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Polycom Appoints Two Industry Veterans to Lead Engineering Innovations to Drive Mass Adoption of Polycom(R) RealPresence(TM) Video Collaboration(Marketwire Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) PLEASANTON, CA -- (MARKET WIRE) -- 01/31/12 -- Polycom, Inc. (NASDAQ: PLCM), the global leader in standards-based unified communications (UC), today announced the appointments of two senior engineering executives, Rick Levenson and A.E. Natarajan, who together bring 50+ years of experience to Polycom, to further drive video collaboration adoption through innovations in the Polycom® RealPresence™ Platform and a wide range of video-enabled devices. Levenson and Natarajan will report to Sudhakar Ramakrishna, executive vice president and general manager of UC solutions and chief development officer. Levenson will lead the "UC Devices" engineering team, responsible for designing and delivering amazing user experiences for RealPresence video collaboration solutions in healthcare, education, government, manufacturing, and other industries. The team will design user experiences across various environments (on the road, at home, at work, in conference rooms or immersive theatres) and devices (smart phones, tablets, laptops, desktops, and office and room systems). Natarajan will lead Polycom's RealPresence Platform engineering efforts, focusing on platform infrastructure that spans UC environments from the enterprise to the cloud. The Polycom RealPresence Platform is the most comprehensive software infrastructure for universal video collaboration, and delivers the industry's only universal bridging software that supports up to 75,000 device registrations and 25,000 concurrent sessions. "Polycom believes in pushing the greatness of human collaboration forward by making video collaboration simple to use and available to everyone through open, standards-based software -- delivered on-premises or from the cloud -- that connects people securely across any network, protocol, application or device they want to use. A key part of our strategy is to drive the network effect for video collaboration in new and emerging markets such as social, mobile, and cloud-delivered video," said Ramakrishna. "A.E. and Rick bring a wealth of experience in managing large development teams and projects, in areas such as software development, mobility, infrastructure, and the cloud, and they join an engineering team that is one of high-tech's most formidable innovation engines. Together with our existing engineering leadership, we expect A.E. and Rick to continue to create game-changing technologies that bring secure video collaboration to more people, places, devices, and use cases as the best way to collaborate with anyone from anywhere." Polycom has more than 800 patents issued or pending worldwide and has received over 100 awards for excellence. Polycom innovations in audio, visual, touch-screen, and networking technologies have set the standard for delivering an exceptionally easy-to-use and lifelike video collaboration experience that improves engagement and productivity. Rick Levenson, Group Vice President - UC DevicesLevenson, a software and human factors expert, has extensive experience in a wide variety of environments, from nascent start-ups through large industry research labs, running organizations in Europe, Asia, and across the U.S. Levenson joins Polycom from Microsoft's Speech Cloud Services team and was formerly SVP of products at Tellme Networks (acquired by Microsoft in 2007). Levenson has also held key engineering roles at Sun Microsystems (including JavaSoft), Xerox PARC and Openwave. He is co-inventor on issued patents related to video-enhanced, digital communications toolkits, and managed organizations that have filed dozens of patents (25 issued). Levenson holds a bachelor's degree in Theoretical Mathematics from U.C. Berkeley, and a master's degree in Computer Science from Stanford University. "I've spent most of my career at the intersection of technology and human communications, and I'm excited to join Polycom, a company that is focused on communications and collaboration," said Levenson. "I thrive in industries that are evolving and growing, and I look forward to creating technologies at Polycom that change people's everyday lives." A.E. Natarajan, Group Vice President - RealPresence Platform & SolutionsNatarajan joins Polycom from Cisco Systems, where he was a vice president of engineering, leading a large team of engineers across several geographies, and helping to grow several multi-billion dollar product lines. He is an expert in enterprise IT, service provider networking, internetworking, and security, with more than 20 years of industry experience. Natarajan has also worked at Novell and several start-ups, and is a recognized industry evangelist for driving many standards in networking and information security. Natarajan holds a bachelor's degree in Electrical and Electronics from University of Madras, and a master's degree from the Indian Institute of Technology in Madras. "There are significant market transformations occurring with video and cloud today, both in the enterprise and with service providers," said Natarajan. "Polycom has an excellent leadership team and engineering talent pool, and I'm excited to join this winning team and help Polycom capitalize on this transformation." About PolycomPolycom is the global leader in standards-based unified communications (UC) solutions for telepresence, video, and voice, powered by the Polycom RealPresence platform. The RealPresence platform interoperates with the broadest range of business, mobile and social applications and devices. More than 400,000 organizations trust Polycom solutions to collaborate and meet face to face from any location for more productive and effective engagement with colleagues, partners, customers and prospects. Polycom, together with its broad partner ecosystem, provides customers with the best TCO, scalability, and security -- on-premises, hosted or cloud delivered. Visit www.polycom.com or connect with Polycom on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Forward Looking StatementsThis release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 regarding future events, future demand for our products, anticipated growth, and the future performance of the Company, including statements regarding Polycom driving the network effect of video and creating game-changing technology. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially, including the impact of competition on our product sales and for our customers and partners; the impact of increased competition due to consolidation in our industry or competition from companies that are larger or that have greater resources than we do; potential fluctuations in results and future growth rates; risks associated with general economic conditions and external market factors; the market acceptance of our products and changing market demands, including demands for differing technologies or product and services offerings; our ability to successfully integrate our acquisitions into our business; possible delays in the development, availability and shipment of new products; increasing costs and differing uses of capital; changes in key personnel that may cause disruption to the business; any disruptive impact to us that may result from new executive hires; the impact of restructuring actions; and the impact of global conflicts that may adversely impact our business. Many of these risks and uncertainties are discussed in the Company's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2011, and in other reports filed by Polycom with the SEC. Polycom disclaims any intent or obligations to update these forward-looking statements. NOTE: The product plans, specifications, and descriptions herein are provided for information only and subject to change without notice, and are provided without warranty of any kind, express or implied. Polycom reserves the right to modify future product plans at any time. Products and related specifications referenced herein are not guaranteed and will be delivered on a when and if available basis. © 2012 Polycom, Inc. All rights reserved. POLYCOM®, the Polycom "Triangles" logo, and the names and marks associated with Polycom's products are trademarks and/or service marks of Polycom, Inc. and are registered and/or common law marks in the United States and various other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners. Add to Digg Bookmark with del.icio.us Add to Newsvine Press Contact: Shawn Dainas Polycom, Inc. 925.924.5676 [email protected] Source: Polycom, Inc. |