Meeting platforms face competition from budget-friendly alternatives, causing interruptions in video conferences.
Cisco remains the market leader in the video conferencing industry, with a 50.6% market share, according to a recent report by IDC. This growth is largely due to Cisco's 2010 acquisition of Tandberg.
However, the high-end, immersive telepresence market has been taking a hit lately, as sales of high-end telepresence systems fell by 39% during the first quarter of 2012 compared to the same period of last year, IDC found. This decline can be attributed to the emergence of lower-cost, HD-quality video solutions and new video deployment options.
Rich Costello, senior analyst at IDC, stated that these developments are contributing to the disruption of the high-end video conferencing and telepresence systems market. The overall video conferencing market grew at 14% year-on-year during the quarter, reaching $639 million.
The growth in the video market is also attributed to video integrated with vendors' unified communications and collaboration portfolios, as well as increasing strength among small workgroup, desktop, and mobile collaboration users. IDC identified that sales of personal video conferencing offerings, such as WebEx, rose by 53% during the same period.
Besides Cisco and Polycom, the most important video conferencing solution providers with significant market share in 2012 included Lifesize, Vidyo, and Radvision. These companies were notable players in the market at that time.
It's worth noting that IDC did not provide information on the sales figures for the lower-cost, HD-quality video solutions or the new video deployment options. However, Costello confirmed that a range of new video deployment options for customers has also emerged.
The multi-CODEC telepresence systems, such as Cisco's Telepresence 3200, use multiple network data encoding systems for audio, video, and data to ensure high quality. On the other hand, the sales of cheaper, single-CODEC telepresence systems rose by 29% during the first quarter of 2012.
Looking forward, IDC expects the overall video market to continue growing positively for several years. The growth in the video market is a testament to the increasing importance of video conferencing in today's digital age, offering businesses and individuals the opportunity to communicate more effectively and collaborate more efficiently.
