HP unveils Skyroom video collaboration tool
SAN FRANCISCO—Looking to take advantage of tightened corporate travel budgets, Hewlett-Packard on Tuesday showed the latest tech to come out of its labs, called Skyroom. — Unveiled together with Intel at the start of the Intel Developer Forum here …
Context & Ripple Effects
Skyroom is HP's second act on a theme it has pushed since its 2007 technology showcase on connecting people to information wherever they are — this time aimed squarely at companies whose travel budgets have been cut. Unveiling it jointly with Intel at the opening of the Intel Developer Forum ties the product to the chipmaker's stage rather than HP's own.
The launch lands in a busy week for both partners: five days earlier HP added Marc Andreessen to its board, and at the same forum Intel announced its Atom Developer Program and app store for netbook-suited applications — giving the Skyroom announcement an ecosystem backdrop beyond a single product demo.
First-order effects
- HP positions Skyroom directly against corporate travel spend, selling collaboration software into accounts where finance teams are cutting trips — a demand-side wedge rather than a feature-led pitch.
- The joint Intel debut gives Skyroom visibility at IDF alongside Intel's developer push, aligning the tool with the netbook application pipeline Intel announced the same day.
Second-order effects
- Rivals in room-based and desktop video conferencing face pressure to answer at price points accessible to travel-squeezed mid-market buyers, not just premium telepresence suites.
- Intel benefits by seeding its new app store narrative with a marquee PC-maker collaboration, reinforcing its case that netbook-class silicon can host real productivity workloads.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, downturn-era travel cuts become the recurring trigger that pulls video collaboration out of executive boardrooms and into ordinary employee desktops, resetting buyer expectations for what remote meetings cost.
- Hardware-plus-software launches staged at partner events point toward collaboration becoming a bundled play between PC makers and silicon vendors rather than a standalone software category.
The trend: Economic pressure on corporate travel keeps converting video collaboration from a premium telepresence niche into a mainstream desktop category, with PC-and-chip partnerships setting the distribution path.