Polycom Working with Macquarie Equipment Finance and GE Capital to Offer Access to Funding on Global Basis
SAN JOSE, Calif. – Oct. 30, 2012 – Polycom, Inc. (Nasdaq: PLCM), the global leader in open standards-based unified communications and collaboration (UC&C), today introduced a series of new customer financing options that put comprehensive, tailored UC&C solutions within reach of more customers. This comprehensive and flexible financing model helps free customers from the limitations of quarterly capital expense budgets, and allows more organizations to implement UC&C solutions that fully meet their needs. Polycom is leveraging Macquarie Equipment Finance’s global capabilities to provide customer financing solutions. In addition, through an arrangement with GE Capital, Polycom is offering its channel partners access to working capital aimed at lessening the burden of inventory carrying costs during customer implementations.
Offered through Polycom Capital, the new customer financing programs take an “all-in” approach by letting small and medium businesses (SMBs) and enterprises finance their Polycom RealPresence solutions and services, as well as their entire UC&C implementation. Polycom Capital has designed three programs to accommodate a variety of customer needs:
- 0% for 24 months. For organizations seeking no-interest financing over a shorter term, this option is available to all enterprises, service providers and SMBs, though smaller companies are likely to find it especially attractive.
- 2.99% for 36 months. This program is ideal for organizations seeking below-market, longer-term financing.
- Technology refresh financing. This financing program is for customers wanting the flexibility of upgrading to next-generation solutions without waiting until the end of the financing term. It provides organizations the option of refreshing their recent purchase at specific intervals within the term of the program, without financial penalties or fees.
“These new attractive financing options from Polycom Capital put unified communications and video collaboration solutions within reach of nearly any business, and we believe it will help us sell even more of the full product portfolio to our customers,” said Eric Brown, Polycom Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer. “In today’s market, we’re seeing strong interest from both customers and partners in Polycom Capital. With various payment options and the ability to finance everything – maintenance, installation, services, training and even non-Polycom accessories – Polycom Capital provides a very compelling value proposition for customers and partners.”
“We are excited to help Polycom offer its customers financing options so they can create comprehensive unified communications and collaboration solutions,” said Nicholas Holmes, global head of vendor programs for Macquarie Equipment Finance.
New Financing Options for Polycom Channel Partners
Polycom Capital is also working with GE Capital to provide Polycom channel partners access to working capital. The program provides partners with extended payment terms and higher credit lines for their purchases of Polycom products; this gives partners time to install Polycom products and services, and collect from customers before having to pay for their inventory. Depending on geography, payment terms can be as long as 90 days.Longer terms may be available for specific transactions.
“GE Capital is pleased to work with Polycom and its global reseller network to provide the working capital financing necessary to meet the needs of its resellers,” said Tom Grathwohl, senior managing director of global and structured solutions of GE Capital, Commercial Distribution Finance.
Polycom channel reseller partners are part of the Polycom Partner Network, an extensive ecosystem of channel and alliance partners that embrace and extend Polycom’s open, standards-based video collaboration solutions. Together, Polycom and its partners deliver the most complete video collaboration solutions available to more than 415,000 Polycom customers.
The new customer and channel financing programs give customers and partners access to the full portfolio of RealPresence video collaboration solutions – including all the new next-generation RealPresence solutions announced in early October (see the related press release) – from video software for mobile devices, PCs and laptops; to group systems and executive desktops; to immersive theaters; to practitioner carts for the healthcare industry. The portfolio is powered by the Polycom® RealPresence® Platform, the most comprehensive and interoperable UC&C infrastructure for universal video collaboration, which provides robust provisioning, management, scalability, reliability, flexibility and security. In early October, Polycom also announced powerful enhancements to the RealPresence Platform, including the industry’s first open standards-based SVC (Scalable Video Coding), with 3X HD multipoint video call capacity for greater scalability, dramatically lower TCO, superior performance, and backwards- and forwards-compatibility to protect customer investments. Through its unique support of open standards, the Polycom RealPresence Platform ensures integration with hundreds of unified communications and social networking applications, and integrates with core networking and security infrastructure to deliver secure collaboration with any number of people across heterogeneous networks.
Polycom Capital financing programs for customers and channel partners are available through Polycom’s local sales contacts throughout the world. Interested parties should contact their local Polycom sales or Polycom Capital representatives. Alternative financing options are available for channel partners.
More at www.polycom.com