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In The News
Guardian Leads Boston Ballet To New IP Telephony System
For the Boston Ballet, both seeing and hearing were believing.
The ballet company recently enlisted the help of solution provider Guardian Information Technologies to find a new voice-mail system. It ended up purchasing an IP telephony solution from Shoreline Communications after seeing one in action at Guardian's offices.
"We were talking about voice-mail systems, and I asked if they had ever considered voice-over-IP technology. They hadn't," said Bradley Warren, CEO of Guardian, a solution provider based in Leominster, Mass. "I said, 'Come and look at it. We have it set up in our offices.' Sure enough, they fell in love with the system."
Guardian's Warren says the ballet company is using existing data connections and didn't need to increase capacity between locations.
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The Boston Ballet initially wanted to replace its Avaya Octel voice-mail system, which had run out of capacity. On top of that, the company usually closes its offices for a week around the holidays, and that puts an unusually heavy burden on its communications infrastructure.
Guardian, which has been managing the ballet company's network for more than three years, offered a cost-effective IP telephony solution from Shoreline that replaced its 10-year-old Nortel Meridian PBX and solved its voice-mail problems at the same time.
So how did Guardian sell an IP telephony solution to a customer that wasn't even in the market for a new phone system? By showing the Boston Ballet that it could dramatically increase the functionality of its phone system without having to pay any more than the $1,500 per month it was already spending for communications services, said Jack Feivou, COO and director of artistic operations at the ballet company.
The customer gained not only a fully functioning voice-mail system but also additional features such as caller ID, the ability to integrate Microsoft Outlook contact information with the phone system and the ability to reassign phone numbers to different handsets.
"As soon as we saw the Shoreline system, I knew it was what we wanted because of the functionality and because it was recommended by people we trust," Feivou said. "There's been a huge productivity improvement."
Guardian's VoIP solution, which was implemented in August, included 10 ShoreGear-12 voice switches, each supporting 12 analog ports, and a ShoreGear-T1, which provides a T1 interface for trunking to the central office.
Guardian secured a five-year lease-to-buy deal that kept equipment costs within the ballet company's budget, Warren said. And since Shoreline's system supports a number of third-party handsets, the customer was able to protect some of the investment it had made in existing phones, he said.
In addition, the ballet company was able to eliminate unused phone lines and interoffice toll costs.
Guardian's voice-mail implementation accommodates up to 190 users and spans the ballet company's three facilities: its headquarters in downtown Boston and two suburban dance schools.
"They're now using their existing data connections, and we didn't even have to increase capacity between locations," Warren said. The Shoreline solution also supports softswitch users, such as dancers who don't maintain an office but still need to have access to voice mail and communications services, he said.
The Boston Ballet also can route phone calls to its Boston venue, The Wang Theatre, during the performance season, Feivou said. "This makes it easier to communicate, and we don't have to give everybody new phone numbers," he said.
Guardian included management of the new voice-mail system in the services package it was already providing and has trained the ballet's lone IT employee to perform simple management tasks on-site.
When it comes time to upgrade its telephony system again, the ballet company will save additional money, Feivou said.
"It'll basically be just a software upgrade, and we don't have to change out huge switching boxes. %85 That, plus the fact that we can plug in virtually any phone, will be huge for future maintenance," he said. "We're very happy with the system. It was a good choice."
SOURCE: CRN
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