Cisco on Cisco

Important news about company plans, results, and strategies has a greater impact on employees when an executive, especially the CEO, delivers it personally. But in-person presentations are often hard to arrange in global companies such as Cisco.

In the past, Cisco executives traveled to cities where the largest number of Cisco employees could congregate. For remote employees, these executive events were broadcast using a satellite truck and Cisco IP TV technologies, and a video on demand was made available for viewing after the event.

But an April 2007 presentation by Cisco CEO John Chambers at the Sydney Convention Centre in Australia took a simpler, less costly approach. Nearly 500 Cisco employees from Australia and New Zealand were there in person, and for employees who were unable to attend the event was broadcast live over the Cisco network with a new and creative use of Cisco routing technologies.

“The traditional methods for transmitting a live broadcast were simply too expensive for this single event,” says Anthony Wolfenden, operations director in the rich media group, Cisco Corporate Communications. “We were looking at costs of AU$10,000 for each alternative that we considered: a broadcast truck and satellite links, or a 10-Mbps Internet link specially installed between the convention center and our local office.”

A Simpler Solution

In Cisco IT’s solution for this event, the live video stream was compressed and transmitted from a PC-based studio system in the convention center to the Cisco office in Sydney, using a Cisco Enterprise Class Teleworker (ECT) router and a 1-Mbps Internet connection. The link was configured as a symmetrical digital subscriber line (SDSL) service to provide the greatest bandwidth for video broadcast.

At the Cisco office, the video stream was received on a standard Cisco PC connected to a digital media encoder, from which remote employees could access the broadcast over the Cisco network. Although many watched from their offices, employees working at home could also access the video stream over their VPN connections.

Good Video at Less Cost

The connectivity cost of this broadcast solution was significantly less than the expense of a satellite link or 10-Mbps direct circuit. For example, the expense of the 1-Mbps connection was only AU$400 for the event. And video and audio quality was more than adequate for employees who watched over the VPN, comparable to any broadcast video stream viewed on a PC.

No change in procedures or equipment was required for the camera crew in the meeting room, because the PC studio system accepts standard video outputs. The network broadcast solution is also expected to reduce the need for postproduction work, such as video editing to adjust audio and lighting levels. With a live video stream transmitted over the network, event producers can identify and resolve these quality issues before the event begins.

More Live Broadcasts in More Areas

“This event confirmed that we can produce similar live broadcasts from any location where a 1-Mbps Internet connection is available, which is almost anywhere,” says Wolfenden. “This capability makes it much easier for company executives to deliver live presentations because employees won’t need to travel and the executives do not need to be located at a broadcast studio or other facility with a high-bandwidth network connection.”

With this solution, Wolfenden expects that Cisco Corporate Communications will share many more intercontinental and regional events that were not broadcast to employees before, allowing more news to reach more employees more often.

For More Information

Cisco on Cisco
Cisco IT Streaming Video for Corporate Events Case Study
Cisco IT Remote Access VPN Solution Case Study