I recently spoke with Brett McAteer the Vice President of Marketing at IPeak Networks who told me about their new Internet Performance & Quality platform (IPQ), which reduces packet loss for telepresence and videoconferencing.  The solutions places a simple to install IPQ device between the telepresence or videoconferencing endpoint and the router.  The IPQ device, when packet loss is detected, begins splitting up the packets into segments and injecting redundancy information into different segment which allows the IPQ box on the other side to reconstruct the packets even if some segments are lost.
The benefit for telepresence and videoconferencing network managers is the ability to run packet-loss sensitive TP & VTC traffic over best-effort networks like the Internet and to connect with business partners, vendors, and customers over the Internet for inter-company business.  If both companies are running IPQ then the data stream is automatically protected when connecting to disparate organizations. 

Most enterprise organizations would require a large capacity 100MBps IPQ Concentrator fronting their MCU and other video network infrastructure.  Any telepresence or videoconferencing endpoints that could use a quality improvement when connecting over the internet or disparate networks where packet loss was an issue would receive a low cost IPQ Network Appliance which can be shipped out and easily installed by anyone with two hands and three neurons prior to an important videocall. Small organizations without video network infrastructure would simply require the lost cost appliance for each end-point.  

 
Caveats:  The IPeak IPQ solution does not protect against jitter and, like other forward-error correction solutions, increases the total amount of bandwidth required for the call as the redundancy information requires a larger data stream to carry. 

 
Wainhouse Research recently completed an evaluation of the IPeak IPQ technology in their Atlanta Test Lab to see how this unusual solution handled varying degrees of packet loss on a lossy IP network. Their published results: 

"The IPeak solution consistently (and automatically) reduced the packet loss received by each video system, in some cases by over 90%. This enabled WR to conduct successful video calls within our test facility at packet loss levels of up to 3%."



To facilitate this effort, IPeak provided WR with two (2) IPQ Network Appliances for use during the evaluation. WR installed the IPeak devices, alongside a number of video endpoints and infrastructure devices, within its Atlanta test lab. WR then conducted two rounds of test calls between the installed systems while inserting increasing levels of packet loss. During the first round of test calls, which WR refers to as the baseline tests, the IPQ technology was disabled. During the second round of calls, the IPQ technology was enabled.

Throughout the testing, WR was impressed by the performance of the IPQ technology. The solution consistently (and automatically) reduced the packet loss received by each video system, in some cases by over 90%. This enabled WR to conduct successful video calls within our test facility at packet loss levels of up to 3%. Based on these findings, WR believes this technology to be well suited for organizations conducting (or looking to conduct) IP videoconferencing sessions over lossy networks - especially those organizations with multi-vendor deployments."

Download the Complete Wainhouse Report Here: http://ipeaknetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/Wainhouse-Research-IPQ-Evaluation-Report.pdf