Big Data Collaboration Center, Cisco, 2012
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Initial rendering of Big Data Collaboration Center
The Big Data Collaboration Room transformed the traditional war room into a virtualized collaboration environment for faster, more connected decision-making. Designed for distributed teams working across devices and time zones, the experience allowed participants to engage with shared applications, content, annotations, and video whether they were physically present or joining remotely.
Our CPG client told us they needed to move faster and bring more diverse teams together to solve problems, design new offerings, and align on decisions. Traditionally, that kind of work happened in war rooms: physical spaces covered in ideas, notes, and visual artifacts that evolved over the course of a project. The biggest challenges was the time it took to get the right talent in a room together.

We transformed that model into a virtualized physical space that could be entered from the room itself or through a device. The goal was to make collaboration feel continuous and shared, regardless of where participants were located.
Inside the room, teams could interact with business applications, post and save materials to shared surfaces, annotate content, and collaborate through high-definition video. Multiple participants could simultaneously create, edit, and comment in real time using familiar tools, making the experience feel less like a meeting and more like an active working session.
The result was a more connected and effective environment for strategic collaboration—supporting creativity, improving decision-making, and helping teams work across devices, locations, and time zones without losing the energy of being in the same room.
Patent issued March 2013 US 13/788,103.
Initial Mock-ups and Prototypes


Related Implementations
Cisco Analytics Cafe is an instance of a Big Data Collaboration Center. It’s designed to faciliate better understanding of the behaviors and trends of Cisco’s customer segments. The room, populated with multivariant visualizations that combine data from advanced analytical models and customer behaviors,is used to bring data scientist together with business stakeholders to uncover new opportunities to drive revenue growth.
Related links
Building a big data collaboration center
Blog Post: A Room With a View (of Big Data)
