Polycom is working with the South African government to accelerate the adoption of telepresence and video conferencing technology in the private and public sector.
So says Stanton Naidoo, major account manager for Polycom SA. “We are seeing a lot of interest for the real-presence centres coming from the financial and government sectors. This comes from government's mandate to go green and reduce travel expenses, and they are seriously looking at video conferencing and telepresence technology.”
Boosting healthcare
According to Naidoo, the South African government is working on developing a single system for healthcare where patients' details are recorded across a common network which is integrated with a telehealth solution.
“We are engaging with the government on this technology and are working closely with SITA to drive it as the technology provider to government.”
He points to a mobile health van that Polycom built, aimed at patients who are unable to travel to their nearest clinic or hospital. The technology records the vital signs of the patient in real-time and high-definition. These details are then sent to a doctor in Johannesburg in real-time via Polycom's telepresence technology.
“Similarly to what we are doing in the health industry, we are working with the Department of Education by linking together schools and education institutions on a national scale to enable learners to be exposed to different levels of communication and collaborate effectively,” says Naidoo.
Opportunity ahead
Naidoo says SA has done fairly well, having placed constraints against overspending to curb the impact of the recession. However, he notes that Polycom is not immune to the global economic crisis.
“A lot of measures will get the country out of the recession quicker, such as the financial boost from the 2010 Fifa World Cup. Companies are also more cautious in their spending and deals are being put on hold. At the moment, the biggest growth area we're seeing is infrastructure and video conferencing technology.”
Naidoo adds that smart bandwidth provisioning needs to be adopted. “We are starting to see higher capacity broadband becoming available. IP telephony will turn into video telephony and we expect that it will continue to evolve.
“It's going to be an interesting time for SA as we see more IP integration from the likes of Telkom, Vodacom, MTN and Neotel.”
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