or
The Writing on the AV Wall
by Adrian Berry
As I wrote in an earlier note (Voice and Data Two point Oh), twenty years ago
there were two essentially separate industries involved in getting electronic
information from point 'A' to point 'B'. A certain large data company in Armonk,
NY, was so impressed with a certain PBX manufacturing company that they bought
it and started to
push all of their customers to buy their new product. Although IBM eventually
admitted defeat and closed down their voice operation, the die had been cast.
And eventually the IT industry reinvented voice communication in their own
image: today we have VOIP, and the switched-circuit industry is relegated to
consumer and small-business telephone service for the arguably short balance of
it's life.
Now we have something else called 'Collaboration'. This very nebulous concept
covers just about anything that involves people comparing notes with each other,
and not always in the same room - or even on the same continent. It covers both
audio and video teleconferencing, computer conferencing, and even just sitting
around a meeting room table with a Powerpoint showing on the display. And as the
technology used for collaboration becomes more technologically advanced, the
line between what has been considered Information Technology and AV technology
becomes increasingly blurred.
Having observed the death (not to put too fine a point on it) of the Voice
industry first-hand, I am seeing the same signs where the AV industry is
concerned. And let's face it, the AV industry is nowhere near as formidable as
the Voice industry was - we have no AT&T, no Northern Telecom, no Alcatel. The
provision of products and services supporting Collaboration will, over the next
few years, be taken over by the companies providing network services in much the
same way that those firms now have Cisco telephone systems - a large number of
them already have videoconference installations referred to as "Cisco rooms".
There is even a note on Chief Manufacturing's website called "Setting
up a Telepresence Suite" which details how a Collaboration provider
has set up telepresence suites without
"..a sophisticated integrated audio system in here, special lighting, custom acoustical treatments, or anything else that really drives prices up.."
- in essence without an AV contractor.
We can already see the institutional market (nurse call systems, paging/public address,
school intercom) getting swallowed up by the security industry. The high-end
consumer industry may be around for a while, but as the large entertainment
providers move towards "full-service" (Internet/home phone/digital
TV/whole-house entertainment) this will downsize too. And as Meeting Room
systems become the responsibility of corporate IT departments, the hapless AV
contractor who still installs RGBHV switchers to switch VGA, and blames his
client's laptops because they need DDC information, will quickly find himself
losing customers to an IT-centric company who knows better. The industry conceit
that "it is easier to teach an AV guy data than to teach an IT guy AV" just
won't cut it. The AV industry, like the Voice industry before it, is being
remade in IT's image as we speak.
So what's left? There will be very small installations that can be handled by
the smallest of AV companies, or the larger box-sale stores that can do "hang 'n
bang". There will also be large venues such as churches, auditoriums and
stadiums that are essentially standalone systems - no need for Collaboration
here. And there will be the rental business for those companies already
established in that market. But any AV contractor who's core business is the
corporate installation market has a severely limited lifespan.
The writing is on the wall.
