London, UK - January 28, 2013 - Polycom, Inc. (Nasdaq: PLCM), the global leader in open standards-based unified communications and collaboration (UC&C), today announced that German Law Firm Luther Rechtsanwaltsgesellschaft has implemented Polycom® RealPresence® video solutions, integrated with IBM Sametime®, across 17 locations around the world. The joint IBM and Polycom solution allows each of Luther's 700 employees to connect and collaborate, securely using high-definition Polycom video from anywhere on any device. In fact, Polycom video collaboration has become Luther's default choice of communication tool.

 

"We have given our employees freedom," said Andreas Gaebisch, CIO at Luther. "Freedom to connect and hold their meetings from anywhere using video, without having to worry about dial format, location, bandwidth, quality or security."

 

Luther is a leading German commercial law firm, ranked by Chambers as one of the top law firms in Europe. The company is represented at 11 German economic centers and has international offices in Brussels, Budapest, London, Luxembourg, Shanghai and Singapore. As global business requirements demand hours of meetings and collaboration between offices, partners, and customers, Luther wanted a more effective and productive meeting experience.

 

Gaebisch says that for three months he and his team searched and tested for the optimum video collaboration solution that would integrate with Luther's existing network and IBM's social communications platform. Polycom came out ahead with its solutions that run on the secure and open standards-based video software infrastructure provided by the Polycom® RealPresence® Platform, which integrates seamlessly with IBM Sametime. Employees at Luther were already familiar with IBM Sametime software as a social communications tool, and found Polycom RealPresence video solutions easy to use, efficient, and a great option to business travel. Together, the IBM and Polycom solution enables every employee, simply by clicking on a name in their Sametime contact list, to initiate a secure, face-to-face HD video meeting, or join any meeting room.

 

"Seeing is believing, and with video you see people's reactions and misunderstandings are therefore much less frequent than in a simple phone conversation," Gaebisch explained.

 

Video collaboration has improved team performance, and Luther is noticing a culture change is taking place. People are choosing to hold meetings using video, including through IBM Sametime and on Polycom HDX room systems, which are powered by the Polycom® RealPresence® Platform - the most comprehensive and interoperable software infrastructure for universal HD video collaboration. Because the Polycom Platform is based on open standards, Luther is able to hold secure video meetings with customers, partners, and other law firms even if they are using other providers' products. In early October 2012, Polycom announced powerful enhancements to the RealPresence® Platform, including the industry's first open standards-based SVC (Scalable Video Coding), with 3X HD multipoint video call capacity for greater scalability, dramatically lower TCO, superior performance, and backwards- and forwards-compatibility to protect customer investments.

 

Luther conducts a wide range of meetings and collaborations over video, including:

"When investing in new technology you want the assurance it will still be a standard in five years," said Gaebisch. "With Polycom leading the innovations and long history in standards-based technologies, we feel confident we have made the right investment."