In the midst of tremendous disruption, it is impossible to tell where the global media industry is ultimately heading. But a recent analysis from the Cisco Internet Business Solutions Group (IBSG) explores four possible future scenarios for the media industry. While they do not “predict” the future, the scenarios help build our understanding of possible outcomes — and how various industry players could be affected.

The Shape of Things To Come: Four Scenarios

We explored the ways certain industry developments could swing future outcomes. Combining these drivers into logical groupings (consumer behavior, regulatory requirements, technology, and macroeconomic conditions), we were able to define the following four scenarios, as shown in Figure 1. These scenarios are differentiated by consumer demand, industry structure, and content supply:

• Dark Ages — low demand, consolidated industry, and relatively low content supply
• Survival of the Fittest — low demand, fragmented industry, and high content supply
• Golden Age of Content — high demand, consolidated industry, and controlled content supply
• Wonderland — high demand, fragmented industry, and high content supply

Obviously, each of the scenarios will have different winners and losers. The financial impact and the implications for players across the industry value chain will substantially change by scenario. And in each scenario, distributors and infrastructure providers will need to consider different types of investments. Consequently, each type of player will need to adapt its competitive responses to the future scenario taking shape.

Figure 1.   Four Future Scenarios Are Based on Various Groupings of Industry Drivers.

 Source: Cisco IBSG, 2013

Following are examples of how two future scenarios could play out: Read More »

Tags: broadband, Cisco, cloud, cloud services, content, IBSG, infrastructure, media, media industry, monetization, over-the-top, regulatory requirements, service providers, video

If you are deploying or managing video and collaboration applications, you might have realized that providing good quality experience for users can quickly become complex and costly as you deploy so many different applications and endpoints from different vendors at the same time in the same infrastructure.

The figure below compares voice and video applications. As you can see, the characteristics of voice applications are very consistent when compared with the different video applications. Different video applications have different bandwidth requirements; traffic is bursty, unpredictable and highly compressed and often available in a variety of form factors from different vendors.

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Tags: business video, collaboration, enterprise networks, medianet, rich media applications, video

 If you find yourself in Austin, Texas next week, you’ll want to swing by the American Telemedicine Association (ATA) Meeting and Tradeshow which runs from May 5-7. 

Growing annually by leaps and bounds, ATA 2013 is expected to be their biggest and best conference yet, with over 6000 attendees.  The ATA 2013 exhibit hall will host 300 leading vendors with groundbreaking remote healthcare technologies and services.

And you can count on Cisco to be there front and center.   

So while you’re there, don’t miss a visit to the Cisco booth (#332) to see market leading solutions that overcome the barrier of distance while improving the patient experience.  If you take a second to let us scan your name badge, you’ll be in the running for a chance to win a $250 American Express gift card!

Finally, don’t miss Cisco executives in these two sessions:

Monday, May 6: 3:00 – 4:00 pm
Selling Abroad: Companies Making an Impact in the International Market
David W. Plummer, General Manager, Cisco HealthPresence

Monday, May 6: 4:15 – 5:15 pm
Market Watch: Not All Telehealth Markets are Equal
Barbara Casey, Senior Executive Director, Cisco Healthcare Business Transformation

In the meantime, you can learn more about Cisco Care-at-a-Distance solutions for telehealth by clicking here. 

We’ll see you in Austin!

Tags: healthcare, TelePresence, video

Hello IP Surveillance Enthusiasts,

ISC West was held at Las Vegas between Apr 10-12, and we continued the engagements with our partners on Cisco Medianet Plugfest here. Plugfest was launched at ASIS Philadelphia in September 2012, and from then till now, we have been actively working on getting partners on-boarded into Cisco’s MSP Cisco Developer Network (CDN) program, evaluating the test results gathered during ASIS and making recommendations to partners on improving interoperability with the network.

At ISC West, we had the wonderful opportunity to touch base with many of our partners already in CDN, and the ones we are closely working with on the process.

These were the sessions/interactions we had on Plugfest at ISC West -

Read More »

Tags: asis, business video, cdn, enterprise networks, ip video surveillance, isc west, medianet, msp, plugfest, rich media applications, security, video, video surveillance

Chances are, you’ve heard this line or a variation thereof before: “Video conferencing improves collaboration and lowers costs for organizations around the world.” While this is true, for this blog, I want to focus on ways video is changing government by sharing the story of two government agencies that are using video in new and unique ways.

We frequently hear how important it is to “do more with less.” In the face of sequestrations and reduced traveling budgets, this is a reality, and agencies are turning to alternatives like video conferencing. Video technologies such as telepresence are streamlining government processes and increasing collaboration, all while cutting costs. Read More »

Tags: budget, collaboration, government, mobile collaboration, secure collaboration, sequestration, TelePresence, telework, travel reduction, video, video conferencing