| Founded | In 2003, Austin, Texas |
|---|---|
| Founder(s) | Craig Malloy |
| Headquarters | Austin, Texas, USA |
| Key people | Craig Malloy, Founder & CEO[1] Michael Lovell, Chief Financial Officer Casey King, Chief Technology Officer |
| Products |
LifeSize Desktop |
| Owner(s) | Logitech |
| Employees | 400+ |
| Website | LifeSize |
LifeSize, a division of Logitech, is a video and audio telecommunications company in the United States which provides high definition videoconferencing endpoints and accessories, infrastructure products and a cloud-based video collaboration platform. LifeSize's worldwide headquarters is located in Austin, Texas. Its Europe-Middle East-Africa regional office is located in Munich, Germany and its Asia-Pacific regional office is located in Singapore.
In 2009, Logitech acquired LifeSize for US$405 million in cash. LifeSize then became "LifeSize, a division of Logitech," but continued to operate as a separate division led by Craig Malloy as its Chief Executive Officer.[2]
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Craig Malloy, its chief executive officer in 2009, was a product manager at VTEL Corporation in Austin until 1996, when he left and founded ViaVideo. ViaVideo was acquired by Polycom in 1998. Malloy was the senior vice president and general manager of the Video Communication Division of Polycom through 2002, when he left to found his own high definition video telecommunications company.
LifeSize was founded by Craig Malloy and Michael Kenoyer in January 2003. It operated in “stealth mode” under the name KMV Technologies from 2003 to 2005. Investors in LifeSize included Redpoint Ventures, Sutter Hill Ventures, Pinnacle Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners and Tenaya Capital.[3] The company name change to LifeSize Communications was unveiled at the Interop trade show in Las Vegas, Nevada in May 2005. This is also when LifeSize announced its first product, LifeSize Room, which was the first high definition video conferencing endpoint brought to market.[4]
LifeSize focuses the technology on replicating face-to-face communications through high definition videoconferencing, often called telepresence. LifeSize product stable includes high definition endpoints and accessories, NAT\firewall traversal, audio phones, ISDN gateways, Multipoint Control Units and management systems, as well as mobile videoconferencing software and a cloud-based IaaS offering for video conferencing. LifeSize also offers a streaming, recording, and auto-publishing server called LifeSize Video Center.[5] LifeSize has partnered with various other technology companies, including Alcatel-Lucent, Avaya, Inc., BroadSoft, Inc., Microsoft, ShoreTel, Inc., Siemens, Skype and VBrick Systems.[6]
Rather than people traveling in order to have a meeting, it is now commonplace to instead use a telepresence system, which uses single or multiple video codec systems. Each member or party of the meeting uses a telepresence room to 'dial in' and can both see and talk to every other member on a video screen as if they were in the same room. This allows time and cost benefits. It can also be superior to telephone conferences, as the visual aspect enhances non-verbal communication, allowing for perceptions of facial expressions and other body language.
LifeSize videoconferencing codecs have the following features:[7]
LifeSize operates through channel partners, with more than 1,500 partners in over 100 countries worldwide.[8] Potential customers find a local partner through the LifeSize website's "Find a Partner" section, and any purchases of LifeSize systems is made through the channel.
LifeSize videoconferencing is used by a wide array of customers, from worldwide enterprises down to small businesses, and across several industries (education, financial services, manufacturing, design, government, technology, retail, health care, construction, real estate, public utilities, legal services, arts organizations, nonprofits, transportation, media and entertainment).
Some LifeSize customers are: