by Adam Clarke | Jun 12, 2017 | Apropos
TeleConsultants is increasingly being asked to provide technical project management services to help our clients implement solutions. This is partly from a need to minimise full time resources and also from recognition that this is a specialist area of ICT. Engaging specialist resources means the correct people are involved and ensures that key issues are not overlooked by the different delivery groups. Clients feel that that by selecting a supplier to provide a telephony or unified communications (UC) solution will provide them with an organisation that will deliver the solution with little help from anyone else. Unfortunately this is not the case. The client is required to involve a number of areas of ICT and often these are provided by multiple 3rd parties. What the Unified Communication (UC) solution provider will deliver: Core software, and less often now, some hardware (server, gateways) Endpoints, desk phones, softphones, desktop/mobile UC applications Profession services to install and configure their software What you, the client, and your 3rd party providers, will need to deliver: Windows servers for UC applications (often virtual) Virtual datacentre infrastructure Other server requirements, DHCP, FTP Datacentre switches WAN routers Telecommunications trunks, often SIP Network switches Network design and Windows management expertise (IP addressing, VLANs and group policy etc) Desktop or end user services, Windows/Mac, iOS/Android Integration Server i.e. Exchange, CRM Desktop, i.e. Outlook Other UC apps i.e. Skype for Business There are many pieces of the puzzle that the UC service provider is not responsible for, especially in the datacentre and across the network. These are your servers and your network. UC service providers will come across many different...
by Adam Clarke | Jun 12, 2017 | Apropos
The Spark public paging network will close on 30 June 2017. This network has been taken over by the Fire Service for their own purposes and they are also making it available to a select number of New Zealand Health and Emergency Service organisations. Other paging customers will need to look at alternatives. All Spark paging services including Buzzme and Minicall, will stop working from this date. TeleConsultants has been working with clients to find alternatives since 2015, when Spark announced the closure. If you are still unsure how you will replace this service in your business please contact...
by Adam Clarke | May 4, 2017 | Apropos
TeleConsultants attended the Comms Connect Wellington conference in April. This continues the many years of RFUANZ conferences, who remain Association Partner for the event. The conference highlighted the best in radio and wireless communications from narrow-band radio to PTT over cellular, and from professional LTE to satellite communications. This year’s conference did not stress the convergence of mobile radio and LTE as much as last year. It did however deliver more practical examples of this happening in the technology on show, as well as the case studies that were presented by vendors, dealers and end users. Emergency services use of mobile radio continues to be a key area. There are also many other industries where this technology is key to delivering critical communications – particularly helping to deliver to health and safety commitments organisations face today. The link below takes you to the conference program and includes further links to the presentations of many of the sessions. We recommend if you are working with mobile radio that you look at what is being done by a number of organisations and we are very keen to discuss how this technology can help your business. http://www.comms-connect.co.nz/conference-program/ The opening address included an update on Radio Spectrum Policy by Len Starling, who is the Manager of Policy and Planning in the Radio Spectrum Management team at the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment(MBIE). As a reminder, MBIE has issued directives for the phasing out of 25 kHz Land Mobile Radio (LMR) channels. For VHF channels the deadline was 1st November 2015, and for UHF channels 31st December 2019. If you are working with,...
by Adam Clarke | May 4, 2017 | Apropos
On 19 April Spark announced it is switching from the ageing Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). The replacement next generation IP-based network is the Converged Communications Network (CCN). The new network, to be progressively phased in over the next five years, will provide the foundation for Spark’s voice services into the future. It will bring together all voice communications – be it landline, mobile, video or data-based. Spark says it will enable richer, better customer experiences with voice, video, and collaboration features over whatever Spark service is available to them at the time, and provide the platform for new voice products and services. Some of mainstream media have suggested that this means customers will no longer be able to have a landline at home however this is not entirely true. People will still be able to get a landline but it will on the new CCN network rather than the current copper PSTN. Spark’s challenge will be limited by where they can deliver these services, highlighted by the frustrations some people have in getting UFB to their locations, particularly in more rural areas. For business users this announcement should possibly be less of a surprise. Spark has been talking to their clients about moving to IP services for some time. Most new voice contracts will include moving off copper and ISDN connections to SIP whether you are with Spark or not. These services have been available for many years now and are considerably more cost effective. Whilst these services can drive savings a considerable number of customers have not yet moved. It may not be a priority and quite...
by Adam Clarke | Apr 10, 2017 | Apropos
We know everyone is busy and that sometimes we think working with others will take up even more time. We often hear people believe they are too busy to start telecommunications initiatives with TeleConsultants and find it takes quite some time for clients to engage us. The truth is often it only takes a small amount of time and then we ease the workload and remove issues. Don’t put things off any longer. We always deliver considerably more value than we...
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