InformationWeek
Defining The Business Value Of Technology
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May 14, 2001 |
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Sells Printing: A Migration Plan
By Candee Wilde
he delay in embracing IP--driven largely by the traditional vendors' reluctance to sacrifice revenue from circuit-switched PBXs--may have cost established vendors the early lead in the IP PBX market. But they did use that time to develop a migration path to IP telephony for their current customers, which could prove very important in the long run.
"This is a great thing if you're an IP manager in a large enterprise because you can capture some of the additional functionality of an IP PBX, but don't have to trash that major investment in a legacy PBX," says Charles Gerlach, strategy-practice director Mainspring Inc. in Cambridge, Mass. Large companies can easily spend upwards of $200,000 on a new PBX system and usually try to get five to seven years' service out of it. In 1998 and 1999, more enterprises than usual purchased new PBXs to alleviate concerns about potential Y2K difficulties, which also is delaying IP PBX purchases.
That was the major reason Jason Cetina, network and telecommunications administrator for Sells Printing Co. chose Alcatel's OmniPCX 4400 when he replaced the $50 million printing firm's PBX, a discontinued Fujitsu model that had to be repaired with refurbished parts. "I did not want a pure IP solution because analog connections are still crucial," Cetina says.
The OmniPCX 4400 is a Unix-based PBX that handles IP traffic as well as analog, digital, and wireless connections. Alcatel introduced the OmniPCX 4400 to the U.S. market in January 2000. Of the established PBX vendors, analysts say Alcatel and, to a lesser extent, Siemens AG, have been particularly aggressive on the IP front. The two companies lead the market for traditional PBXs.
When Sells started thinking about a new phone system, the New Berlin, Wis., company also was remodeling its offices to make room for roughly 20 new employees. "We decided to pull Category 5 wire to everyone's desk instead of putting in separate telecom and data wires," Cetina says. "The other issue was the warehouse around the corner, which didn't have a full-featured telephone system. We looked at IP PBXs from Alcatel, Cisco, Lucent, and Nortel, and asked the vendors for a lot of features."
For instance, Sells wanted its new IP PBX system to integrate with a Windows NT-based voice-mail system it had recently purchased and to fully duplicate the features the old PBX delivered. The OmniPCX 4400 met those requirements, and also suited Sells because it supports Wireless Reflexes, a line of Private Wireless Telecommunication handsets that are well-suited to employees who rarely sit at a desk. About 100 Sells employees, including those who work at the warehouse located about a quarter of a mile away from its office, are using the wireless handset as their only telephone terminal. The OmniPCX 4400 delivers such PBX features as dial-by-name, voice-mail notification, and conference calling to the remote facility. An 802.11 wireless LAN supports the wireless phones and wireless notebook computers used by employees.
The remaining 50 Sells workers are using Alcatel's desktop telephones, which are IP-enabled with a snap-in module, Cetina says. The phones have a two-line, 20-character LCD display that's smaller than the one on Cisco's IP phone, but Cetina says he doesn't mind. "I don't see the need for stock quotes, E-mail, and an HTML browser on my telephone. Even the techno geeks here didn't ask for that. I think [a large screen] is a fad that won't last."
Sells spent about $100,000 on rewiring the office, which Cetina says will be offset by savings of up to $15,000 a year from eliminating service fees he paid the former PBX vendor to add or move extensions. Trunking and a 100-station OmniPCX 4400 system with 100 stations (half desktop and half wireless phones) would cost roughly $75,000.
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