The paradigm shift that happened with the Internet revolutionizing voice transmission over data networks continues to show ample benefits for both emerging and established business ventures. Be it inside a single office or across a global reach, IP telephony has proven to be a boon for many businesses that allows them to communicate with clients, prospects, vendors, and other stakeholders for better business.
A case study for migrating to IP telephony
The twin key values that come out of the merging of traditional voice and data networks into a single common infrastructure platform are reduction in costs and increase in efficiencies. A classic case of how this convergence has brought people within organizations closer to each other is the case of Reuters which chose to invest whole heartedly into IP network setup when it moved its headquarters from Fleet Street to Canary Wharf in 2005. In place of the expensive coaxial system, it switched to modern VoIP network, plug and play TV-to-IP distribution and stream TV to all employees’ workstations and TV sets within the office. With this migration, Matt Hassock, Reuters’ technical operations manager at that time reported that while the setup did prove to be expensive, the real cost saving prowess emerged in the long run.
Advantages of IP telephony
As the real life case studies depict, the value provided by this migration from disparate lines to single line for voice and data. Let’s look at these advantages in detail –
- Lower telecom costs – Migration of data and voice over a single ecosystem has brought down the telecom costs considerably. Geographically diverse regions can now be easily connected seamlessly without the need for maintaining separate phone lines and data connections. Need for separate personnel for telecom and IT needs too can be avoided. Also the dedicated nature of fixed line telephone systems now is a thing of past. Shared bandwidth over IP enables faster data transmission. This lowered costs of transmission coupled with lesser bandwidth requirement leads to a healthy 20%-40% savings on telecom costs.
- Much simpler to manage and administer – This merging together also offers benefits at multiple levels. Take the case of a simple event of phone extension relocation. Under the older fixed line systems, getting hold of a PBX engineer or OEM service technician and then requisitioning him/her to move the extension can cost upto $250. With IP telephony it is a matter of an in-house IT person to do this change or relocation through a web based portal. It also ensures negligible downtime as compared to fixed line telephony systems.
- Remote access becomes easier – With IP telephony services from skilled yet creative suppliers and providers like Hutaib Infotech Solutions, remote and mobile-based access is now a reality. Users can now communicate all across the world with the peers, partners or customers. Organizations too can have a single user directory for all branches across cities or countries. Outsiders can get a unified messaging or unified routing to the apt extension, thus depicting solidarity of the company irrespective of geographical barriers. Be it participating in a conference call, access e-mails or communicating with other employees this is all possible now thanks to IP telephony.