BEIRUT, Lebanon, 29th June 2012 - Cisco hosted last week "The New Collaboration Experience" event for its customers in Lebanon. The event unveiled new ways to collaborate in this post-PC world that is mobile, social, visual and virtual.

Cisco demonstrated to its customers how the Cisco Collaboration Solutions can improve customer experiences to help accelerate innovation and improve decision making while fostering a culture of collaboration via Unified Communications: Delivering the next wave of collaborative workspaces in the modern post-pc era; Customer Collaboration: Execution and Innovation- Driving to Leadership in Customer Collaboration; Telepresence: Delivering on the Promise of Video Everywhere; Collaborative Workspace Applications: Developing the Next Wave of Productivity.

Bring Your Own Device "BYOD" trend was also addressed thoroughly during the event. The influx of technology innovations has resulted in a notable shift in employee attitudes across the workplace environment. In allowing workers to bring their personal devices into the workplace, the term BYOD has come to inspire a new debate occurring in various industries. For example, with mobility and device use on the rise, a recent Cisco survey of over 600 IT leaders cited that by 2014, the average worker will interact with 3.3 connected devices, up from an average of 2.8 in 2012. What's more, the survey found that BYOD is merely the "tip of the iceberg" when it comes to gaining the full benefits of mobility. Over three-fourths (76%) of IT leaders surveyed categorized BYOD as somewhat or extremely positive for their organizations, while also acknowledging the need for new technology solutions to address emerging security threats and IT support requirements for multiple mobile platforms.

Fadi Moubarak, General Manager, Cisco Lebanon said: "We've listened to our customers in Lebanon and significantly advanced Jabber and WebEx to enable seamless experiences on a range of devices and platforms, whether on premises or in the cloud. This approach further accelerates our strategic goal of enabling "any-to-any" collaboration while also making it easier than ever to collaborate with people inside or outside of an organization. In a post-PC era, businesses need ways to extend mobile, social, video and virtual collaboration on any mobile phone, Virtual Desktop, tablet or Internet-connected device. We are bringing that to life today. "

During the event, Cisco unveiled the next phase of its Virtualization Experience Infrastructure (VXI), an IT system that was designed to simplify desktop virtualization and bring voice and video to the virtual workspace. Cisco VXI helps enterprises to take advantage of the financial, data security and workforce flexibility benefits offered by desktop virtualization, with the ability to integrate rich media and video collaboration capabilities to create next generation workspaces.

Cisco also unveiled the next generation of Cisco WebEx. From HD video advancements and enhanced mobile capabilities that enable all new ways to engage prior, during and after a meeting, Cisco WebEx is helping to change the meeting experience. Additionally, Cisco is extending cloud conferencing to more people with a new free basic edition of WebEx® designed for three people or less.

The advancements Cisco is introducing --from Cisco WebEx Connect® to Cisco Jabber™ -- can change how people meet utilizing expanded on-premise and cloud-based services, and can give workers an easy way to collaborate directly from any device, driving new levels of business productivity and competitiveness.

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For further information please contact:
Cisco
Jumana Akkawi
+971 4 3907983
jakkawi@cisco.com