SightSpeed keeps the talkin’ smooth – Berkeley company touts real-time, high-quality video conferencing

A CORNELL University professor says we don’t need to grasp everything in our field of vision to comprehend an image. Just 80 percent of it. On the basis of this and other insights gained after professor Toby Berger’s seven years of laboratory research, a Berkeley company has developed a smoothly perceived, real-time video experience to enhance a two-way conversation over a broadband Internet connection.

By Francine Brevetti, BUSINESS WRITER Oakland Tribune

"We are the first that does real-time, full-motion, high-quality video," for Internet-enabled collaborations and meetings, SightSpeed’s Chief Executive Officer Brad Treat said.

SightSpeed also has been literally tested in the field. Aaron Blake of the U.S. Geological Survey in Sacramento works with a dispersed group of biologists studying salmon migration. When he wants to share the complex figures and three-dimensional drawings that are common in his work, he picks up the camera and aims it at the object so his long-distance colleague can appreciate it.

The scientist expressed frustration with the "standard video conferencing" he has experienced in meetings and training sessions. Typically, such systems cut in and out; and, "Can you see me now?" is the standard refrain, he grumbled.

However, Blake said he has come to rely on SightSpeed.

"I’ve been using (SightSpeed) to collaborate," to write papers and give talks and to coordinate research efforts, he said.

Any desktop or laptop computer with a broadband connection — wireless or standard — regular audio and an off-the-shelf Web cam that sits atop the monitor can empower SightSpeed.

Treat encountered the technology when he was studying for his master’s degree at Cornell. Developed by Toby Berger, professor of virtual statistics and computer engineering at Cornell and a SightSpeed director, the technology captures only that visual information that is required for the brain to identify an object, mostly its edges and its shape. On the other hand, standard video technology compresses all the data of the visual stream.

Since SightSpeed tailors the stream of images for the human eye rather than the computer, Treat said, "We perceive its video as smooth and full-motion."

"There’s no herky-jerky," he said.

Currently, the software can be downloaded for free. Soon the 11-man company will introduce three tiers of pricing based on usage as it goes after the corporate marketplace.

E. Brent Kelly, an analyst with Wainhouse Research, found the software loaded perfectly and played easily. He called "the video quality surprising quite good. … and perfectly synched from audio."

He observed that SightSpeed’s product was targeting the same market as Pleasanton-based Polycom’s product meant for the desktop rather than a conference room. The difference is that Polycom’s video compression is in its branded camera, which the customer must buy, unlike SightSpeed’s technology, which can be accessed with off-the-shelf Web cams.

But Kelly said that he felt SightSpeed’s technology lacked wide application because it does not allow a means for sharing data.

"It turns out that data is pretty important," the analyst said. "That’s what your meetings are about. There are a number of Web conferencing (products) where both audio and data more important, and video is secondary."

Kelly said SightSpeed would do best by finding niches such as applications for the deaf or translation services.

While acknowledging the opportunity in niche markets, Treat chafed at relegating the technology to niche markets. And he didn’t consider his company as competing with Web or video conferencing companies such as Polycom, WebEx or PlaceWare.

"They’re office collaboration (products)," he said. "We are in real-time see and hear. We’re like (instant messaging) with video. We are as easy to use as IM but with quality reserved for board room solutions."

Treat defended the technology’s lack of incorporating text, observing that many established ways of sharing text such as IM or e-mail are already used with SightSpeed.

IDC’s Robert Mahowald, senior research analyst, agreed that SightSpeed has "compelling" technology. If it outperforms Polycom’s desktop solution, that would be "an innovation," the analyst said. However, "It may find itself overpowered by the behemoths such as Microsoft and others that are coming out with their own collaboration tools with voice over and video IP," the IDC analyst said.

Microsoft recently acquired PlaceWare and renamed it Live Meeting.

The Berkeley startup may benefit from the rising awareness of high-quality video, Mahowald said, but a customer would be more likely to go "with a best of breed vendor rather than one not integrated with data."

http://www.oaklandtribune.com/Stories/0,1413,82~10834~1564034,00.html