OnePIN Avoids the Capital Cost of Purchasing a PBX and the Operational Cost of Maintaining It
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John Gates, Elevate Communications, (617) 861-3651
WESTBOROUGH, MA, December 12, 2006—Whaleback Systems™ today announced that OnePIN®, Inc. has selected and deployed the CrystalBlue Voice Service™ for enterprise-wide telephony communications. OnePIN, which provides secure, permission-based software solutions to help people manage and maintain relationships across networks and devices, selected CrystalBlue to provide employees with rich telephony features while avoiding the capital cost of purchasing a PBX and telephones and avoiding the operational costs and maintenance hassles of administering and managing telephony services.
According to Paul Novak, Director of IT for OnePIN, “The Whaleback telephony service offers more functionality, requires less maintenance and costs dramatically less than alternate solutions. We didn’t have to purchase any equipment and we can rely on Whaleback to monitor and manage the service. The CrystalBlue Voice Service frees up my time so I can focus on internal IT issues, and OnePIN benefits from robust VoIP features and the ability to easily and cost-effectively scale the solution to support additional employees and new offices.”
OnePIN originally had a small PBX, but it couldn’t scale to support new users and new locations. It didn’t support “must-have” business features such as direct inward dialing and 3-digit extension dialing. “We are building an international business, and that requires teamwork and efficient communications across the company,” said Novak. “CrystalBlue is a feature-rich voice service that improves communications within the company and allows employees to leverage advanced telephony features to improve productivity.”
After evaluating alternatives in the summer, OnePIN selected the CrystalBlue Voice Service. “Our cost for the managed service will be about 1/3 less in the first year than if we had purchased an IP PBX,” said Novak. “Whaleback quickly installed and activated the service and taught us how to use the Executive IP Handsets. Now, when we need additional handsets we place the order, receive them the next day, plug them into an Ethernet connection and they are fully operational. Whaleback performs the necessary management and administration and we don’t have to deal with it. We get regular reports from Whaleback and their service is reliable and dependable.”
OnePIN now has about 20 Executive IP Handsets connected to a SMB 1500 IP PBX, which is fully monitored and managed by Whaleback. A voice-only DSL connection was provisioned by Whaleback, and all calls run over the Whaleback network and Whaleback provides end-to-end monitoring. “Customer support for Whaleback has been excellent,” said Novak. “They respond immediately and monitor traffic and make sure that we benefit from business-quality voice over the Internet.”
Road Warrior™ remote worker functionality allows OnePIN employees to gain full access to the SMB 1500 IP PBX from any broadband connection. Road Warrior supports mirrored extensions so that SMBs can provide some members of the distributed workforce with a PC-based Executive IP Softphone that mirrors the behavior of their desktop phone. “For example, at this moment we have sales executives traveling to Western Europe and Latin America, and they have Executive IP Softphones loaded onto their laptop computers,” explained Novak. “When they plug their computer into an Ethernet connection or gain wireless Internet access at a café or airport, they can place and receive calls from their computer as if they were sitting at their desk in the office.”
Users can even move their Executive IP Phones when needed. “We’re in a development-focused environment that often requires intense concentration, and an employee that wants to stay at home for a few days can bring home their desktop phone, plug it into their home network and send and receive calls as if they were in the office,” said Novak.
The CrystalBlue Voice Service has even supported OnePIN’s international marketing efforts. OnePIN recently exhibited at an industry trade show in Dubai, United Arab Emirates and a OnePIN employee packed an Executive IP Handset, plugged it into the Ethernet connection at the booth and spoke with employees at headquarters throughout the event.
OnePIN has opened up its Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) office in Ankara, Turkey—and connected it over the Internet to headquarters. “I can call a colleague in Turkey by just dialing a three-digit extension,” stated Novak. “Whaleback provides very attractive international calling rates, and we have flat-priced, unlimited domestic calling. We can add new offices over time and easily provide remote employees with broadband access to our telephony services.”
“We’re already taking advantages of many of the advanced features of CrystalBlue,” stated Novak. “For example, we take advantage of unified messaging and voice mails are automatically distributed to each employee’s computer inbox. But we’ve only begun to scratch the surface of the functionality in the CrystalBlue Voice Service and we plan to more fully utilize productivity features like OrcaDial click-to-dial functionality to improve productivity and efficiency throughout the organization.”
“I’ve managed PBXs and I’ve managed Centrex services in the past, and both are a drain on IT resources,” said Novak. “By selecting a monitored and managed service, we can focus on running our business instead of focusing on telecommunications. We’ve had no outages and everybody’s happy with the service. The Whaleback support and network operations organizations have been phenomenal and we benefit from a great service that Whaleback manages so that we don’t have to.”
OnePIN, Inc. is building the foundation for the next generation of content and information exchange. Based on its patented technology, OnePIN provides secure, permission-based software solutions to help people manage and maintain relationships across networks and devices. The privately held company is headquartered in Westborough, Massachusetts, USA.
Whaleback Systems is a Managed Service Provider (MSP) and the pioneering developer of the first business phone solution built from the ground up for broadband. Unlike traditional systems, the Whaleback CrystalBlue Voice Service is 100 percent premises-based and software-driven. It includes the only IP PBX with Key System Unit features and Road Warrior Functionality. Whaleback's all-inclusive, unlimited domestic calling package makes the most advanced technology immediately affordable for companies that need between 5 and 1,500 phone stations. The Whaleback service is available through partnerships with channel partners and VARs.
