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Videoconference and Telepresence Market Update

Why travel to meet with employees and vendor partners when you can just as easily interact with them via online video communication? Whatever motivates people to endure airline departure delays and airport security lines, just so they can attend internal business meetings, it clearly isn't their increased productivity.

Enterprise videoconferencing and telepresence systems market showed mixed results in the first quarter of 2016 (1Q16), with overall videoconferencing equipment revenue decreasing 21.1 percent quarter over quarter, but increasing 2.3 percent year over year, according to the latest study by International Data Corporation (IDC).

The total worldwide enterprise video equipment revenue in 1Q16 was over $495 million -- that's down from about $628 million in 4Q15. The total number of videoconferencing units sold in 1Q16 (101,391) decreased 8.0 percent quarter over quarter, but increased 9.9 percent compared to 1Q15.

"Some mixed news for the worldwide enterprise videoconferencing equipment market in 1Q16 as it saw mostly negative quarter-over-quarter results but also some positive year-over-year numbers -- including overall revenue and unit shipments growing 2.3 percent and 9.9 percent year over year respectively," said Rich Costello, senior analyst at IDC.

Video Communication Market Development 
  • Multi-codec telepresence equipment revenue ($23.9 million) was down 44.4 percent quarter over quarter, but increased 27.4 percent year over year in 1Q16. Unit shipments were down 47.1 percent quarter over quarter, but increased 48.8 percent year over year.
  • Room-based videoconferencing system revenue ($359.6 million) decreased 15.4 percent quarter over quarter, but increased 9.8 percent year over year. Unit shipments decreased 8.8 percent quarter over quarter, but increased 10.4 percent year over year.
  • Personal videoconferencing systems revenue ($41.8 million) – including executive desktop systems - decreased both 7.9 percent compared to 4Q15 and 5.7 percent year over year. Unit shipments were down 4.3 percent quarter over quarter, but increased 8.2 percent compared to 1Q15.
  • Video infrastructure equipment revenue ($69.9 million) – including MCUs and other video-related infrastructure – decreased both 38.8 percent quarter over quarter and 25.3 percent year over year.

Regional Results for First Quarter of 2016
  • North America revenue decreased 17.4 percent quarter over quarter, but increased 17.8 percent year over year.
  • Latin America revenue decreased both 30.6 percent quarter over quarter and 26.4 percent year over year.
  • Europe, Middle East & Africa (EMEA) revenue decreased both 26.3 percent quarter over quarter and 12.6 percent year over year.
  • Asia-Pacific revenue decreased 19.2 percent quarter-over-quarter, but increased 6.3 percent year-over-year.

IDC believes that the quarterly declines are mainly due to the usual seasonality in this market, with the first quarter pretty much always the weakest of the year, and the fourth quarter usually the strongest. So the video communication market seems to be status-quo, for the time being.

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