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SAN JOSE, Calif.--([ BUSINESS WIRE ])--[ Polycom, Inc ]. (Nasdaq:PLCM), the global leader in open standards-based unified communications (UC), today announced that Forrester Research Inc. named Polycom a leader and top-ranked Company in both acurrent offeringsa and astrategya in a new report on video collaboration solutions.

"Polycom has a diverse portfolio of endpoints including a range of options that run the gamut from mobile and room-based systems to immersive telepresence"

The report, titled aThe Forrester Wavea": Room-Based Videoconferencing, Q3 2012,a uses 39 criteria to evaluate the top vendors in the industry, looking at video collaboration solutions for every work environment a" from mobile and desktops to room systems and immersive telepresence a" along with the services that support them. Forrester found that Polycom has taken the top scores in acurrent offeringsa based on such factors as conferencing experience, quality of experience, management platform, recording and streaming, and security and compliance, all for which Polycom was also top-ranked. In the astrategya category, Forrester named Polycom a leader largely because of its product roadmap and particular strengths in aUC integrationa and ainteroperabilitya a" a key focus of and competitive advantage for Polycom and its global ecosystem of over 7,000 partners. In addition, Polycom was top ranked in the apartnersa category. ([ Download the full report here ]).

aAs Forrester notes in its new aWavea report, Polycom is now top-ranked in acurrent offeringsa for video collaboration. Polycom today is delivering the most useful innovations, best user experiences, and broadest interoperability of any video collaboration company,a said Polycom CEO Andy Miller. aImportantly, Forrester also named Polycom the top-ranked company in astrategyaa" which we see as validation from an important thought leader that Polycom is on the right track with our vision to make video collaboration ubiquitous through an innovative roadmap and by offering the industryas best user experience. Polycom will also continue to offer the industryas broadest multi-vendor integration and lowest TCO. For our more than 415,000 customers globally, Polycom is delivering innovations in video collaboration that are changing the way people work, collaborate, learn, govern, create and even help save lives.a

aPolycom has a diverse portfolio of endpoints including a range of options that run the gamut from mobile and room-based systems to immersive telepresence,a wrote Phillip Karcher, the author of the Forrester Research report. aThrough technology partnerships, with Microsoft in particular, Polycom provides endpoints that work well in multi-vendor environments. Many of its endpoints also interoperate natively with nonstandard protocols and codecs.a

Video Collaboration Is Becoming More Ubiquitous, Forrester Finds

The Forrester Wave report also discusses the growing interest in aface to facea video collaboration, which is helping businesses increase productivity, improve employee engagement and trust, and lower costs.

aIn a work culture dominated by virtual meetings, more firms are looking to videoconferencing to replicate the in-person experience that employees prefer a" or at least make voice conversations more engaging by fostering the trust and improved communications that comes with being able to read the other personas body language,a wrote Forrester in the report. aMobile executives want video for better work-life balance, managers want it to see that their direct reports arenat distracted, and multicultural organizations want it to foster the trust and improved communication that comes with being able to read the body language of remote team members.a

Also, according to Forresteras report: aVideoconferencing innovation today is happening on smaller screens like PCs, smartphones, and tablets that workers use in their everyday jobs. In response to the growing interest, vendors not only have to show strategies that account for desktop and mobile applications a" they also have to make their traditional dedicated room-based systems easier to deploy at scale.a

Polycom RealPresence Video Collaboration Solutions

Polycom RealPresence video collaboration solutions deliver secure, high-quality video to companies of all sizes, so that teams can meet face-to-face with colleagues, partners and customers anywhere people work a in the office, at home, on the go, or on the manufacturing floor, in a hospital or, at a movie set. Polycom offers the broadest range of video collaboration solutions in the industry including:

• [ RealPresence Immersive ] video theaters that provide the experience of being in the same room with other participants a life-sized and eye-to-eye. Polycom provides the industryas best immersive video experience, with cinema-like video quality, crystal-clear HD audio with tailored acoustics, and personal content monitors, creating a real-as-life remote group collaboration experience that makes the distance and technology invisible.
• [ Room ] solutions that facilitate enterprise-grade video collaboration, regardless of room size or budget. Polycom RealPresence Room (HDX Series) video solutions are secure, easy to operate, and consistently deliver a flawless visual communications experience. Polycom RealPresence Room solutions make it simple for people to meet face-to-face and share HD-quality content with peers, partners, and customers wherever they may be located.
• [ Desktop ] systems that deliver HD video collaboration to the personal workspace, including to PCs and laptops.
• Award-winning [ Real Presence Mobile ], which extends video collaboration beyond the office to leading Apple and Android smartphones and tablets.
• Innovative video and UC solutions such as [ Polycom EagleEye Director ], the most intelligent UC camera , which delivers breakthrough HD experiences by automatically zooming in on the active speaker in the room as they talk or walk; and [ Polycom UC Boarda" ], which transforms ordinary surfaces into virtual whiteboards.

These solutions are powered by the [ Polycom RealPresence Platform ], the most comprehensive and interoperable infrastructure for universal video collaboration. The RealPresence Platform provides the robust provisioning, management, scalability, reliability, flexibility, and security required both for video enterprises and their private video clouds serving thousands of users, as well as for Video-as-a-Service (VaaS) delivered from the cloud potentially to tens of millions. Because of Polycom's focus on interoperability, the RealPresence Platform works with hundreds of UC and business apps, transforming islands of employees and fragmented communications systems into a seamless video enterprise where enterprise-grade video is easily and securely available to all authorized personnel whether they're mobile, remote, or on-site. Polycom [ recently announced a rich new suite of open APIs ] for developers, partners, and service providers to integrate business apps such as billing, scheduling, directory, management, and monitoring with the Platform, extending the value of RealPresence video solutions to new industries, new use cases, and new users.

About Polycom

Polycom is the global leader in open standards-based unified communications (UC) solutions for [ telepresence ], [ video ], and [ voice ] powered by the Polycom RealPresence Platform.The RealPresence Platform interoperates with the broadest range of business, mobile, and social applications and devices. More than 400,000 organizations trust Polycom solutions to collaborate and meet face to face from any location for more productive and effective engagement with colleagues, partners, customers, specialists, and prospects.Polycom, together with its broad partner ecosystem, provides customers with the best total cost of ownership, interoperability, scalability, and security for video collaboration, whether on-premises, hosted, or cloud delivered. Visit [ www.polycom.com ] or connect with Polycom on [ Twitter ], [ Facebook ], and [ LinkedIn ].

2012 Polycom, Inc. All rights reserved. POLYCOM, the Polycom logo, and the names and marks associated with Polycomas products are trademarks and/or service marks of Polycom, Inc. and are registered and/or common law marks in the United States and various other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.