Unified Communications Services

Based in Burr Ridge, Illinois Convergence Technologies, Inc. (CTI) is a Premier Certified Partner of Cisco Systems®, and an expert provider of network security and IP communications solutions in the Midwest. Since 1995, CTI has embraced a philosophy of focusing on customer's business needs, rather than on product lines or specific technologies, enabling it to become a leader in the region.

Appia Communications is Cisco® Powered Network service provider, offering managed communications solutions to small and midsize companies across North America. Unlike traditional telecommunications companies, Appia was built from the ground up to support IP voice services. Headquartered in Traverse City, Michigan, the company has office locations in Los Angeles, Washington, DC, Chicago, Detroit, Indianapolis, Kalamazoo, Michigan, and Mexico City.

Source North America Corporation is a wholesale distributor for the petroleum industry, supplying gas station equipment and other materials to a nationwide customer base. The company operates in 16 states, and employs 90 people. It is headquartered in Arlington Heights, Illinois.

In an industry as heavily regulated as the petroleum industry, a single late equipment order can delay the construction and certification schedule for an entire gas station, and put a customer out of operation for days. To ensure fast, local service, Source North America Corporation was one of the first suppliers in the industry to launch a just-in-time supply chain system, enabling service representatives to view all inventory across the country in real time, and serve customers anywhere with a click of a mouse.

However, the company's data and communications network was not keeping pace with its bold corporate vision. The network had grown organically with the company, and by 2000, it was an unwieldy collection of unmanaged hubs and switches from multiple vendors. The system was difficult to scale and manage, and notoriously unreliable. And in the company's just-in-time operating environment, a single day's outage could cascade into two or three weeks of lost revenues.

The organization's phone systems were also standing in the way of the new initiatives. Employees operated out of small branches and home offices around the country to provide a local presence for customers. But each location had its own phone system, dial plan, and local and long distance carriers. Administration costs were high, and there was no way to create a truly unified, interconnected workforce.

"Our long distance carriers were charging us for every number we had, and we were paying all kinds of additional fees," says Glen Corkill, president and chief executive officer of Source North America. "Only portions of the company had voice mail, and we had gotten to the point where we were relying on answering machines in people's homes. That's no way to run a nationwide company."

Corkill knew that if Source North America was going to continue to lead the industry, the company needed a more cost-effective, scalable, and reliable communications system. "Essentially, what customers are buying from us is our ability to respond," he says. "Our network is what ties us together and allows us to do that. If the system is down, we're in big trouble."

In 2001 Source North America opted to begin a complete overhaul of its data and communications network, and chose Cisco Premier Certified channel partner CTI to help with the process. Corkill had worked previously with CTI and had grown to trust the firm's judgment and expertise. But to win the contract for a complete network upgrade, CTI focused on addressing three key requirements: stability, simplicity, and scalability.

"Our philosophy is that our customers are not trying to win a science fair award, they're trying to run a business," says Mark Kruer, president of CTI. "That means keeping it as simple as possible."

Given the instability of Source North America's existing multivendor network, Kruer wanted to provide a single-vendor solution to minimize problems and speed deployment. Only Cisco Systems offered a comprehensive suite of network and security solutions, and a name that Corkill recognized and trusted.

"The point here was to get Source North America's business up and running efficiently, inexpensively, and ensure that it wouldn't cost a fortune to keep it working over the next few years," says Kruer. "If you want to do that, then you do it with Cisco."

While Corkill was enthusiastic about the data network upgrade, he was not initially convinced that migrating the phone systems to the network was necessary. CTI's consultants believed that ultimately, the savings and flexibility of an IP communications solution would become too compelling to resist. Rather than try to convince his client directly, Kruer decided to focus on the immediate data network problems. But he also made sure that the network Source North America put in place was scalable enough to accommodate future voice services.

"We always build for the future," he says. "We always assume our clients are going to have a complete network with everything at some point, so we make sure everything we build scales to that eventuality."

When Corkill was finally ready to deploy an IP Communications solution, he decided to adopt a hosted solution, and turned to Appia Communications. As a Cisco Powered Network designated service provider, Appia offered specialized expertise, greater efficiency, end-to-end security, cutting-edge technologies and services, and access to nationwide network resources, enabling Source North America to extend the power of its network, while still focusing on its core business. By outsourcing voice systems to a managed service provider like Appia, Source North America was able to let the IP communications experts handle the day-to-day management of the system, reducing the company's total cost of ownership of its communications infrastructure, as well as increasing the reliability of its systems.

"We're really too small to have all the technology people on staff to do IP telephony, yet we want to have a nationwide, best-in-class phone system," says Corkill. "With Appia, we get the best of both worlds, and I have complete peace of mind. It's the perfect solution for a company that wants to focus on its customers and not its phone systems."

Today, the company has a robust, redundant nationwide voice and data network infrastructure from Cisco Systems, in which no single point of failure can bring down business operations.

