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These profiles, as supplied by the relevant vendor, service provider or reseller, are of small and medium sized companies that are using a VoIP system. 

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Sample End User Profile

 Company:  Berkeley Enterprise Partners

Boston  MA  USA

Activity Segment: Consulting (in the full members' version you can choose to look for end users based on the business segment you are interested in)

Employees:  25  Date of Deployment:  December 1999

Vendor(s) Used

3Com (in the full members' version you can click on the vendor's name and find out more about them)

Service Provider(s) Used

Reseller(s) Used

NetTeks

Description

  Berkeley Enterprise Partners is a fast-growing, eCRM (eCustomer Relationship Management) consultancy and professional services company that helps Fortune 1000 enterprises architect end-to-end, revenue-generating customer care solutions. Through a broad-based offering that reaches from the executive suite to the operational teams, Berkeley brings enterprises closer to their customers by optimizing interactions and maximizing loyalty.

Specifically, Berkeley works with its clients to build a customer care strategy that integrates online resources, such as the Web and e-mail with traditional offline customer interaction channels, including face-to-face sales, call centers, and marketing. As a component of that, the firm also specializes in recommending Web-enabling solutions and technologies to link voice and data communications within the call center, making possible efficient multichannel communication.

Founded in 1999, privately held Berkeley employs a staff of 25 at its worldwide headquarters in Boston. Following a move from its first office into a larger, two-floor site, the firm installed a network infrastructure powered by 3Com switches.

The network provides employees with an Ethernet backbone, which they use with Dell laptop computers to access and share information. Berkeley recently opened a facility in Terrytown, NY that's linked to its Boston network via a WAN (wide area network).

Network Challenge
Integrated customer communication is at the heart of Berkeley Enterprise Partners' business, and its telephones are a critical tool. Employees use them to communicate with clients, contact the office when working offsite, and conduct meetings.

The firm's consulting staff also requires real-time communications while away from the office, providing ultra-responsive service to clients and consulting peers. In its previous location, an office complex in Boston's Faneuil Hall, voice and data communications were provided by the property's management. However, when Berkeley began preparing its move to its current two-floor facility, the company needed to identify a telephone solution that would support its burgeoning business and future growth.

Although the firm required all the features of a sophisticated, full-featured enterprise telephone system, the cost savings was a key consideration. Moreover, because the company needed dial tone and Internet access from the first day it relocated, Berkeley wanted a system that could be installed quickly and easily. It also wanted to deploy the same efficient, timesaving application it frequently recommends to clients-computer telephony integration (CTI).

After considering traditional PBX systems from Nortel, Lucent, and Toshiba, a Centrex system from Bell Atlantic, and network telephony solutions from Cisco and 3Com, Berkeley chose to standardize on the 3Com NBX 100 communications system. The NBX 100 system is a feature-rich software-based telephony solution that works on a company's LAN (local area network), eliminating the need for separate voice and data wiring.

Network Applications
Berkeley Enterprise Partners depends on the 3Com NBX 100 communications system's powerful array of features to provide prompt, efficient service to customers and to optimize its internal operations:

The NBX 100 system provides the firm's employees with a host of advanced call management features, including caller ID, call forwarding, voice conferencing, and off-site notification, which informs remote users via pager, phone, or cell phone that they have messages waiting.

Berkeley staff members rely on the NBX 100 system's voice mail feature to retrieve messages from customers, colleagues, and vendors, both at the office and remotely.

The NBX 100 system's multilevel automated attendant feature answers all the firm's incoming calls and promptly directs callers to the appropriate employee or, if unavailable, to the voice mailbox. The multilevel feature allows Berkeley to give callers flexible routing options to reach the party best able to respond to their need.

The system's CTI capability enables callers' records to appear automatically on employees' computer screens. With Tygart's PRISM/Look PRO, a Windows-based program written for the Microsoft telephony application programming interface (TAPI) standard, users can file notes on each call in the Microsoft Outlook personal contact application. NBX's CTI-ready feature provides improved, consistent customer service-at an affordable price.

"With the NBX 100 system, we have access to the advanced features of a larger, more expensive telephone system at a price we can afford. We now have a superb, cutting-edge communications system that allows us to run our business smoothly and effectively. This is a tremendous business advantage."

