The digital and print versions talk about the trends going on right now -- lack of expertise, reticence of the ‘millennium generation’ to study subjects and gain skills that manufacturers need, and how all sorts of devices are coming onto the plant floor and carpeted areas to help workers do their jobs more efficiently. Read More »
In the wake of the Apple iBooks announcement back in January, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan quickly called on USA schools to fully deploy digital textbooks by 2017. To any observer of the glacial speed of digital conversion in our schools today, this goal seems aggressive.
What could help speed up the pace of these conversions? Well for one, large technology companies.
Owning diverse school curriculum and procurement customer relationships by the thousands, broad product lines, large-scale resources, partnerships, and professional services support, large technology companies could spark more BYOD and 1:1 conversions with more complete, more innovative, and more easy-to-use products and services. And they could help fix the massive challenges schools have when they look to plan and tackle these digital conversions.
Guest post from Hans Hwang, Vice President of Collaboration within Cisco Advanced Services.
At last month’s Enterprise Connect (EC), there was a lot of discussion around the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) movement, and how IT departments are enabling this “new collaboration experience.” As OJ Winge, SVP and GM of Cisco’s Collaboration Endpoints Technology Group, outlined in his EC keynote, collaboration is becoming more “mobile, social, visual and virtual.” This is especially true as employees look to smartphones and tablets to enable them to collaborate more efficiently and effectively, and get their jobs done whenever and wherever they are. This increasing desire for untethered collaboration, without compromising on the collaboration experience, means IT departments must take a side.
The Proactive Enabler or the Passive Supporter
Whether IT embraces or ignores this trend, there are serious concerns for companies: impact on network, security, governance and liability questions. IT has a choice: they can either choose to embrace the opportunities BYOD policies bring, and become known as strong enablers and leaders to employee productivity and flexible work styles. Or, IT can limit users’ device choices and act as a passive supporter for a company’s workforce.
A passive approach might be to approve only one or two specific devices, and to restrict access and limit applications. A enabling approach might be to allow a choice of mobile devices and applications, to support collaboration on these devices and to reduce security risk with technology, policy, governance and training.
Cisco Recognizes Mobility is an Integrated, Critical Element of a Collaboration Strategy Mobility has quickly risen to the #2 technology priority for CIOs as opposed to three to four years ago when it was ranked number 12. (Gartner CIO Study)
To help IT plan and prepare for the impact to collaboration, Cisco Services has introduced a dedicated practice for Mobile Collaboration Services. This new Cisco practice is designed to help IT departments connect their organizations’ business imperatives to mobile collaboration business transformation opportunities. Experts from this practice can also help organizations prepare their network and communications infrastructure to deliver a compelling collaboration experience.
I attended Enterprise Connect for the ninth time this year, but it was the first time I delivered a keynote address. With the advances in technology today I could have delivered my keynote via TelePresence from Oslo, my home town in Norway. But I chose to attend in person because in this case face-to-face was the best way to tell my story.
I spoke to how “It is not enough to be connected.” This may sound strange coming from me, especially since I represent “the” networking company, but Cisco has evolved, as technology, businesses, and customer needs have evolved. Just being connected is not enough to drive the next levels of productivity. So, we need to think beyond connectivity. Read More »
I just returned from presenting at the Cisco Asia Pac 2012 Collaboration Summit in Singapore and I must say the Merlion was an excellent host. Not only was Singapore beautiful and their people welcoming but the event itself was incredible. I had the opportunity to share our Next Generation Virtual Workspace strategy to over 110 customers and analysts from across the Asia Pacific region.
Presenting the New Virtual Workspace Solution
In Singapore, I shared the newest addition to the Virtualized Collaboration Endpoint portfolio: Cisco’s Virtualization Experience Client (VXC) 6215, that brings voice and video to virtual desktops through one thin client solution. Rich media has been a challenge in virtual desktop environments, and Cisco’s new Virtual Workspace solution has the “secret sauce” to finally make this work.
In the past, voice (and particularly video) worked in virtual desktops in a “good enough” manner. However, this isn’t good enough for wide scale enterprise deployments. Leveraging years of experience and expertise in Unified Communications and Data Center, Cisco uses the Cisco Unified Communications architecture to separate the virtual desktop traffic from rich media in a way that provides a greater user experience at the virtual desktop. High quality voice and video are now possible with our VXC endpoints and UC Infrastructure working in conjunction with our technology partners Citrix and VMware.
