Video is becoming a growing part of the human experience.

Indeed, Cisco’s (News - Alert) Visual Networking Index indicates that IP video will represent 79 percent of global traffic by 2018.

While we are all familiar with the consumer trends of Netflix binge-watching, disappearing SnapChat videos, and cat videos on YouTube (News - Alert), a much less discussed part of the video picture is how it’s impacting businesses. Nonetheless, many businesses are embracing video both for internal and external uses.

“As enterprises look at applications for video across marketing, corporate communications, and training, selecting the right technology platform is an important decision,” said Forrester (News - Alert), which defines video platforms as solutions that capture, manage, and deliver one-to-many live and on-demand IP video. “Video platforms empower application development and delivery pros with tools to set up enterprise-wide video publishing services, embed video in business applications, and distribute video efficiently in different network environments. Selecting the right platform allows AD&D pros to maximize their opportunity to apply video communications to achieve organizational objectives and enhance customer and employee experiences.”

Enterprise video platforms come in a wide range of varieties, as noted by February’s Forrester Wave report. That, of course, includes platforms like InXpo and On24 that focus on real-time collaboration and others like Kaltura and Ramp that allow for the creation and sharing of on-demand video via online portals. Some solutions like MediaPlatform and Qumu cater to corporate communications and training, and others like Brightcove and Ooyala take aim at marketing. But, according to Forrester, “the lines are blurring as vendors seek to become single solutions for comprehensive internal plus external video publishing and presentation needs.”

Some enterprise video solutions are also bringing analytics into the mix to enable companies to more easily gauge the value of and even monetize their video efforts.

Here’s a sampling of some of the players in the enterprise video arena.

23 Video offers a cloud video CMS that delivers unlimited videos for $675 a month.

In February, 23 Video launched Fashion Release in an effort to make it easier to create attractive and responsive video websites. The solution offers customizable templates for video campaigns for corporate communications and internal marketing. And organizations can tweak the templates to meet their needs by inserting their own logos, colors, and font selections.

Brightcove, meanwhile, sells cloud solutions for delivering and monetizing video across connected devices. Offering a suite of products and services that reduce the cost and complexity associated with publishing, distributing, measuring and monetizing video across devices, Brightcove has more than 5,500 customers in more than 70 countries. 

In February the company unveiled the new Brightcove Player

"Speed and performance are key elements of the new Brightcove Player," said Simon Jones, Vice President of Marketing at Conviva. “Brightcove’s technology combined with Conviva’s real-time big data processing platform will give publishers a prime opportunity to deliver an engaging TV-quality experience to their audiences.”

Telstra’s (News - Alert) Ooyala offers solutions in the video streaming, personalization, and analytics arena.

“Ooyala helps media companies build the largest possible audiences online, while Videoplaza [which Ooyala bought last year] helps them extract as much value as possible from that audience,” Ooyala CEO Jay Fulcher said. “Our combined platforms will offer a more holistic view of content and ad performance across a broadcaster’s entire business, including granular data on not only what, how and where people are watching, but also where and how they can make the most money.”

Kaltura, which Forrester says is the fastest growing video platform and the one with the widest use case and appeal, is deployed globally in thousands of enterprises, media companies, service providers and educational institutions.

“Video is rapidly replacing text as the preferred medium and data type,” Kaltura Chairman and CEO Ron Yekutiel said. “Organizations across all industries are being videofied with standalone video solutions such as video portals and webcasting systems, and by adding integrated video functionalities and workflows into their existing enterprise solutions, such as web and content management systems, social enterprise systems, marketing systems, human capital management systems.”