Once
cameras became standard equipment on mobile phones, it was only a matter of
time before vendors realized that the foundation was there for using
image-capture technology to transmit video. It’s actually possible that by the
time we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the AT&T picture phone shown
at the 1964 New York World’s Fair, video chat may even be commonplace.
But
before that happens, users will have to thread their way through a landscape
littered with incompatible options, segmented by carriers, mobile apps, and
networks.
Vivox,
developer of the VoiceEverywhere voice/video/chat platform, Tuesday acquired
Palo Alto, Calif.-based Droplet Technology, for an undisclosed sum. “We’re
adding Droplet to upgrade the capabilities of our current communications
platform,” Vivox CEO Rob Seaver told PCWorld. “Mobile video is a highly
demanding environment that requires specialized technology. Droplet is
optimized to handle mobile video much better than other applications and to
reduce the bandwidth demands on a mobile network.”
The
VoiceEverywhere platform offers voice, video, and text chat capabilities, and
is already integrated into multiple gaming and communications applications,
Seaver said. He said that the technology is already used by more than 80
million people who want to communicate while playing games from Sony and Nexon
or while wandering through the Second Life virtual world. “You can walk up to
people and start talking to them,” said Seaver, “and if you walk away, their
voices will fade.”
The
technology is also used in T-Mobile’s Bobsled application, which runs on
iPhones, iPads, and Android phones and lets Facebook users initiate video chats
with friends.
Other Players
Vivox
isn't the only player in this arena. Aylus Networks provides a similar platform
for voice/video/text chat, and companies such as Oovoo and WeTalk target
video-chat capabilities. And those are just the start-ups. There’s also
Microsoft’s acquisition of Skype, which threatens to rewrite the rules of
collaboration.
A
big problem for consumers is that the voice/video/text chat space is highly
fragmented. Some applications only work with certain platforms (for instance,
Fringland with Android). Some work only with tablets (take Polycom’s meeting
application for iPads and Android tablets). Some are targeting group video,
such as Google Hangouts and AnyMeeting). That doesn’t even begin to factor in
the gaming community.
In
fact, the whole market is in a state of flux. “Video chat has always been a
PC-to-PC solution, which has kept it from being as automatic as a phone call,”
said IDC Senior Reseach Analyst Irene Berlinsky in a video presentation last
summer. “But now it’s going to mobile phones and to tablets.” It’s also going
to TV, she said, citing a Skype-Comcast partnership that would “offer remote
workers the opportunity to collaborate over video on a large screen that’s much
cheaper even than scaled-down telepresence options.
There’s
also a question of where it will work. Berlinsky said that because video chat
over mobile networks will eat up a lot of data, it’s more likely to be used
over Wi-Fi. But that’s where Seaver says Droplet’s video optimization
capability will help Vivox compete, because it can “cap the bandwidth use at a
level that’s appropriate for conditions on the network and still provide a
great quality image.”
He
insisted that having a platform, rather than just an application, will boost
Vivox’s differentiation and its ability to survive any forthcoming
consolidation. “The secret is not just having a range of ways to
communicate," Seaver says. "The secret is having a communications
platform that will help users talk to who they want, when they want, in the
mode they want on any device.”
Source
PCWorld
Tag :
mobile,
technology
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