At the company headquarters, a Cisco 3600 Series Multiservice Platform provides integrated voice and data connectivity, and incorporates built-in scalability-including more than 70 modular interface options-to support future network expansions. Three Cisco Catalyst® 3550 Series switches manage and optimize bandwidth across the network and provide the quality-of-service (QoS) functionality to support IP telephony. Two of the Catalyst 3550 switches also provide power-over-Ethernet (PoE) to support the company's Cisco 7940 and 7912 IP phones. A Cisco PIX® 515E Security Appliance helps further safeguard the network from attacks that could impact service. The company's six branch offices are outfitted with Cisco 1750 Series modular access routers that integrate voice, data, and security services in a single branch office platform.

Since Source North America's WAN was already based on a robust, multiservice Cisco infrastructure, adding voice services was a relatively easy, inexpensive enhancement. The Cisco routers at the headquarters and remote offices required only a new line card to fully support IP Communications. And, because the company had deployed Cisco PoE switches, they didn't even need power supplies for the Cisco IP phones, saving as much as US$50 per handset.

Today, Source North America also uses its Cisco voice and data infrastructure to fully connect home-based employees. The company simply outfits these workers with Cisco PIX 501 security appliances and Cisco IP phones. The employees arrange their own broadband Internet service. Using a secure VPN connection to the company's network, home-based employees now have full access to the company phone system and dial plan, as well as the same e-mail and supply chain applications as office-based employees.

In the three years Source North America's new network infrastructure has been in place, the company has realized all the benefits it hoped to achieve, and more. By consolidating T1 lines, eliminating private branch exchange (PBX) phone system service contracts, and reducing toll costs, Source North America now saves as much as US$6,000 per month-a savings of 50 percent annually in communications costs. Site-to-site calls between employees, which formerly made up 20 percent of telecommunications costs, are now carried at no additional cost over the company's IP network. Overall, the company has reduced long-distance costs from an average of more than 7.5 cents per minute down to 2 cents per minute.

The managed data network from CTI and hosted IP Communications solution from Appia also provides substantial soft-cost savings by dramatically reducing Source North America's total cost of ownership of its IT systems, as well as minimizing the administrative effort required to maintain the solution. Today, if there is a problem or question with the phone service, the company doesn't have to deal with dozens of PBX system vendors and local and long-distance voice carriers; they just call Appia. "We used to get 40 phone bills a month, and it would take us an entire day to process all of them," says Corkill. "Now it takes a few hours."

"By deploying a hosted telephony solution as opposed to putting in a complete solution themselves, Source North America was able to reduce their administrative costs and see an immediate reduction in their monthly phone expenses," adds ," adds Victor von Schlegell, President, Appia Communications. "Plus, they're more satisfied because they can focus on their core business, instead of just worrying about technology."

The solution has also proven to be extremely scalable, enabling Source North America to expand rapidly without incurring additional telecommunications costs.

"When we first started working with Source North America, it was a relatively small company, with five full-time IT people," says Kruer. "Since then, it has grown three to four times as large, and now employs only two IT people."

Most importantly for Source North America's customers, the company now has a truly unified, interconnected workforce, with every employee just four digits away from every other employee. Phone representatives can route requests and questions across the country, and ensure that customers are rapidly connected with the specialists and services they need.

"If we have one specialist who's very good at something, we can staff that person in one location to serve five different markets," says Corkill. "This allows us to maintain our presence as a local business, but also have all the power and advantages of being a national operation."

For Source North America, ensuring that employees have a reliable voice system was critical. Since the changeover, the company has not had a single network outage. "I don't think I've ever seen the phones in my office go down for more than 30 seconds," says Corkill. "Something hits us, a bad storm or a power outage, and we are right back up and running."

The distributed IP Communications system also provides built-in business continuance in the event of a natural disaster at any location. If a remote office goes out or employees can't get into work, calls can be easily rerouted to other parts of the country. "No matter what happens, we can continue to respond to our customers in any situation," says Corkill.

Overall, Corkill is extremely pleased with how the new system has transformed his business. "We've gone a lot farther than we ever expected with the system," he says. "For me, the most impressive thing is that the brochures said we could do something, and we actually did it. The Cisco marketing and sales and product development staff made us a promise, and fulfilled that promise."

Source North America plans to continue enhancing and expanding its infrastructure, and deploying new technologies to better serve its customers. In the coming months, CTI plans to deploy Cisco Unity™ Unified Messaging. When fully deployed, the company's nationwide employees will be able to receive voice mail, e-mail, and faxes in a single, manageable inbox, further enhancing employee productivity and customer service. The company also plans to further exploit its versatile phone system by routing calls across time zones to give customers a longer day than anyone else in the industry.

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To find a more about Cisco Managed Services for Small & Medium Business, go to: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/netsol/ns458/networking_solutions_program_category_home.html