Organization Profile: Chemical Manufacturing Company
Industry: Manufacturing
Solution:
- Design, deployment and ongoing support of converged voice/data network infrastructure, data center and IP Telephony system
Results:
- Successful rollout of entire IT infrastructure with minimal downtime
- Completion of project on time and within budget
- Robust solution providing simplified management
When a major division of a 50-year-old chemical manufacturing company in Alabama was sold by its parent organization, management specified that the company must become fully separated from its previous corporate family. Due to configuration of the previous infrastructure, the only acceptable solution required that the new company build an entirely new data center and telephone system to serve approximately 250 users.
The company quickly elected to establish a converged voice and data network, using IP Telephony, over its existing fiber-optic network. The company engaged Global Data Systems to design, plan and implement an IP Telephony phone system. GDS also was actively involved in the planning for the data center itself.
Installation of the phone system required running 3,000 feet of cable from the new data center back to the main telephone service provider’s trunk line and bringing the fiber-optic cable into the data center to link to 13 new intermediate distribution facilities (IDFs). GDS provided the wiring from the IDFs to each workstation, running CAT-5 cable from the IDFs to each user.
GDS’ implementation included telephony design, deployment of approximately 250 handheld phones, a complete unified messaging system, comprehensive dial-plan generation, hardware-based conferencing, in-line power switch modules and installation of Cisco CallManager software. CallManager is the primary software application that extends enterprise telephony features and functions to enterprise packet telephony network devices. It is installed on a server-class PC and provides basic call processing, signaling and connection services to configured devices including IP phones and soft phones, gateways, applications and other devices.
GDS also provided all the startup services - delivering and installing all Cisco hardware and software, programming and configuring the equipment, and then testing it before the company went live with its new converged network.
The company was able to go live with its new data center and IP phone system just five months after receiving initial approval for the project, with minimal downtime. The project was completed on budget and on time.
With its converged network, the company has eliminated the cost and complexity of maintaining separate voice and data networks, while also reducing long-distance phone charges. The IP Telephony system also provides easy-to-use tools that have allowed staff to route and handle calls and messages more efficiently - even for mobile and remote users. GDS continues to provide support for the system.