HANNOVER, Germany (CeBIT 2007) - March 16, 2007 - Cisco® today announced a set of new technologies that extend the capabilities of the Cisco TelePresence meeting solution to enable virtual meetings in multiple locations at one time and to provide businesses with the freedom to organize meetings with customers or partners outside the corporate firewall. Cisco is also introducing a number of solutions that will create a more collaborative meeting environment, including innovative tools that simplify how meeting participants share documents, objects and images over TelePresence and engage with a virtual agent for customer care.

Cisco also announced that Regus Group plc, the world's leading provider of pioneering workplace solutions, has selected Cisco technology to provide the first public TelePresence service (http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2007/prod_031607b.html).

Multiple Locations

A major step in the evolution of Cisco's TelePresence experience is the ability to connect to multiple locations during a single virtual meeting. Cisco's new TelePresence Multipoint Switch, which supports up to 36 separate physical locations, enables businesses to invite meeting participants and content experts to the virtual table at the push of a button, regardless of location. Depending on user preferences, meeting participants who speak are displayed either by entire location or by individual screens.

Multiple Organizations

With today's announcement, Cisco is also expanding the TelePresence Experience beyond the corporate firewall to enable organizations to establish inter-company meetings via the Cisco Secure Business to Business TelePresence technology. Now, in addition to holding meetings within an organization, sales teams, executives and other meeting organizers will be able to hold virtual meetings with customers and partners with the same ease as internal meetings, decreasing the time it takes to make critical business decisions while reducing travel expenses for all parties involved.

Multiple Documents, Applications and Objects

The ability to showcase new products or share presentations in a virtual meeting environment is key to enabling a truly collaborative meeting experience. With the new Cisco Auto-Collaborate capability, meeting participants can easily share files, physical documents and objects over TelePresence using collaboration tools such as a high-definition document camera or simply by plugging in a laptop computer. This unique Cisco innovation projects images from the most recently activated device to all rooms in the meeting automatically, without user intervention in a completely plug-and-play fashion.

Multiple Branch Customer Care

Additionally, Cisco is taking the TelePresence solution to the contact center environment with the introduction of Cisco TelePresence Virtual Agent, a new solution that integrates the single-screen Cisco TelePresence 1000 with Cisco Unified Contact Center Express. This new solution helps enable skilled sales or technical personnel to be virtually deployed in real time for more effective and productive customer contact, taking advantage of advanced call center scheduling capabilities. These experts can now interact with customers across multiple remote branch locations on demand, without the need to travel to branches.

Cisco also announced support for third-party video conferencing solutions based on the H.323 standard to take advantage of existing investments while realizing the benefits of the Cisco TelePresence experience.

Customer Adoption

National Lambda Rail, Inc is also deploying multiple Cisco TelePresence facilities:

"In working with research groups at significant academic institutions throughout the US, we recognized that research can be better facilitated and enhanced by direct face to face discussion between geographically distant teams," commented Tom West, President and CEO of National Lambda Rail, Inc. "We are enabling member institutions and regional networks to deploy multiple Cisco TelePresence facilities to take advantage of the full reach of our network to support this process amongst the academic community."

Services and Partners

Lastly, Cisco Services is introducing Cisco TelePresence Select Operate Service, which provides customers and partners with remote monitoring and management of their network, Unified Communications and TelePresence solutions. An optional service offered in conjunction with Cisco TelePresence Select Operate Service is the Cisco TelePresence Remote Assistance Service, which provides real-time administrative support.

Cisco TelePresence Authorized Technology Provider (ATP) Partners are trained and authorized to design, deploy and support the Cisco TelePresence Meeting Solution.

"We are demonstrating a highly innovative global solution at CeBIT 2007, by supporting the first public demonstration of the Cisco Multipoint TelePresence solution," commented Ulrich Kemp, COO Business Services, T-Systems, a Cisco TelePresence ATP Program Partner. "Our expertise in global IP networking and understanding of quality-of-service implementations helps T-Systems provide strategic support for organizations who want to roll out multisite TelePresence deployments around the world."

The Cisco TelePresence Meeting Solution is best delivered over a Cisco-certified TelePresence network connection, which takes advantage of Cisco Internet Protocol Next-Generation Network architecture and innovative technology, such as the Cisco Carrier Routing System and the Cisco XR 12000 series to deliver the most scalable and secure solution. Cisco TelePresence-certified network service providers work to ensure that businesses get the lifelike communications experience they demand for global collaboration. A number of leading providers around the world, including AT&T, BT, Deutsche Telekom, NTT, and Verizon Business have announced trials of the Cisco TelePresence meeting solution and have indicated plans to incorporate Cisco TelePresence into their service portfolios.

"These new enhancements move TelePresence beyond the four- to twelve-person meeting solution to a new range of applications that help scale businesses and their teams. This demonstrates how Cisco is continuing to shape the industry with unique innovations that work over existing enterprise and service provider networks without the need for separate overlay networks," said Marthin De Beer, senior vice president, Emerging Markets Technology Group for Cisco. "With these new features, Cisco is the only vendor with the expertise and technology to deliver inter-company TelePresence meetings with simplicity and security in an end-to-end architectural approach."

Cisco TelePresence represents the industry's only virtual meeting solution delivering 1080p high-definition life-size images, spatial audio, and plug-and-play collaborative tools. By reducing training requirements to a minimal level, Cisco has made TelePresence as easy to use as placing a phone call and scheduling as simple as organising a meeting on a group calendar.