Well, the business video crystal ball just got a whole lot clearer.

For several years, the prospect of consolidation, merger and acquisition activity has been looming over the business video sector. A cadre of relatively small, innovative software developers has emerged as prime targets for some form of M&A activity. Guessing just how the market consolidation would unfold had become a favorite parlor game of some long-time industry executives who would let themselves sometimes dream about the payday that would come with a big buyout.

Some thought it would be a good idea to roll up a string of these developers into a single, dominating business video solution. Others thought these emerging firms would make ideal acquisitions for industry giants like Microsoft and Cisco (News - Alert), providing these companies with an expanded footprint in the online business video sector.

With the March 23 announcement by Polycom of its plans to acquire business video pioneer Accordent in a cash deal valued at $50 million, we now have an official starting point for the Business Video M&A Era that puts us squarely in the middle of those two possible market trajectories.

The deal allows Polycom (News - Alert) to tell prospective customers a more comprehensive video communications story than ever before. With $1.2 billion in 2010 revenues, Polycom certainly is no business video shrimp. However, its successful product line was relatively one-dimensional, excelling at enabling live video communications in and between corporate conference rooms.

The Accordent deal definitively and decisively helps Polycom build a bridge to other branches of the business video market space. Specifically, Accordent instantly makes Polycom relevant in providing platforms that manage on-demand content and make it possible to distribute content – both live and on-demand – to corporate desktops.

Up until now, Polycom had dabbled in the online side of the video business, selling gear from partners like Qumu on an OEM basis. The Accordent acquisition illustrates that the video world beyond the conference room is no longer an afterthought for Polycom.

In a conference call with reporters following the acquisition announcement, Polycom’s Vice President of Solution Product Marketing, Jim Kruger (News - Alert), said that the prospects for growth in corporate demand for distributing live and on-demand video to the corporate desktop served as a key factor driving Polycom’s interest in the acquisition.

“We felt strong we needed to own the technology and have control over the product roadmap,” Kruger said.

As the newly combined Polycom-Accordent team reviews its roadmap, chances are that many other executives competing in the business video sector are taking a fresh look at their long-term product positioning, as well.

If the Polycom-Accordent deal is taken as a template for the direction of future merger and acquisition activity in the sector, it would seem to point towards combinations that integrate multiple forms of video communications under a single platform. The ability to handle live and on-demand video communications with equal ease will become mere table stakes for competing in this market.

Indeed, expect the term “unified communications” to become even more widely used in video circles than ever before in an environment where vendors will look to link solutions that provide one-stop shops for integrating video into established forms of business communications.

In short, the stage is set for a flurry of technology platform integration that will be achieved via merger and acquisition activity. Any purveyor of live communications solutions – whether that be Web conferencing, video conferencing or telepresence platforms – that is not kicking the tires on expanding into online video content management runs the risk of being left behind.