Well, Day Two has gone really well, although like last year I am certain that my brand-new running shoes will be completely trashed by the end of the show. Seriously, folks, with 1,200+ exhibits in a dozen buildings, the last two years I have bought new sneakers to wear at the show, and thrown them […]

In addition to focusing on the simple user-experience Cisco has created with their line in recent years, Cisco’s focus at ISE 2016 is demo’ing their Speaker Track and Spark. Cisco Director of Collaboration Solutions Marketing Angie Mistretta explained Cisco’s presence at ISE and what visitors to their booth can expect.

As stated in my previous blog, “Baffling” Backdoor Cyber-Talks, numerous people in the industry through discussion as well as writing got right out and on top of a major story in the industry. Again, my hats off to them and this now leads to my next discussion on the matter of security. With the AMX […]

While this could be considered last week’s news, I did say there would be a followup to the final story from my previous This Week blog. Here’s what it looks like when your startup passes a make-or-break test (12/4) The future is looking very bright now for videoconferencing company Blue Jeans Network after “Big Papi” […]

Today, Cisco announced its intent to acquire Acano Limited, a privately held company based in London that provides collaboration infrastructure and conferencing software. Acano’s hardware and software includes gateways, and video and audio bridging technology that allows customers to connect video systems from multiple vendors across both cloud and hybrid environments. This acquisition will help […]

A new series – I’ll be looking at news and developments in both AV and IT within the industry during the week. Cisco Announces Intent to Acquire Acano (11/20) Today, Cisco announced its intent to acquire Acano Limited, a privately held company based in London that provides collaboration infrastructure and conferencing software. Acano’s hardware and […]

This past week, many industry professionals and end users attended InfoComm Connections in New York’s Jacob Javits Center where certain industry manufacturers exhibited. Co-located with NAB CCW (now NAB Show New York), the statement put out by the industry organization was as follows:  We realize that not everyone has the time or budget to attend […]

ScanSource today announced the execution of a letter of intent to purchase the assets of KBZ, a Cisco Authorized Distributor. Founded in 1987 and based in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, KBZ operates in the United States and has approximately 75 employees. The company’s sales for the trailing twelve months ended June 30, 2015 are estimated to total […]

Day two of the Enterprise Connect show provided more excellent experiences with companies specializing in providing unified communications and collaboration solutions. Here are the booth videos from the second day. AGT AGT has improved the way organizations communicate and collaborate for over 20 years. Our passion for technical innovation, visual communication and customer service – […]

When you look at certain individuals who have been influential in the audio visual industry, there are those who have contributed in numerous high level ways. Gary Hall is certainly one of those individuals who has made major contributions and continues to be held in high regard by many in the industry. Along with being […]

As you may know, Integrated Systems Europe (ISE) is Europe’s — and the world’s — largest AV show. Combining both residential and commercial AV technology in one giant trade show venue at the Amsterdam RAI, the show is nicely spread out in 12 easy-to-navigate halls that you can walk without back-tracking as it’s laid-out in […]

Last week I published a blog on the Internet of Things and convergence, basically highlighting two companies — Cisco and Google as those leading the way in IoT and IT. However I felt the need to clarify that while I mentioned the cloud collaboration environment that Cisco has built through acquisitions as strategic to an overall […]

Practically everyone now offers a collaboration solution was the clear take away from my recent visit to InfoComm 2014. From telecons to document sharing; from video calling to video conferencing; solutions in all shapes and sizes could be had. I met with a number of companies at InfoComm and learned about many solutions, but clearly […]

New solutions continue to enter the market at a rapid pace and if all were taken into consideration, it’s altogether possible that this series could go on for months. However, due to the fact that I’ve set it to end prior to InfoComm we are coming to the last few chapters. So far all companies […]

Well, June approaches again, and with it, among other things, comes the InfoComm show. And I don’t mean InfoComm Patagonia or InfoComm New Zealand or whatever they’re up to these days. I mean the original, accept-no-substitutes, convince-the-boss-I-NEED to-go, InfoComm show. Actually, that’s not to disparage InfoComm’s ever-widening pantheon of AV shows around the world. I […]

At NAB 2014, Cisco and Sony became the first companies to publicly demonstrate the live delivery of full-frame rate 4K 60P content. The live demonstration streamed live 4K video from New York City to Las Vegas and was on display for NAB show attendees at the Cisco and Sony booths. Live events in New York […]

By Chandler Leik rAVe Staffer Dirk Schlesinger, the global lead for manufacturing industries of Cisco Consulting Services, delivered the Opening Keynote Address of ISE 2014 on Mon., 3 Feb. 2014 at 6:00 p.m. His speech revolved around “Kick-Starting the Market for Building Automation.” Managing Director of ISE Mike Blackman prefaced Schlesinger’s speech saying it was […]

