Polycom takes UC beyond Mobile and Cloud…
To Acquire HP's Visual Collaboration Business Including Halo, Becomes an Exclusive Partner to HP for Telepresence and expands Strategic Relationships with Microsoft
Polycom, Inc. has made several significant announcements with its Polycom Open Collaboration Network partners that will dramatically change the visual communications and UC industry, accelerate adoption of UC, and deliver on Polycom's UC Everywhere vision. The first major announcement is that Polycom would be acquiring HP's Visual Collaboration business, including the Halo Products and Managed Services business.
Shane Robison, Executive Vice-President & Chief Strategy and Technology Officer, HP, has joined Polycom CEO Andy Miller during yesterday's webcast to discuss the strategic alliance. The companies also signed a strategic agreement that makes Polycom an exclusive partner to HP for telepresence and certain video UC solutions, including both resale and internal HP deployments, and integrates Polycom's video applications on HP's WebOS TouchPad product line.
"Customers will benefit from this transaction and alliance because they will receive the focus of two world-class technology companies through greater service and product opportunities," said Shane Robison, HP Executive VP & Chief Strategy and Technology Officer. "This transaction and alliance allows us to focus on executing our strategy in cloud computing and connectivity, while ensuring the long-term care of our customers and development of our services business."
Polycom also announced the revolutionary Open Visual Communications Consortium (OVCC), a breakthrough open video exchange cloud with the world's leading service providers that will enable visual communications beyond corporate firewalls and proprietary video platforms. In an unprecedented industry development, 14 top service providers around the globe have joined forces in OVCC to deliver B2B communication through the cloud. The founding members of OVCC include: Airtel, AT&T, BCS Global, BT Conferencing, Cable&Wireless Worldwide, Global Crossing, Glowpoint, iFormata Communications, Masergy, Orange Business Services, PCCW Global, Telefonica, Telstra, and Verizon. The OVCC members will connect millions of users worldwide through agreements with hundreds of interconnected service providers across six continents.
Further, Polycom's Miller and Microsoft Corporate VP Gurdeep Singh Pall are all set to announce the development of two new breakthroughs in enterprise UC. These new solutions will expand the Microsoft and Polycom joint development and go-to-market activities on multiple fronts. As a strategic Microsoft UC solution partner, Polycom and Microsoft are already executing on six strategic agreements. Polycom previously announced SVC, the underlying technology that enables Polycom and Microsoft to deliver the industry's most powerful telepresence application to hundreds of millions of Microsoft desktops.
Not only this, Polycom will continue to drive deep, innovative end-to-end UC solutions with our full ecosystem of Polycom Open Collaboration Network partners, including Microsoft, HP, IBM, Juniper, BroadSoft, Siemens, McAfee and Avaya - to break down the barriers of distance communication and make it easier for our customers to deploy UC solutions through integration services, interoperability, ease of use, and management. Polycom will continue to work with our industry-leading partners to build on the current momentum and will provide additional updates as we launch new solutions.
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