Yorktel Inks Reseller Partnership With iRobot for Ava 500(R), the World's First Autonomous Video Collaboration Robot for the Enterprise

EATONTOWN, NJ--(Marketwired - Mar 17, 2014) - Yorktel (@Yorktelcorp), the worldwide leader in unified communications and collaboration (UCC), cloud, and video managed services, today announced that it is an official integrator and reseller of the iRobot Ava® 500, the first video collaboration robot that delivers high-definition industry-standard video, enterprise-grade security, and autonomous navigation to the enterprise market.

Ava 500 is a milestone innovation that combines the power of iRobot's mobile robotics platform with Cisco's telepresence expertise, ushering in an unprecedented era in visual communications and mobility. The robot provides the remote user with complete freedom of movement, physical presence, and an unparalleled experience of 'being there.' The easy to use, self-driven robot allows someone to immediately be anywhere in an organization (including offices, hallways, laboratories, and manufacturing lines) from anywhere in the world, reaching locations where fixed telepresence solutions are either impractical or unavailable.

Through this partnership, customers will benefit from Yorktel's deep integration, installation, monitoring, maintenance, and professional and managed services expertise. Also Yorktel's VideoCloud™ service platform complements Ava 500 by providing comprehensive interoperability with other systems.

For example, when operating on Yorktel's VideoCloud, Ava 500 allows multipoint conferencing, enabling several scientists to collaborate with colleagues during an experiment. Likewise, it allows a business executive to be joined by other team members, all using a variety of devices and operating systems, to remotely attend a meeting in a huddle room or other location. 

Ava 500 helps globally dispersed teams work more closely together without the need for costly and time-consuming travel, enabling increased collaboration between executives, managers, and employees. With iRobot's autonomous navigation, Ava 500 drives itself to selected destinations, all while safely maneuvering to avoid bumping into people and other objects.

"We are thrilled to be among the first few iRobot channel partners that are able to offer the iRobot Ava 500 to customers," said Ron Gaboury, Yorktel CEO. "Since our inception, we have operated on the cutting edge of video and collaboration technologies, and we believe video collaboration robots represent the next frontier of visual communications, applications and mobility. It is an honor to work with iRobot, an organization that shares our commitment to innovation."

"iRobot is excited to be working with Yorktel to bring Ava 500 to the enterprise market," said Youssef Saleh, senior vice president and general manager of iRobot's Remote Presence business unit. "This game-changing technology will play an important role in addressing a variety of business issues by unlocking new applications for telepresence."

Yorktel works with Fortune 500 enterprises and government agencies worldwide, and empowers its customers to realize the full potential of next-generation unified communications, video conferencing, media services, visual communications and collaboration. Professional services, management and support expertise, combined with proven best practices and cutting-edge technology, are the cornerstones of Yorktel's award-winning services, and how Yorktel makes complicated simple.

ABOUT YORKTEL
Yorktel is a leading global provider of UCC, cloud, and video managed services for large enterprise and federal government customers. Founded in 1985 and headquartered in New Jersey, with offices across the US, UK, and France. Yorktel enables customers to successfully integrate video into their operations -- from video conferencing to video event production; on premise or in the cloud. Yorktel designs, integrates, and manages enterprise-wide unified communications solutions.

For more information, visit Yorktel online at www.yorktel.com or email knowmore@yorktel.com. Follow Yorktel on Twitter: @yorktelcorp

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