The Web Conferencing Blog

Microsoft RoundTable Video Gets Patent Suit

I'm a personal shareholder in Microsoft (MSFT), mainly because I love their gaming products: XBOX 360, but when it comes to business practices, Microsoft has never been known as a "fair" player. Then again, who really is?

FullView, a company based in NJ is suing Microsoft and its RoundTable Webcam for patent infringement. FullView is requesting the UC District Court for the Northen District of California to require Microsoft to stop selling RoundTable and award FullView triple damages.

FullView's patent dates back to 1995 and covers a camera system with continuous full 360-degree view. The patent was officially awarded to FullView in March 2004.

Thanks,
David Chao
The Web Conferencing Expert

ITIL Standards for IT Services

When evaluating IT solutions like a systems management solution or case ticket tracking system, check to see if the solution has ITIL standards. ITIL (IT Infrastructure Library) has become the standard framework of best practice approaches intended to facilitate the delivery of high quality IT services. ITIL outlines a set of management procedures that are intended to support businesses in achieving both financial quality and value in IT operations.

ITIL consists of 6 main sets:

- Service Support
- Service Delivery
- Planning to Implement Service Management
- ICT Infrastructure Management
- Applications Management
- The Business Perspective

ITIL is also recognized as an international standard, ISO IEC 20000.

A few systems management and case ticket tracking providers:
- Dell's Systems Management (EverDream)
- Parature ServiceDesk and Asset Management
- Computer Associates Unicenter ServiceDesk and Asset Management
- IBM (Tivoli): Service Management and Asset Management
- Symantec (Altiris) Service Desk, HelpDesk, Asset Management

Thanks
David Chao
The Web Conferecing Expert

Ribbit Telephony and Salesforce.com

Ribbit, an internet startup company that specilized in telephony services, has integrated its telephony solution with Salesforce.com's CRM application. With this integration, users can push voicemails from their cell phones into SFA and attach the voice mails to a specific customer record/opportunity/activity. Voice messages can be converted into text for greater efficiency compared to typing in notes. Voice messages can also be searched by keywords.

Customers can opt to use their own cell phone or make outbound calls within SFA via Ribbit's software-based phone. This provides flexibility to customers.

Ribbit is priced at $25 per user per month. This includes unlimited voice messaging, storage and inbound calls to the software-based phone, and five voice to text transciptions. Voice to text transcriptions is an additional $10 per user per month for 40 messages. Unlimited ouotbound calling in the US through Ribbit's online phone is $15 per user per month.

The Ribbit application is still in beta across some 70 different companies. Learn more about Amphibian by clicking on the "Watch the Amphilbian Video."

Thanks,
David Chao
The Web Conferencing Expert

Important Tech Trends: SaaS

Software as a Service (SaaS) is one of the most important and pervasive technology trend today. We are seeing large on-premise application providers like Microsoft, SAP, Oracle, and IBM embracing the SaaS trend with acquisitions.

The acquisition of WebEx by Cisco last year not only raises SaaS awareness but also validates the fact that the SaaS market is here to stay. This key acquisition is the beginning of more acquisitions to come from other companies and should significantly benefit any stable and profitable company with a SaaS business model.

It should also be noted that Abhijit Dubey, associate principal for McKinsey, told attendees at the Interop Conference in Las Vegas that in a survey of IT buyers found that 62% believed the SaaS industry was at the beginning of the innovation cycle and that SaaS ranked as the most important item for their businesses this year.

Dubey also mentioned that the value of a SaaS model is tremendous: companies deploying traditional software spend 60 to 70 cents on every dollar invested on software over a five year period on the underlying platform driving the applications. For SaaS users, that amount drops to 20 to 30 cents on the dollar.

Goldman Sachs said it perfectly, "SaaS solutions solve many of the problems that traditional software faces, including large upfront license fees, long time to implementation, and access issues by mobile workforce, outside of the company network." In many instances, customers prefer this style of delivery and the large incumbents have to adjust their strategies accordingly. Over the next several years it will become pervasive in almost all areas of the software market."

Key SaaS Players:

- Customer Relationship Management (CRM): Salesforce.com, Oracle On-Demand and PeopleSoft Enterprise On-Demand, RightNow, NetSuite, Kintera, SugarCRM, Intacct, SAP Business ByDesign, Zoho.com
- Learning Management Systems (LMS): SumTotal, Learn.com, GeoLearning, Saba, Blackboard
- Supply Chain Management (SCM): Digital River, Manugistics, SAP
- Content Management: EMC eRoom, Vignette, Interwoven
- Business Intelligence: Business Objects, WebTrends, DemandTec
- Web Conferencing: Cisco/WebEx, Adobe, Microsoft, Centra
- Web Analytics: Omniture, Google Urchin, CoreMetrics, WebTrends
- Human Capital Management: Taleo, Salary.com, SumTotal, Kenexa, SuccessFactors, PeopleClick

Thanks,
David Chao
The Web Conferencing Expert

WebEx: Regional Manager

Readers,

Thank you for your interest in "The Web Conferencing Blog." For those that are regular readers and subscribers, I hope the information, thoughts and opinions are insightful and I thank you for your interest.

For those that read my blogs and suddenly have the epiphany that I work for WebEx did you happen to stumble on my Linkedin.com Profile that's clearly visible on the blog? Comments like "Great blog from a Regional Manager who works at WebEx," or "Who do you work for again?" are not only trivial but they take up space in my inbox and I simply delete such comments, especially when the persons making these wasteful comments purposely keep their identities anonymous. If you don't have anything interesting to say, don't say anything, don't leave a comment.

If you want to bash a specific blog entry or bash me, do it. If it so happens that you work for a competitor, so be it, you have a right to exercise your thoughts also. However, if you choose to leave a comment, at least identify yourself as I have done. Not doing so is cowardly.

Again, "The Weg Conferencing Blog," contains information, thoughts and opinions that do not reflect the opinions of WebEx or Cisco.

Thanks,
David Chao
The Web Conferencing Expert