By Angie Mistretta Cisco We are just under a week away from Integrated Systems Europe (ISE) and our teams are geared up and ready to go!  If you are planning to be in Amsterdam for this event, stop by and visit Cisco in Stand 12-B74. Our presence at this year’s event is even bigger than […]

Cisco, making its second appearance at the show, will be showing five new products and technologies at the Integrated Systems Europe show in Amsterdam next month. We have the inside scoop — we spent the day there this past Tuesday and shot six videos that include an overall review of everything Cisco will have at […]

Cisco new Edge 340 Digital Media Player (DMP) is designed to be a digital signage media player optimized for touch-based signage applications. It uses hardware-accelerated video and is pre-integrated with both single-touch and multi-touch capabilities. Designed to be used with Power over Ethernet (PoE), the Edge 340 comes in both Wi-Fi and non-Wi-Fi models (wires […]

Dirk Schlesinger, the global lead for manufacturing industries of Cisco Consulting Services, will present the Opening Keynote Address of ISE 2014. Titled ‘Kick-Starting the Market for Building Automation,’ Schlesinger’s speech will give attendees an exclusive insight into how a new cross-industry initiative set up by Cisco, ABB, Bosch and LG will transform the world of […]

If you’re attending ISE 2014 Feb. 4-6, you won’t want to miss the following professional development and networking opportunities. There’s less than a month to go, so plan accordingly. It’s as easy as 1-2-3. Register for Your CTS Exam at ISE: Again this year, you can take the CTS, CTS-D and CTS-I exams at Integrated […]

New VC technology lets everyone into the party It always amazes me the calls I get from very large organizations and universities making the comment “We don’t want Cisco or Polycom endpoints.” At first I thought this was just a few fringe organizations, but it is becoming all too common request as of lately. While […]

Integrated Systems Events announced this week that Dr. Dirk Schlesinger, the global lead for manufacturing industries of Cisco Consulting Services, will present the opening keynote address of ISE 2014. Schlesinger’s address, “Kick-Starting the Market for Building Automation,” will give attendees an exclusive insight into how a new cross-industry initiative set up by Cisco, ABB, Bosch […]

By Monica Heck Special to InfoComm International Whether you call it simply unified communications (UC) or you also throw collaboration into the mix (UCC), it’s clear that this years-old-yet-bleeding-edge technology has finally gained its footing. Even if you struggle to define the collection of videoconferencing, chat, email and other solutions that fall under the UC […]

Infonetics Research has released excerpts from its 2Q13 Enterprise Telepresence and Video Conferencing Equipment report, which tracks dedicated and PBX-based video conferencing and telepresence infrastructure and endpoints: There’s now evidence the videoconferencing market is bouncing back. “After a tumultuous 2012 that saw growth in the videoconferencing market screech to a halt, sales returned to year-over-year […]

        To see a list of all the awards we are giving as part of our 2013 rAVe Best of InfoComm awards, click here. To see all our of InfoComm 2013 coverage, click here. Most Creative New Product: Cisco Ava 500 iRobot Cisco’s AV 500 iRobot is a VTC system that’s basically […]

Any of you following my Press Release Challenge may wonder what lessons we can learn from the rewrites I attempted over the past couple weeks. One thing I learned was that writing press releases isn’t easy. However there are some very common themes into how to make your message more effective when putting one out. […]

Alright, it’s the last week of the AVPhenom Press Release Challenge, and as such, I wanted to make it hard on myself I guess.  I didn’t get any nominations this week, so I had to dig into the nominations of the past couple weeks.  I wanted to rewrite one fellow BlogSquad writer Lee Distad sent […]

Vaddio EasyUSB video solutions have tested compatible with Cisco WebEx Meeting Center. In addition to sharing a desktop, documents or web browser with Vaddio video solutions, WebEx users can now share high definition video up to 720p and have remote pan, tilt and zoom control. “We are committed to assuring that all of Vaddio’s professional […]

The pervasive theme at InfoComm for Cisco was all about collaboration. The company actually demonstrated a partnership with Prysm on a telepresence solution, but one of the cooler new things at InfoComm had to be their iRobot solution. Dubbed the Ava 500, Cisco and iRobot signed a joint marketing agreement to get the portable telepresence […]

By John Restrick Cisco I am a strong believer in the power of video; video can transform the relationships we have with our colleagues, partners, suppliers and customers. Our goal is to make video as universally available and easy to use as voice and data are today. Recent developments  make it possible to scale video […]