OVCC compliant videoconferencing services become available

The Open Visual Communications Consortium (OVCC) on Tuesday announced that the first series of OVCC-compliant video conferencing services are being offered by AT&T (NYSE: T), BCS Global, Airtel Business, BT (NYSE: BT), Glowpoint and Orange Business Services.

OVCC first announced that eight service providers would participate in the first wave of multinetwork video service offerings this fall in June.

In addition, OVCC members AT&T, Airtel Business, Masergy and Orange Business Services developed the OVCC compliant interconnect network that supports the new interoperable video services for enterprise users.

With the advent of the OVCC, any customer of these providers will be able to conduct videoconferencing sessions without having to worry that their client or co-workers have the same conferencing service.

Among the services offered will be scheduled meetings, content sharing and encryption.

Offered under their own respective brands, the new services marks the first set of commercial OVCC services that follow the organization's blueprint delivered to businesses this year.

Similar to the interconnection agreements traditional carriers have to make to expand their voice and data services outside of their own territories, the OVCC is providing a framework to interconnect video exchanges, which have been traditionally islands.

Andrew McFadzen, president of the Open Visual Communications Consortium, said in a release announcing the first wave of OVCC services that "Enterprise users will schedule video collaboration meetings, pushing beyond corporate firewalls and proprietary platforms to collaborate effectively with more people."

While business customers will need to ask their service provider about their OVCC-compliant offerings, the benefits are lower travel costs to conduct face-to-face meetings and enhancing collaboration.

Outside of the auspices of the OVCC, a growing number of telcos such as Tata have been striking one-off deals with other carriers to create public telepresence rooms.

For more:
- see the release

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