prawling international law firm DLA Piper has up-
graded from videoconferencing to telepresence, 
which will save the firm nearly $1 million per year in 
reduced travel costs and lost productivity. The conferencing 
gear that simulates across-the-table meetings has “a provable 
and achievable return on investment over five years, and may 
actually pay for itself before then,” says Don Jaycox, CIO of 
DLA Piper U.S. 
 This involves an “immersive video experience,” or tech-
nology that provides high-end, high-definition visual and 
audio communications in a completely integrated environ-
ment. The goal is to make anyone involved in these meet-
ings feel as if they’re actually in the room with the other 
meeting participants, regardless of where everyone is physi-
cally based. 
 “Rescheduling half the firm’s in-person board meetings 
as telepresence conferences and relying on at least two at-
torneys per week to use telepresence rather than travel ac-
counts for significant savings when lost productivity for 
travel time is factored in,” says Jaycox. 
 “If I look at my total telepresence project cost, which 
includes equipment, room construction, implementation 
services, maintenance contract, financing costs, etc., then 
amortize that over the expected five-year life of the system, 
it works out to be just a hair under $500,000 per year for our 
six U.S. sites,” he says. “Our early experience suggests that a 
more accurate number of avoided trips is closer to four or 
five per week, so the $970,000 projection almost certainly 
underestimates our actual savings,” he notes. 
 The sites were selected so they put 80 percent of the at-
torneys within a one-hour drive of a telepresence room