Last October, Cisco Systems chairman John Chambers wowed an audience at a conference in Bangalore when he summoned to the stage Marthin De Beer, head of Cisco's emerging technologies. De Beer strode onto the platform, greeted Chambers, and said: "I'm actually in California, 14,000 miles away."

Chambers likened De Beer's full-size, 3-D hologram-like figure, similar to what CNN used in its election night coverage, to the beam-me-up transporter in Star Trek. It was actually a sophisticated video illusion based on a 150-year-old classic magician's mirror trick called Pepper's Ghost—and part of Cisco's TelePresence System 3000, which costs about $300,000 a unit.

For the last decade, companies that make videoconferencing systems have touted their products as viable alternatives to corporate travel. But until recently, there wasn't persuasive evidence that videoconferencing would substantially replace getting on an airplane.

Now, the industry is betting heavily that videoconferencing—and especially its highest-end niche, telepresence—is going to gain firm traction, as companies confront soaring travel costs and tighter budgets, as the technology itself improves, and as employees become fed up with hassles on the road. In fact, in a Cisco commercial for its teleconferencing systems, showing executives mirroring flight attendants, a voice-over advocates "Business travel without the travel."

"The process of getting there absolutely is awful," Peter Handal, C.E.O. of Dale Carnegie Training, says of business travel. "I used to enjoy both being there and getting there. Now I enjoy only being there."

His productivity and management-skills company, which has offices in 70 countries, has replaced some in-person meetings with videoconference technologies—though he's still on the road domestically and internationally. "I don't fool myself into thinking that when I look at the screen I'm looking at the real world," Handal says. "I really do believe we need to get out there and press the flesh and meet our customers and meet the people running our offices."

Videoconferencing companies think that they can persuade hard-core road warriors like Handal to stay in the office more with technology that enhances the virtual-meeting experience. There are various levels of videoconferencing, starting with the simple two-way audio-video capabilities that are standard on personal computers. These work well for personal and very basic business communications where a somewhat jerky picture and imprecisely synchronized audio will suffice.

On the other end of the spectrum are sophisticated telepresencing systems that feature cinematic-quality, ultra-high-definition picture and sound. For now, the systems—by companies such as Polycom, Hewlett-Packard, Teliris, and Cisco—are designed to link conference suites in different locations in such a way that participants feel they are present together in the same location. Depending on the size and the maker, prices range from around $80,000 to $400,000.