Orange to launch Telepresence Community with Cisco

Orange Business Services is planning to boost its telepresence offerings

Orange is preparing to launch a Telepresence Community service which will offer enterprise customers access to some 800 telepresence locations.

The company is partnering with Cisco on a deal to offer access to Cisco's telepresence videoconferencing network for Orange Business Services customers. The service is currently in a trial mode, and will launch "in the near future".

Orange hopes that the deal will increase telepresence uptake and kick start an effort to sign interoperability deals with other service providers.

The company is offering a promotion which will allow Business Services customers free access to the Telepresence Community until March 2011.

"Opening our network and customer base to work with enterprises connected to other operators' networks will create a global video community," said Orange Business Services global communication service vice president Marc Blanchet.

"We aim to have at least three major interconnections in place before the end of the year, and will continue adding to the community as required by the demands of our growing customer base."

Orange is also planning to integrate its telepresence offerings into a complete hosted service to allow users to pay based on usage time.