ARC builds VOIP-ready network with Nortel and Saab-Grintek

[sox63]

http://www.itweb.co.za/sections/business/2007/0708301032.asp?S=Servers%20and%20Server-Based%20Computing&A=SBC&O=FPTOP

If only more companies could take this approach and adopt technology in a phased manner. Not familiar with the Nortel Platform, anyone here worked with it before?

[kilos]

http://www.nortel.com/solutions/providers/enabling_tech/voip/index.html

Imagine pricey like the Siemens installed at the local Mossel Bay Municipality and the Philips VOIP system installed at the local George Municipality all phones are VoIP based.
Pity the Asterisk VoIP companies could not get in their.
Pricing for Asterisk I believe is 10-25% of the total cost of the main stream companies.

[daffy]

Nortel is insanely expensive, and a basic setup has very limited functionality.
More functionality, requires another license and possibly even more hardware, and often costs more than the original setup.

That being said. It works. And it works well.
But then again, a decent Asterisk setup does too, but its pretty hard to find a decent Asterisk based VoIP solution from a company with good support.

[Garlic_Milkshake]

http://www.nortel.com/solutions/providers/enabling_tech/voip/index.html

Imagine pricey like the Siemens installed at the local Mossel Bay Municipality and the Philips VOIP system installed at the local George Municipality all phones are VoIP based.
Pity the Asterisk VoIP companies could not get in their.
Pricing for Asterisk I believe is 10-25% of the total cost of the main stream companies.

At least going the route of Siemens,Phillips and Nortel you will have support and someone to blame. The problem with Asterisk is that its always run out of a local office and haven't got the backup. A lot of the times, the local office closes down, and then you need to find alternative support. In the long run, this could be way more expensive that taking one of the big Vendors. Further more, R&D on Asterisk software are done by the local supplier and for another company to take it over, could be to load completely new Software which again is ectra costs.:D

[kilos]

Thats why its important to go for a company that has offices
in the major centers hopefully where their offices are.
ARC certainly spread all over SA, so going with the top IT companies
will be an obvious choice.