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In organizations across the country, the need for collaboration among audiovisual and information technology professionals is essential as remote monitoring and network collaboration continues to grow. The following article shows the key findings in a new research study by the International Communications Industries Association (ICIA), the trade association representing the professional audiovisual communications industry.
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| ICIA Sees Growing Need for AV/IT Collaboration |
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ICIA's September 2003 AV/IT Networking Survey of AV Managers polled AV professionals within large enterprises, specifically corporations, universities, government and healthcare. Fifty-four percent represented enterprises with 1,000 or more employees. More than half of the enterprises indicated that they have 20 or more installed systems and of those, 36 percent have 50 or more installed systems.
"Many IT professionals are recognizing the benefits of supporting their organization's AV systems over a network. Connectivity to a network is no longer a product feature in search of a problem, but is becoming an important buying decision in the deployment and ownership of AV systems,said Jody Thomas, CEO of Kayye Consulting and ICIA's IT Council Chairman. "Conferencing and other network-driven content applications are also helping to define the convergence between the AV system and IT infrastructure. |
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| Among the key findings of the ICIA survey: |
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IT plays an important role when integrating AV systems - IT specialists serve in a consulting capacity (32 percent) or a highly influential capacity (17 percent). IT specialists are playing a role in any decisions regarding devices that are in any way connected to their network. As these devices are becoming more network enabled, IT specialists' influence is becoming greater out of necessity.
IT supports AV systems - 35 percent of IT specialists play some role in supporting AV systems as consultants (17 percent) or with partial responsibility (18 percent). Anything that is attached to the network ultimately becomes the responsibility of IT specialists to support, to the extent that many companies are shifting the responsibility for AV under the IT umbrella. As their support role becomes greater, there is an upstream effect that they will become significantly more involved in future purchasing decisions of AV products.
Network connections serve multiple applications - 23 percent video/audio conferencing; 17 percent remote monitoring; 13 percent data collaboration; 13 percent remote trouble shooting; 8 percent security; 6 percent asset management; 6 percent PC-less presentations; 6 percent wireless presentations; 8 percent other.
AV managers value the network - Network connectivity is deemed an important feature by 60 percent of AV managers. AV managers also recognize that as these systems become more widely deployed, it makes their jobs easier to operate within a standards-based environment that is quickly and easily scalable and more readily supportable.
These survey results provide further validation of the AV/IT convergence trend. An ICIA survey of Independent Consultants in Audiovisual Technologies (ICAT) earlier this year showed that IT networks were a necessary component in over 80 percent of AV systems designs completed by ICAT firms in 2002. Consultants used an Ethernet network for AV systems control in over 47 percent of the projects, for IP-based videoconferencing in 31 percent of projects and for streaming in 11 percent of projects.
ICIA is also surveying AV manufacturers and professional AV dealers this fall, to get their views on the future of AV/IT networking and collaboration. A report summarizing the findings from all ICIA surveys will be available at www.infocomm.org later this fall.
ICIA's Market Intelligence program includes primary research, and also acts as a referral service to research conducted by market analyst partners. More information about this program is available under Market Intelligence at www.infocomm.org. |
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| About the AV Communications Industry |
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Educational facilities, government agencies, businesses, architectural firms and building owners rely on professionally designed, installed and produced AV systems for a variety of conferencing, communications, sales and advertising functions. The AV communications industry makes the technologies that support these functions possible, specifically the products and systems for visual display, audio production, interfacing and signal distribution, lighting, control systems, interactive display, remote video and web conferencing, as well as the cabling, connectors, and racks to tie them into a system. The AV industry interfaces with IT and telecommunications industries largely to transport the information that is presented using these AV technologies. AV solutions providers pursue ongoing training and development, including ICIA's highly respected education and certification programs, to stay up on the latest AV technologies
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| About ICIA |
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The International Communications Industries Association, Inc.® (ICIA®) is the premier trade association for the professional audiovisual communications industry. ICIA is the founder of InfoComm, the conference and trade exposition for audiovisual communications professionals who come to learn about the latest technologies and available services as well as new and alternative applications. ICIA serves its worldwide membership as the pre-eminent provider of education, training and certification.
ICIA and its foundation, the International Communications Industries Foundation, Inc.® (ICIF®) have established a new market intelligence program. The purpose of the program is to facilitate the process of finding relevant market information and increase the number of available market reports covering the AV industry.
More information about the AV industry and Spinitar can be found at www.spinitar.com and www.infocomm.org
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