Cisco announced the Cisco Virtual Office, a solution which allows businesses to extend their enterprise and productivity by bringing the office to employees who regularly work in a variety of remote settings.
The networking solution packages routing, switching, security, wireless, IP telephony, and policy control technology into a centrally managed solution that provides secure video, voice, data and wireless service.
The solution has a “zero-touch” setup, making the setup automated and pre-configured. It also offers management servers for policy, identity, and configuration.
Video conferencing is fast becoming the trend to help companies reduce their carbon footprints.
A recent survey conducted by InterCall shows that more than half of the respondents’ companies are providing conferencing tools to cutback on travels.
BT claims to have reduced its carbon footprint by 97,000 tons of CO2 per year, that’s 15 percent of its CO2 use, by using phone conferences and videoconferencing to cut back on staff travel for meetings.
Deloitte is also turning to video conferencing to cut costs and carbon footprints.
Second Life may also have a future as a way for companies to reduce business travel.