Web conferencing: A cost-effective option

Kiran Datar, managing director - India, Cisco, WebEx Technology Group

These are the times where every penny counts and needs to be spent wisely. Opting for collaborative solutions like web conferencing during tough times not only saves money but also helps business to run effectively.

Kiran Datar, managing director - India, Cisco, WebEx Technology Group, tells V.Sudhakshina of CyberMedia News as to how can collaboration solutions such as Web conferencing could help businesses in saving on costs wisely and the opportunities for web conferencing in India. Excerpts:

How is Cisco WebEx seeing the opportunity from the Web conferencing in the current scenario of economic crisis?

The world is changing as well as the business requirements. The current economic crisis has led to people stress on budgets. Businesses are highly focusing on cutting costs in every possible manner to keep them running.

Collaboration is one among the top priorities for Cisco and is one such effective way for business to rely upon during these tough times. Cisco's web conferencing solution WebEx is one such collaborative platform.

There is a good opportunity for people to save upon unwanted expenses by adopting such collaborative platforms.

The market for web conferencing is growing rapidly. According to the research firm Frost & Sullivan the web conferencing market for APAC was around 150 to 200 million USD in 2006, which is estimated to grow 5 to 8 times closely around one to one and half billion USD by now. India is going to be a huge part for this growth and the opportunity is very large.

In the current global economic crisis, have you witnessed any increase in adoption of Web conferencing by businesses?

The growth has definitely picked up rapidly, thanks to recession. Earlier, solutions like Web conferencing were not much in demand due to lack of awareness. But the economic crisis has made collaboration as one such solution that businesses think of adopting while evaluating for other options in this tough cash crunch scenario.

Web conferencing offers a hosted service platform, which requires no server or additional hardware. Thus, there is no worry on the part of organizations in adopting it as they don't have to put in any extra expense. They just have to pay a monthly subscription fee, which can be paid according to the need.

We have seen a tremendous adoption even in sectors like manufacturing or retail who have limited usage of IT.

The best example I can give here is, our website offers free trials for customers who want to try the Webex solution for the first time. In the last six months, at-least 8 to 9 thousand customers have opted for this free trials. We have noticed a 20 per cent increase. This itself shows that of course there is an interest amongst the customers to adopt our solution.

How about the SMB sector? Have you seen any increase in adoption in that sector too?

SMBs usually need to be convinced out of the way for adopting any new solutions as it involves cost, even to pay the monthly subscription. But, the adoption indicators are even more positive for the SMB sector, as they are the hardest hit in this economic scenario.

As I mentioned earlier, Web conferencing solutions not only help in reducing expenses but also do not have any initial investment. The bandwidth trouble is also not an issue as Web conferencing does not require any huge amount of bandwidth; a minimum of 128 Kbps would give out good quality.

Are there any value additions that Cisco WebEx has brought about in web conferencing in recent times?

We do have an uptake in the value addition for our web conferencing solutions. Our Value addition include elements like adding video, software demos, applications or sharing power-point presentations. We have solutions catering according to the needs of each segment in businesses such as training, support, marketing etc. For example, for training purposes our solutions provide with online assessment. Another best example is marketing, which has suffered due to organizations becoming tighter on their budgets and reducing conducting activities. This is a segment in which adoption is at greater rate, as all the activities like events, seminars, roadshow and campaigns can be put on Web.

Who are your major clients in India?

Our two major clients in India include Wipro and Infosys. The list of our SMB clients includes Indegene Lifesystems Pvt. Ltd., Mistral Solutions Pvt. Ltd., Twenty Twenty Media Pvt. Ltd., Skyline Construction & Housing Pvt. Ltd, Liqwid Krystal, to mention a few.

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