A breakthrough technology for remote meetings, the Cisco TelePresence® solution integrates advanced audio, ultra-high-definition video, and interactive collaboration tools with the underlying network as the platform to deliver an immersive meeting experience. Through this powerful combination of technology and design, local and remote participants feel as if they are in the same room. The Cisco TelePresence solution has the potential to transform the way organizations do business.
Organizations are already using the Cisco TelePresence solution internally to make decisions faster, improve cross-cultural communications, scale scarce resources, and move products to market faster. Many immediately understand the immense value to be gained by having "in-person" Cisco TelePresence meetings externally with customers, partners, suppliers, and other groups; in other words, Cisco TelePresence meetings enabled for intercompany communications.
With this solution you can call directly from a Cisco TelePresence room on your network to a Cisco TelePresence room on a different company's network through a secure connection from your service provider. Cisco encourages you to query your service provider about its intercompany Cisco TelePresence service offering and timing.
The potential power of intercompany collaboration and business applications for the Cisco TelePresence solution is significant. Meeting with customers and suppliers face-to-face more frequently, getting advertising campaigns out faster to effect sales, working with manufacturers to make changes quickly to lower defects, improving supply-chain efficiencies, quickly resolving crises across geographic or organizational boundaries, and speeding merger integrations are just a few examples of the benefits that intercompany "in-person" Cisco TelePresence meetings offer.
These benefits are possible because of the relationships that Cisco enjoys with global enterprises and service providers. Cisco has built the Cisco TelePresence architecture for the end-to-end secure combination of enterprise and service provider networks. Only Cisco understands the underlying network power and intelligence and has the core business relationships that will make intercompany capabilities for the Cisco TelePresence solution a reality.
Further, intercompany capabilities with the Cisco TelePresence solution continue to deliver the same reliability, simplicity, and quality of experience and take full advantage of the same applications, such as Cisco TelePresence Auto Collaborate and multipoint applications. Cisco can deliver fully integrated intracompany and secure intercompany Cisco TelePresence meetings over your network.
To enable Cisco service provider partners, we are delivering a set of validated reference architectures and solutions designed so that service providers can securely and reliably support Cisco TelePresence calls across and between single or multiple service provider networks. Cisco offers a certification program for the Cisco Certified TelePresence Connection and is expanding the certification for intercompany Cisco TelePresence meetings.
As customers continue to grow internal Cisco TelePresence deployments, they should prepare their networks for intercompany Cisco TelePresence capabilities. Some of the following questions and answers may assist in further understanding the intercompany Cisco TelePresence solution for deployment planning.
Enterprise Q&A
Q. What is the intercompany Cisco TelePresence solution?
A. The intercompany Cisco TelePresence solution means the combination of existing enterprise networks and service provider connections to extend Cisco TelePresence meetings beyond your enterprise boundary - allowing you to meet "in person" with customers, suppliers, and partners as easily as you can internally. Any organization that regularly needs to meet with third parties can benefit from this solution. To enable service providers to offer intercompany commercial services for Cisco TelePresence meetings, we are delivering a fully validated reference architecture that facilitates calls between multiple enterprise networks to securely traverse the service provider network with no comingling of routes, addresses, or data.
Q. What is the intercompany value proposition for the Cisco TelePresence solution? Why is valuable to me?
A. Intercompany capabilities for Cisco TelePresence meetings provide a venue for real-time, face-to-face meetings between enterprises. Being able to conduct TelePresence meetings across company boundaries - to meet "in person" - is viewed as strategic by many organizations looking for competitive advantage in gaining greater customer intimacy, speeding time to market, scaling scarce resources, and making faster decisions with partners. Whether a manufacturer is dealing with critical supply-chain concerns, financial firms are discussing an IPO or merger, or an engineer is discussing the integration of a crucial feature with a collaboration partner, the Cisco TelePresence solution plays a critical role.
Q. What is the Cisco strategy for delivering intercompany capabilities for CiscoTelePresence meetings?
A. Cisco is working to enable service providers to deliver intercompany IP connectivity and services to connect Cisco TelePresence users. To have an "in-person" Cisco TelePresence experience between organizations, enterprise users will order their network connections from their service provider.
Q. The Cisco TelePresence solution is an extension of the Cisco® Unified Communications Solution. Can I just call another company's Cisco TelePresence room?
