Marconi Middle East’s stand at the recently held Riyadh International Communications and IT Conference was fronted by Marconi’s state-of-the-art Virtual Presence System (ViPr).

As close as you can get to “being there,” the ViPr(tm) Virtual Presence System from Marconi provides virtual presence communications for defence and intelligence networks, including Type 1 encrypted networks, for management of multi-site operations.
“Network-centric military and government operations demand secure, high-resolution, real-time, multimedia communications between geographically dispersed locations. Marconi meets these demands with the ViPr Virtual Presence System,” a company statement said.
 It has been described as a definitive personal communications device - a network appliance that delivers face-to-face, DVD-quality video with CD-quality audio to desktops between two or more sites.
“ViPr enables a new era of remote communications, even over secure, encrypted networks, delivering real-time information to where it needs to be,” the statement said.
As part of the conference, Andrew Furner, managing director, Marconi Middle East, spoke on “Next Generation Networks” and the opportunities and challenges they would bring to the region. The event was held from February 29 to March 4.
In another development, Marconi announced that Fadhil Al Ibrahim had been appointed as the new director and chairman of Marconi Middle East.
The announcement was made by Mike Parton, CEO Marconi Corporation plc.
At the time he was made chairman, Al Ibrahim was an executive director of GPT, a subsidiary of Marconi, since 1995, and earlier the general manager for Cable and Wireless in Saudi Arabia from 1978. He holds a BSc in mechanical engineering from the University of Petroleum and Minerals in Dhahran.
John Devaney, Marconi Corp. Plc chairman, and Geoff Doy, CEO for sales and marketing, were in Riyadh primarily to congratulate Al Ibrahim on his new position and to meet and greet Marconi customers in the region.
Doy, in a statement, said: “This is an important decision by Marconi and is in recognition and appreciation of the significant   role Fadhil has played over the years in developing and establishing the Marconi business in the Middle East region.”
Marconi has a wide presence in the region with some 500 staff supporting its activities and customers.