend) are invited to answer a survey, which covers various interesting questions involving video conferencing and the enterprise.

As I was among those who filled the survey, I recently received this year’s results, and I have to say that I haven’t got to reading them thoroughly until most recently. By chance, I got to read the report just after I completed last week’s post about the $100 endpoint. It turns out that the survey results are so relevant to that post and my views, that I had to share them with you.

A Few Interesting Statistics First

312 people responded to the survey. Most of the responds came from large enterprises (1K employees or more). Most of the responds (68%) came from end users (and not people from the industry). Responds came from various industries, including education, healthcare, financial, government, etc.

The responders testified that they are either involved in planning their enterprise’s conferencing and collaboration roadmap (85%), currently use such solutions (66%) or support others in the enterprise using such solutions (66%).

Most responders (~50%) estimated that there are more than 50 room systems (“Group and Exec Systems”) in their organization; most (80%) estimated having 10 or more desktop systems; and, surprisingly, most (50%) said they don’t use any IP phones in their enterprise. Another interesting stats is that 70% of responders testified that they have deployed more than 50 multi-codec (telepresence) systems in their world-wide offices.

Now That It’s Working, It’s A Bit Expensive

Now all this is very interesting, but for me the highlight of the survey was the question regarding the interests and/or ability of responders to deploy additional video conferencing systems in their enterprise. With all due respect to the numbers above, it’s clear that this is not a mass deployment, and to reach that we need enterprises to continue to deploy more systems.

For room systems the #1 barrier for deploying more systems was “too expensive”. 25% noted it as a major barrier, 43% as a minor barrier. Number 2 and 3 were “Under-utilized” and “No need” (~20% said that’s a major barrier, ~30% said that’s a minor barrier). What about video quality and reliability, you ask?  Well, surprisingly (or not…) they are right at the bottom, and more than 50% of the responders said that they are not a barrier at all.

What’s even more interesting is to see the top 3 barriers for the last few years. “Expense” has been #1 ever since 2002, while #2 and #3 have changed: first it was the network (2002-2005), then it was the “perceived need”, low utilization and quality (2006-2007) and now we’re left with the need and the utilization only.

If you’ve been reading here, you shouldn’t be surprised: the quality of experience has improved dramatically with the introduction of high definition and multi-codec systems, networks have been upgraded. Now we’re left with the human factor – convincing employees to use the systems.

Oh, and don’t forget that #1 barrier: room systems are ridiculously expensive. If the price was low enough so that the expense wouldn’t matter, all we would have been left with was the human factor, and this – I believe – is something that will change significantly in the next couple of years.

LifeSize Conference 200 on display at InfoComm09.

Quality and Reliability? Try Integration

For desktop – surprise, surprise! – 58% said that expenses were not a barrier. Same goes for, and that is very interesting, utilization. I guess you don’t install the software if you’re not going to use it.

The #1 barrier for desktop turns out to be “integration”, which means poor/missing integration with other communication means, such as VoIP, web conferencing, IM services, presence, etc. In other words, the biggest barrier for desktop is that it’s supposed to be “unified communications”, but it’s not really unified.

I guess this is no surprise either, when you come to think about it – as explained in last week’s post, these are exactly the main pros and cons of desktop conferencing: it’s affordable, but not (yet) as reliable and at the same quality as those hardware-based systems.

If you inspect the barrier “evolution” for desktop conferencing since 2002, quality of experience and reliability have always been top 3 barriers, and while until 2009 the #1 barrier was need, it seems that there’s a new and major barrier this year, which is integration. As employees learn to adopt other communication means, they expect all of those means to properly interact. And if and when they don’t, it’s a major issue.

RADVISION’s desktop conferencing solutions shown at InfoComm09.

The Wainhouse Research survey is a must for us industry folks. But I believe it “only” tells a story we already know, even if sometimes we are not willing to admit it. It’s very simple, and it goes like that: In order to make video conferencing a mass deployed, popular communication means in the enterprise, it has to be affordable. And if you choose to solve the expenses issue with desktop clients, you better solve the quality and reliability issues, but don’t forget about integration.