A. With intercompany capabilities in place for the Cisco TelePresence meeting application, you can call a Cisco TelePresence room on another network as easily as you call internally using the Cisco TelePresence solution today. An intercompany Cisco TelePresence call relies on proper enterprise-to-enterprise IP network connectivity with quality-of-service (QoS) elements and service-level agreements (SLAs) that help ensure appropriate bandwidth and latency requirements. To deliver intercompany Cisco TelePresence communications, service providers must implement proper security to connect TelePresence calls between multiple enterprise networks, and if calls traverse multiple service provider networks, they must peer correctly to help ensure that intercompany TelePresence is secure and easy and end users have the proper optimized TelePresence experience.
Q. What new equipment do I need to install in my network to enable intercompany capabilities for Cisco TelePresence meetings?
A. Assuming you already have the Cisco TelePresence application for your intraenterprise calls and a properly provisioned service provider network, you may have very little to do to be ready for intercompany Cisco TelePresence meetings:
• Security: For firewall and Network Address Translation (NAT) Traversal, the firewall should support the TelePresence bandwidth and QoS network requirements. Cisco recommends the Cisco Catalyst® 6500 Series Firewall Services Module (FWSM) and the Cisco ASA 5500 Series Enterprise Firewall Edition for TelePresence.
• Enterprise IP address privacy and topology hiding: You may wish to deploy a Cisco Session Border Controller (SBC) in your company's network edge to "hide" the Cisco Unified Communications Manager. In this case the Cisco Unified Border Element performs the routing to the service provider network. Cisco recommends the Cisco 2851, 3825, and 3845 Integrated Services Routers with an upgrade to Cisco IOS® Software that supports TelePresence. For larger scalability, Cisco recommends the Cisco XR 12000 Series Router with an X-blade or the Cisco 7600 Router with an access-control-entry (ACE) blade, with an upgrade to Cisco IOS Software that supports TelePresence.
Q. Which service providers offer intercompany Cisco TelePresence services? What does it cost? What should I do if my service provider does not offer intercompany capabilities but my company needs them?
A. Commercial intercompany Cisco TelePresence services will be available and priced through service providers. Many service providers are currently performing trials of intercompany Cisco TelePresence capabilities. You should request intercompany Cisco TelePresence connections from your provider.
Q. What level of security does intercompany Cisco TelePresence offer on the network and at the endpoint?
A. Intercompany Cisco TelePresence security is accomplished through a series of network elements that create a secure VPN connection between the enterprises and the service provider, providing a tunnel for Secure Real-Time Transport Protocol-Multiprotocol Label Switching (SRTP-MPLS) traffic. The secure tunnel routes the Cisco TelePresence media and signaling streams through the enterprise's firewall to a customer-edge router and then to the service provider's provider-edge router to the service provider's SBC, through a tagged SRTP-MPLS connection. The SRTP-MPLS tunnel arrangement helps ensure security from the enterprise to the service provider's SBC. The SBC itself serves as a point of secure demarcation between the two enterprise segments, managing and routing the Cisco TelePresence call and logically isolating each enterprise's segment. Neither enterprise has access to the other's network or network data.
In a point-to-point configuration, encryption of the Cisco TelePresence media streams is also possible. Cisco uses Certificate Authority X.509v3 Manufacturing Installed Certificates (MICs) in all Cisco TelePresence endpoints in nonerasable, nonvolatile memory for endpoint-to-endpoint Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS) key exchange.
Q. What about directory, scheduling, and other types of services?
A. Intercompany Cisco TelePresence meetings are new services, so service providers may not provide advanced or add-on services at the time of deployment. Just as you would obtain telephone directory information from a service provider or carrier today, the same would apply for the Cisco TelePresence solution. Service providers can implement directory and scheduling services in many ways, but some of these services require that the service provider have access to an enterprise customer's network.
Q. What is the end-user experience? Will I still get "one-button-to-push" capability? Is scheduling still as easy as booking a room?
A. The end-user experience is the same as that for internal Cisco TelePresence meetings, with both impromptu dialing and one-button-to-push capabilities available. The additional step is scheduling between the cooperating enterprises.
For one-button-to-push dialing, company A and company B both schedule a meeting at the arranged time using their calendaring software. Both companies add the respective external room phone numbers to Cisco Transport Manager, which responds with a confirmation email message. At the scheduled time, a one-button push places the call.
Q. Does the intercompany Cisco TelePresence solution support multisite (multipoint) meetings?
A. Yes. The application supports multisite meetings with the same media encryption capabilities as point-to-point meetings. Secure intercompany multipoint is a critical element to extending the Cisco TelePresence application outside an organization's WAN.
More Information
For more information about the intercompany Cisco TelePresence solution, please visit: http://www.cisco.com/go/telepresence.