Hewlett Packard is taking another stab at the virtual video conferencing market dominated by the likes of GoToMeeting and WebEx. The company unveiled SkyRoom, a PC desktop program that combines aspects of video conferencing, Skype, and IM.
The product, launched simultaneously at the Intel Developers Conference and DEMO, is at the core a two-way video conferencing system. It has similarities to Halo, HP's teleconferencing solution, but it seems focused on smaller businesses and consumers.
What makes it killer though is the ability to share high quality image and videos (even movies) to others in the conference, as well as standard tools like screencasting capabilities.
It's cheaper than most conferencing systems at $149 (a one-time cost, no subscription), but that also means it's still more expensive than Skype, which is free to download. However, HP desktops or workstation notebooks will come with the software standard.