Deutsche Telekom AG is launching a consumer orientated video phone to the German public. Deutsche has signed a contract with Siemens AG’s Private Communications Systems Group, for 250,000 Integrated Services Digital Network integrated video phones that it claims will be the cheapest on the market. The T-view phones are built by Siemens, using Anaheim, California-based 8×8 Inc’s video communications processor chip and are to be sold for around $565. The phones are to be offered with extra video services, such as video-based information services, and Deutsche customer services. The video phone will interoperate with video conferencing systems, as it uses the video over ISDN protocol H.320, and the other video transmission standards H.324 and H.323. But the T-view phones are unlikely to take off outside Germany, because no other European country has a significant consumer base of ISDN installations. Germany has installed some 7 milllion ISDN lines in total.
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