LONDON, April 3 /PRNewswire/ --

Teliris(1) has added three executives to head up day-to-day sales and marketing initiatives to further scale the company as it continues to lead paying deployments of telepresence(2) systems worldwide.(3)

At the company's European headquarters in London, Tony Smith(4) joins Teliris from Polycom as Vice President of European Sales, with the directive to establish and lead a European sales organisation designed to promote the Teliris solution to a wider range of prospects in their local language.

In the US, Jim Kaufold(5) joins Teliris from Orange Business Services as Senior Vice President of Global Sales, responsible for developing Teliris' direct and indirect sales channels. Concurrently, Bob Johnson(6) signs on with the company from Cisco Services as the Senior Vice President of Marketing & Product Management with overall leadership responsibility for developing and implementing the company marketing strategy.

"Each of these strategic hires are key to our continued success and innovative leadership in the telepresence industry," said Marc Trachtenberg, Teliris CEO and co-founder. "Jim, Bob and Tony were chosen specifically for their superior leadership skills and experience to help further Teliris' global expansion as the telepresence industry leader with the largest number of room installations and the most immersive meeting experience available today."

Further information: Please contact Bryony Mansell, David Jullienne or Joel Derbyshire at Fuel PR, Tel: +44-(0)20-7498-8211 or email bryony@fuelrefuel.com (1) Founded in 2001, Teliris develops, implements and manages the world's most widely deployed telepresence systems, realistically replicating the human dynamics of a live meeting. Teliris has over 200 deployments in over 22 countries with the largest installed base of Fortune 500/FTSE 100 companies, including Pearson plc, GlaxoSmithKline, QUALCOMM and Royal Bank of Scotland, among others. Headquartered in New York and London, the company combines a fully managed service with end-to-end integration that offers businesses a 24/7 multipoint capability with a 99%+ availability guarantee, ensuring they can respond and collaborate as needed. In 2007, Fidelity Ventures and Columbia Capital took a major equity stake in Teliris. For further information regarding Teliris, visit the company's web site at www.teliris.com or email Teliris at info@teliris.com. (2) First there was teleconferencing, then video conferencing and now there is telepresence. Telepresence means that intimate, intuitive and effective interactions are occurring over great distances, without the need for physical travel. This is achieved by using state of the art audio and video technology, which allows conversations to take place in real time. The meeting experience is transparent, intimate and effective -- enabling colleagues to read verbal and non-verbal cues, sense the true tone of the meeting and feel each other's presence across the table. (3) In 2007, Teliris received the Global Award for Market Leadership from Frost & Sullivan for holding the largest global market share of customer telepresence solutions at 44%. The company offers the only guaranteed platform that can interoperate with telepresence systems from other vendors and connect remote users to telepresence meetings via a broadband Internet connection. (4) Tony Smith has more than 16 years experience of creating and developing high performance sales teams in Europe for global technology companies. As European sales Vice President, he is responsible for all sales activity in the EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) region including 'high touch' direct sales teams and the development of a limited number of highly focused channel relationships. Tony's previous sales leadership positions have involved the sale of complex high tech solutions and managed services in the areas of communications, visualization, collaboration and High Performance Computing. Prior to Teliris, Tony spent four years at Polycom Inc where he delivered significant growth by creating a new European sales organisation. Before Polycom, Tony spent almost six years leading sales teams for Silicon Graphics Inc (SGI) selling its portfolio of managed services and consulting. Earlier in his career, Tony held a variety of sales leadership roles with other technology and services companies including one of the UK's largest technology VARs (SCC) and Misys PLC. (5) Jim Kaufold has overall leadership responsibility for developing Teliris' direct and indirect sales channels, including strategy, planning, management, and sales execution. Jim has over 19 years of sales leadership and general management experience -- developing and leading global sales organisations to deliver corporate sales, revenue, and profit margin objectives. He has demonstrated success creating and executing sales strategies designed to increase market share and improve sales productivity via both direct and indirect sales channels in global, regional, and vertical markets. Prior to joining Teliris, Jim held several senior executive positions in Orange Business Services - Americas in which he was responsible for channel strategy, planning, sales operations, and the sales leadership of both Canada and the Global Large Account Program. He was also the sales vice president at Gateway Computers, where he led the direct and indirect sales channels for their education and business market segments. Jim spent the first 15 years of his career in telecommunications industry leading various sales organizations serving multi-national corporate clients for AT&T, Sprint, Infonet and KPNQwest. (6) Bob Johnson has over 20 years experience in marketing / product management, application development/integration, and broadband networking. Most recently, Bob was Director of Marketing & Product Management for Cisco's Remote Operations Services group where he was responsible for leading the development of Cisco Select Operate (Managed Services) for TelePresence. Prior to Cisco, Bob was Executive Director at SAIC-Telcordia Technologies responsible for marketing and product management of Broadband Service Assurance, Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance, and Field Mobility/Dispatch software applications. Prior to SAIC, Bob was Vice President Marketing & Product Management of Breakaway Solutions' Application Services division. Under his leadership, Breakaway Solutions was ranked as the industry's second largest Application Services Provider. Earlier in his career, Bob held a variety of sales, marketing, and product management leadership roles with Ernst & Young, Teleport Communications Group, and AT&T. He is also a former Captain in the United States Marine Corps. Bob holds a Masters in Telecommunications from Stevens Institute of Technology, a Master of Business Administration & Management from Webster University, and an undergraduate degree from Boston College.

Web site: http://www.teliris.com

Bryony Mansell, David Jullienne or Joel Derbyshire at Fuel PR, +44-(0)20-7498-8211, or email bryony@fuelrefuel.com, for Teliris