Jay Gauthier, executive vice president and cofounder of Berkeley Enterprise Partners

Business Benefits

* Enhanced communications-The NBX 100 system enhances Berkeley Enterprise Partners' communications with customers and among staff by efficiently routing incoming calls and allowing callers to leave voice messages. Because employees can retrieve messages anytime and from anywhere, the system bolsters the firm's responsiveness and eliminates delays.
* Superior customer service-Since Berkeley consultants can now be instantly notified of calls or have calls forwarded when they are away from the office, they respond to their customers' needs promptly and efficiently.
* Streamlined operations-The NBX 100 CTI feature provides staff with instant access to customer records, saving time and increasing productivity.
* Reduced deployment costs-Using the NBX platform, Berkeley leveraged its existing network and avoided having to install a separate wiring infrastructure for its phones.
* Lower overhead-Berkeley eliminated the need for specialized technical personnel to manage the system or a receptionist to answer the phones. The firm dramatically reduced long-distance telephone charges by installing NBX phones in their new offices in Tarrytown, NY that link to the NBX chassis in Boston via the company's WAN. Intra-company calls will simply run over the WAN, like data from file servers.

"Thanks to the NBX 100, our business-critical operations are running at optimum efficiency. Being able to provide responsive customer service is fundamental to our success and the NBX 100 system allows us to bring our service to an entirely new level."

Jay Gauthier, executive vice president and cofounder of Berkeley Enterprise Partners

Implementation
With the help of its reseller, NetTeks, Inc. of Boston, MA, Berkeley Enterprise Partners deployed the NBX 100 communications system at its Boston headquarters in December 1999.

The firm built a data network based on three 24-port 3Com SuperStack? II Switch 3300s, providing users with an Ethernet core. NetTeks then installed the NBX 100 system directly on the LAN and had the system up and running in no time.

NetTeks installed a single NBX chassis, which contains the call processor and up to five four-port line cards. Then it simply added 25 NBX handsets to Berkeley's LAN.

As network devices, NBX phones plug directly into Ethernet ports on a company's LAN, which means that employees can add and move phones themselves as needed. When using laptop computers at their desks, staff members simply plug their computers into a hub port on their NBX phones to access network data resources.

"The ability to run our phones over a single voice and data network was one of the things about the NBX 100 system that impressed us the most. The solution allows us to make the most of our resources and save substantial money in the fit-out of our corporate facility."

Jay Gauthier, executive vice president and cofounder of Berkeley Enterprise Partners

Technical Solution
The 3Com NBX 100 communications system is an innovative network telephony solution that gives small- and medium-sized enterprises all the benefits of larger, traditional systems at a much lower price.

Berkeley Enterprise Partners optimizes its customer service and internal operations using such call management features of the NBX 100 system as automated attendant, voice mail, call forwarding, and off-site call notification.

Employees use the system's CTI capability to display callers' records automatically. Berkeley soon will utilize other built-in NBX 100 features like call detail reporting, which tracks all phone usage.

The NBX 100 platform's ease of configuration and administration is one of its greatest features. In fact, the firm can now manage its entire phone system itself, without having to hire specialized personnel. Using the NBX NetSet? browser-based administration utility, users can program individual phones as well as the entire system in minutes.

With Berkeley's remote sites linked to its headquarters' network via T1 and digital subscriber line (DSL) technologies, the firm has completely integrated its remote NBX phones into its main system. All employees now have the same voice service features of the NBX 100 platform as if they were physically in the main office.

"The NBX 100 system's flexibility, ease of use, and powerful call management features made the solution a natural choice. Because the system is cost effective, easy to manage, and completely expandable, we know it will support our business-critical communications well into the future."

Jay Gauthier, executive vice president and cofounder of Berkeley Enterprise Partners

Why 3Com
When Berkeley Enterprise Partners moved into its new offices, it needed an expandable, business-grade telephone system that could support its rapid growth.

The firm wanted its employees to have access to all the features of sophisticated phone systems but needed to keep costs to a minimum. After reading an outstanding review of the product in the October 1999 issue of Internet Telephony magazine, Berkeley chose the 3Com NBX 100 communications system.

Jay Gauthier, executive vice president and cofounder of Berkeley Enterprise Partners, particularly appreciates that the NBX 100 system runs independently from a data network operating system. If the network goes down, the phones do not, ensuring reliability. The NBX call processor is uniquely designed to provide consistent, reliable communications.

"As a dynamic, rapidly growing firm, we need powerful, proven tools that we can depend on. The NBX 100 simply offers the best price/performance value on the market."

Jay Gauthier, executive vice president and cofounder of Berkeley Enterprise Partners

With its NBX 100 solution, Berkeley has enhanced its voice communications, corporate image and business processes. As the firm grows, it will add additional NBX telephone sets and deploy other features of the system as required.

The firm's venture capitalists are so impressed with Berkeley's NBX 100 system that they are considering recommending the same system with other startup companies.

"Reliable, crystal clear communications are critical for any growing business, particularly a consulting firm. The NBX 100 system is a revolutionary technology that truly empowers small- and medium-sized enterprises to succeed in today's increasingly competitive business environment."

Jay Gauthier, executive vice president and cofounder of Berkeley Enterprise Partner

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