CASE STUDY
Canadian school district moves to a modern, centralized communications platform
Challenge: An outdated and fragmented system
One of Western Canada’s largest school districts operated its helpdesk and internal communications on a legacy Avaya Voice and Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) system. This aging infrastructure, spread across more than 110 locations, presented significant challenges:
- High operational costs: The district was burdened with the expense and complexity of managing numerous traditional phone lines.
- Lack of modern features: The system offered minimal reporting capabilities, leaving supervisors with no real-time visibility into agent status or call queue metrics.
- Limited scalability and reliability: The on-premises hardware was difficult to scale and lacked the redundancy needed to ensure business continuity during an outage, putting critical services at risk.
The school district needed to transition to a modern, centralized, and resilient communications platform that could reduce costs, enhance operational insight, and guarantee service uptime.
Solution: Centralized SIP trunking with ifonica’s resilient infrastructure
Netagen partnered with the school district to architect and deploy a modern voice communications solution for general telephony along with its Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) platform. The core of this transformation was the strategic implementation of two key deliverables: SIP Trunking and Disaster Recovery.
1) Deliverable: Unified SIP trunking architecture
Netagen replaced the district’s outdated and fragmented telephone lines with a centralized SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) trunking architecture. This consolidated all of the school disctrict’s voice traffic—from the helpdesk to critical analog lines—into a single, IP-based data stream. The entire solution was hosted in Netagen’s secure, carrier-grade data center, removing the burden of managing on-premises hardware.
2) Deliverable: Robust disaster recovery from ifonica
To deliver unmatched reliability, the solution was built on ifonica’s robust network infrastructure. This partnership provided a comprehensive disaster recovery (DR) and business continuity strategy. By hosting the solution across primary a secure data center and leveraging ifonica’s resilient network for connectivity, Netagen ensured that the school district’s communications would remain operational even in the event of a site-specific or regional disruption. This was particularly crucial for ensuring the uninterrupted function of essential life-safety lines, including 911, fire, elevator, and security alarms, which were seamlessly integrated into the new SIP environment.
Value: Cost savings, unbreakable reliability and future-readiness
The value of the deliverables was immediate and multifaceted:
- Significant cost reduction: By consolidating services onto a single SIP platform, the school district eliminated the high recurring costs associated with managing hundreds of individual analog lines, leading to substantial and predictable savings.
- Guaranteed business continuity: The disaster recovery capabilities provided through ifonica’s infrastructure gave the district true peace of mind. Critical communications are now protected against outages, ensuring that staff, students, and emergency services can always connect.
- Enhanced operational control: The new platform provided supervisors with the real-time dashboards and detailed reporting they previously lacked, enabling them to manage resources effectively and improve service levels.
- A foundation for the future: The SIP-based architecture is inherently scalable. It provides the school district with a flexible foundation to easily integrate future communication tools, such as advanced unified communications (UC) or expanded contact center channels, without requiring another major infrastructure overhaul.
Service delivery and ongoing support
The transition was delivered as a fully managed, turnkey project. Netagen handled the end-to-end implementation, from initial design and migration to hosting and final deployment. The service is delivered a model that enables Netagen to manage the platform, provide ongoing support, and ensure the system remains optimized and secure. This allows the school district’s IT team to offload the day-to-day operational burden and focus on other strategic initiatives.
Through this strategic partnership, Netagen and ifonica provided the school district with a modern, cost-effective, and exceptionally resilient communications solution that will serve its needs for years to come.
Choosing ifonica for SIP trunking offers numerous benefits tailored for modern businesses. Our SIP trunking solution provides immediate cost savings compared to traditional PRI or analog lines and eliminates unnecessary infrastructure, optimizing your existing telecom investments and increasing ROI. At ifonica, our team supports Canadian businesses across all sectors. Reach out to one of our experts to find which communication solution will optimize your business operations.
