Videoconf. Will Bolster Travel.

<FONT SIZE="+3"><B> Videoconf. Will Bolster Travel</B>

By Jay Campbell

Although studies continue to show that videoconferencing use is going up, travel managers still agree with the conventional wisdom that videoconferencing does not replace a significant amount of business travel-and could even stimulate it.

A recent <I>Institutional Investor</I> survey of 1,600 CFOs found that one-third of them expect to have audio or videoconferencing on their PCs within the next two to three years. In addition, the latest Boeing market study projects that videoconferencing will substitute for 3 percent of air travel by 2015.

However, the Boeing study also indicates that videoconferencing stimulates economic relationships whose geographic reach could counterbalance the 3 percent reduction.

Eric Boulter, manager of business services for Pepsi, said his company's use of videoconferencing has gone from zero instances in 1993 to 320 in 1995-but travel has continued to grow throughout that time.

"I'm finding that it doesn't take the place of travel, but it enhances it," Boulter said. "It's an additional tool, and we're using it more each year. You're often talking to people you're already familiar with, people with whom you may not need to establish a personal rapport or warmth."

Boulter said videoconferencing is a helpful tool in managing travel dollars: Pepsi's system has just about paid for itself by eliminating less important trips. Boulter could not quantify the savings, noting that while many of the videoconferences replace would-be trips, others essentially are enhanced telephone calls that would not have required travel anyway.

Realizing savings through videoconferencing depends on what the company determines is the right type of communication for the purpose, said Walter Freedman, chairman of desktop video consulting company ViewNet.

"For example, I'm in the service business," said Freedman. "I want my employees to call on customers, and I'm less interested in having them meet internally. In such cases, it's more cost-efficient to use a desktop PC tool; it allows for more time to be spent out there talking to customers."

This is one way in which such technology can stimulate business travel, or at the very least bring more value to the dollar spent.

Wallace Haislip, vice president of companywide procurement for Scientific Atlanta, said that while using videoconferencing for internal activities has reduced travel, "you don't want to use it with customers." Haislip said videoconferencing might affect an air budget of $20 million by $100,000 to $200,000, which he said was "very small."

Bill Lepley, director of travel for Cox Enterprises Inc., said that even for some internal meetings, "I think you really need the one-on-one between employees and upper management. But maybe videoconferencing would be useful to get a message out to your sales force."

Nancy Godfrey, manager of travel administration for Chevron, said videoconferencing at her company hasn't turned out to be cost effective. "Our program met with limited success," she said. "We couldn't seem to get the price down. It is an effective tool, though, in certain situations.