Vidyo

Vidyo, Inc.
Private (venture funded)
Industry Telepresence, Videoconferencing
Founded 2005
Headquarters Hackensack, New Jersey
Key people
 CEO: Eran Westman
Products Personal Telepresence systems, video conferencing endpoints & infrastructure, technology licensing
Number of employees
 300+
Website www.vidyo.com

Vidyo, Inc. is a privately held, venture-funded company that provides both software-based technology and product-based visual communication solutions. The company’s VidyoConferencing solutions are the first in the videoconferencing industry to take advantage of the H.264 standard for video compression, Scalable Video Coding (SVC).[1]

Vidyo’s implementation of this technology enables high definition, low-latency, error resilient, multipoint video communication to both desktop[2] and room system end points across general purpose IP networks.[3]

Vidyo is well known for its implementation in Gmail's video and phone calls.[4] Vidyo is being used for Hangouts feature.

History

Vidyo was born of Ofer Shapiro’s [5] dissatisfaction with the complexity and limitations inherent in traditional video conferencing over IP networks. Shapiro spent eight years at Radvision, where he was responsible for the development of the first IP video conferencing bridge and programmable gatekeeper technology.[6] After leaving Radvision in early 2004, he spent some time thinking about how video conferencing networks could be improved. Packet loss and latency that accompanies general purpose IP networks posed significant challenges to the existing systems. Costly dedicated networks and expensive Multipoint Control Units (MCU), which exacerbated delay due to transcoding or forced all endpoints to conform to the least common denominator endpoint quality, were the only solutions the industry had to offer at that time. He realized that to take advantage of state of the art H.264 compression technology, the fundamental technology behind video conferencing systems had to change and a new system design was required. Mr. Shapiro’s efforts resulted in a paradigm shift for the video conferencing industry - a new system architecture. The solution was based upon Scalable Video Coding (SVC) which allowed for error resiliency which was absent in monolithic encoding schemes that were common throughout the industry.[7] Implementation of SVC for only some system components offered little value. The full benefit of SVC required re-designing both the endpoint (client) and MCU (server), a costly and time consuming proposition for incumbent providers of video conferencing systems. Unencumbered by a legacy product line, Mr. Shapiro took his ideas and developed a new architecture in which the MCU was replaced with a low cost router and all of the encoding and decoding was done at the end points.

At the end of 2004, Mr. Shapiro took his concept and architecture to investors and started raising money to form an organization to develop it. During this process, he met Avery More[8] in early 2005. With Mr. More’s advice and support, Mr. Shapiro brought his plans to venture capital firms Sevin Rosen Funds and Star Ventures. Layered Media (the original name for Vidyo) secured its seed funding in April 2005, led by Mr. Jon Bayless[9] of Sevin Rosen Funds. Mr. Shapiro quickly went to work assembling a veteran team of technology leaders in video compression, transmission and conferencing.

By October 2005, the organization secured its first round of financing from its venture partners. Operating in stealth mode through the beginning of 2007, Shapiro’s team had created a video conferencing solution with HD quality video, that effectively addressed the interactivity inhibiting delay common in legacy systems, and enabled every end point to send and receive at quality levels they were capable of, irrespective of the other endpoints involved in the meeting and the network to which it is connected. Layered Media licensed its technology to its first OEM customers early in 2007.

In June 2007 Layered Media secured series B funding,[10][11] with Rho Ventures joining in to lead the round. Shortly after Layered Media changed its name to Vidyo, Inc.

By the beginning of 2008, Vidyo emerged from stealth mode with a product solution offering for the enterprise market and an annual licensing price model which lowered the start up cost barrier for organizations looking to implement a video conferencing solution.[12]

In the first quarter of 2009, Vidyo raised another round of funding, led by Menlo Ventures joining Rho Ventures, Sevin Rosen Funds, and Star Ventures.[13]

In early April 2010, the company announced another $25 million from their Series C round of financing, bringing the total amount of capital raised by the company to $63 million since its founding in 2005. All existing investors, Menlo Ventures, Rho Ventures, Sevin Rosen Funds and Star Ventures, participated in the round, which was led by Four Rivers Group.

In May 2010, Vidyo launched its Software Development Kit (SDK), enabling developers to build multipoint video conferencing applications into Android and Moblin-based smart phones and tablets running Intel Atom Processor Z6xx series-based platforms (formerly Moorestown) and on ARM processor-based platforms.

In June 2010, at Infocomm in Las Vegas, Vidyo demonstrated the first videoconferencing system to attain 1440p (decode), at 2560 x 1440p resolution, in an HD multiparty video conference via general purpose IP networks.

A few days later, the company announced a partnership [14] with HP to expand the HP Halo portfolio to include conference room and desktop endpoints that run on enterprise networks.

In March 2016, Vidyo integration was added to KioWare Kiosk System Software, creating a video conferencing kiosk solution.[15]

Products

Video-chat service for Nintendo's Wii U video game console was co-developed with Vidyo, Nintendo European Research & Development and Nintendo Software Technology. VidyoRouter is an appliance that performs the packet-switching function. The VidyoPortal is a Web-based environment used to access and manage the VidyoConferencing system and accounts respectively from anywhere with Internet Access. VidyoDesktop is a software-based endpoint, managed via VidyoPortal, and is able to support HD quality video. HD-200 is a High Definition room system endpoint. The HD-100 is an entry level High Definition room system endpoint. Both of these products are managed by the VidyoPortal and interoperate with VidyoDesktop users.

VidyoGateway is an appliance used to connect legacy video conferencing systems with the VidyoConferencing network. The VidyoCampus Program is used by colleges and universities to deploy high-definition (HD) VidyoConferencing to every desktop throughout their collaboration community. It offers single-site licenses that cover bundles of VidyoRouter appliances, VidyoRouter multi-point conferencing port software licenses, VidyoPortal seat software licenses, and VidyoDesktop client downloads. VidyoHealth is a scalable high-definition telemedicine solution that uses the public Internet and existing general purpose IP networks at medical facilities to enable doctor-patient and doctor-doctor interactions.

References

  1. ↑ Interview with Dr.Thomas Wiegand on SVC
  2. ↑ Doug Bojack, "Finally, Desktop Video Conferencing in HD," Technology Intelligence, November 14, 2008
  3. ↑ Vidyo, Inc.
  4. ↑ Vidyo Powers Google Video Chat, Gets Patent — Tech News and Analysis. Gigaom.com. Retrieved on 2013-11-21.
  5. ↑ Vidyo Management Profiles
  6. ↑ Ofer Shapiro, ITU-T Standards Modification Request, February 1997
  7. ↑ Andrew W. Davis,"One on One with Layered Media CEO Ofer Shapiro," The Wainhouse Research Bulletin, Vol.7#31, August 31, 2006
  8. ↑ Eureka Ventures Profiles
  9. ↑ Jon Bayless Profile
  10. ↑ Vidyo Series B Funding Press Release
  11. ↑ Heather Clancy, "Meet Via Video," Entrepreneur.com, December 2008
  12. ↑ Andrew W. Davis,"Vidyo Emerges from Stealth Mode," The Wainhouse Research Bulletin, Vol.9#4, January 31, 2008
  13. ↑ Andrew R. Hickey, "Vidyo Secures $15M in Funding," Channel Web, March 5, 2009
  14. ↑ HP: Vidyo Alliance Previews Major Video Channel Offensive
  15. ↑ http://www.kioware.com/resources.aspx?resID=89&title=Video%20Conferencing%20Kiosks
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