Gill, Jennings & Every Case Study

 

JKC video conference system improves communications at GJE

When Gill, Jennings & Every decided to install video conferencing capability JKC was appointed to specify and install a system that reflected the firm's position as a leading Patent and Trade Mark Attorney dealing primarily in the high technology sector.

Leading the way

Founded in 1912, Gill Jennings & Every (GJE) is one of the leading firms of Patent and Trade Mark Attorneys in Europe, handling patent, design and trade mark rights throughout the world with offices in the City of London, Cambridge, Munich and Alicante.

Always at the forefront of the industry it serves, GJE played a leading role in establishing the Patents County Court and in assisting the development of the European Patent Organisation (EPO) and the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM). The firm is now involved in field trials of electronic filing (e-filing) systems for the EPO and the UK Trade Mark Registry, having completed the first electronic filing of a UK Trade Mark in December 2001.

Improving communications with JKC

GJE decided to investigate video conferencing facilities to enable the partners to set up high quality communications between staff in its own offices and its customers around the world. Another important requirement was to set up conferences directly with the Patent Office.

The company approached JKC, to whom they were recommended by a third party, and after preliminary meetings, representatives from GJE and JKC visited Review Video in Reading, a company that is a major distributor of video conferencing equipment and peripherals and a prime supplier to JKC.

This meeting included a demonstration of the concept of video conferencing and the features of the various systems on offer. After this, the considerable combined experience of JKC and Review Video was made available to GJE and the company's specific requirements were discussed in fine detail.

Going for gold

The outcome of these deliberations was that JKC and Review Video jointly recommended that the Aethra Vega Star Gold Split was the best system for the job. The main reasons for this choice were that the Gold system has the highest bandwidth available at both ISDN and IP and it also has potentially the largest Multi Point Control Unit available. These were important factors to GJE because they provide the best possible call quality while allowing for future expansion.

Using the Gold unit as its hub, the peripherals chosen for the video conference room were a Panasonic 42in Plasma Screen, a 60in Smartboard Benq 8230 Projector, an Elmo 5500XG Visual Presenter and a Samsung DVD/VCR machine.

Setting the scene in the right environment

After further detailed discussions between JKC engineers, the project team at GJE and several third party suppliers, plans for the AV installation in the main video conference room were finalised.

The Smartboard and projector, in conjunction with some of the VGA splitters and switchers, can be used independently of the video conferencing equipment to give the room the capability of being both a full function conferencing suite and a presentation facility. Similarly, the DVD/VCR is able to send footage to the far end and can also be utilised for direct presentations. In addition, the integration of this unit ensures that a recording of the conferences is available for future use.

To provide a clean, modern, aesthetically pleasing appearance all cables in the room were, where possible, entirely concealed.

A team effort

John Cooper, managing director of JKC explains the company's teamwork ethic saying: "As is typical with a JKC installation we worked closely with the customer to understand the system requirement in fine detail and with Review Video to ensure the equipment chosen would deliver the required result."

"We then worked with GJE and all the contractors at every stage of the installation of the conference room to ensure that it met all aspects of their requirement."

Working the system

Although it is still early days, the partners, staff and customers of GJE are already reaping the benefit of the new video conferencing system. GJE is now linked to other patent attorneys throughout the world and a call has been made to Munich for a 'hearing'. Board meetings are already now held without the time wasting travel that was previously required.