MISSISSAUGA, ONTARIO - January 22, 2003 - Cisco Systems today announced the City of Mississauga is transforming its voice and data networks into a converged Internet Protocol (IP) communications system based on Cisco technology. The converged voice-data network is expected to deliver up to $700,000 in annual savings and will be the largest municipal IP telephony system in Canada.
"The City of Mississauga is using IP-based communications technology to significantly reduce costs, while improving organizational efficiency and employee productivity," said Pierre-Paul Allard, president of Cisco Systems Canada. "The convergence of voice, video and data is revolutionizing the way organizations communicate - and the City of Mississauga is setting the bar for municipalities under pressure to do more with less.
Based on Cisco AVVID (Architecture for Voice, Video and Integrated Data) technology, the $3.3 million dollar network will feature 2,300 Cisco IP phones at more than 60 municipal buildings throughout the city. The transition to IP telephony, which began in June 2002, is scheduled to be complete by late spring 2003.
"It's exciting that we can provide our employees with state-of-the-art technology, while saving our taxpayers money at the same time," said Jack Lawrence, director of information technology at the City of Mississauga. "The project has been a tremendous success. Despite the size and complexity of the project, the implementation went smoothly and the transition was seamless to employees and the general public."
According to the City, converging its voice and data networks will lower its total cost of ownership by eliminating redundant infrastructure, centralizing administration and simplifying maintenance. It will also enable a series of new services including Enhanced 911 emergency calling, City-wide four-digit dialing and online employee directories.
IP telephony allows data, voice and video to be transmitted over a single network infrastructure. By transporting voice as high-priority data on high-speed IP data networks, IP telephony can deliver exciting new capabilities and significant cost savings over traditional telephone technology.
Improving Communications, Reducing Costs The City of Mississauga manages a diverse range of public buildings including libraries, arenas, fire departments, parks and recreation and administrative buildings such as city hall. As a long-term Cisco customer, it already had an advanced data network, but lacked a centralized telephone system.
Relying on traditional, circuit-switching telephone technology, the City developed a series of stand-alone phone systems. Within the 2002 time frame existing telephony contracts were due to expire and its old communications infrastructure had become expensive to operate. Following a lengthy public request for proposal process, the City of Mississauga decided on an IP Communications solution from Cisco Systems.
The converged communications system will help solve a 911 dialing issue faced by most large organizations. The City of Mississauga will be the first Canadian enterprise to feature Enhanced 9-1-1 (E 9-1-1), which is designed to automatically provide the location of a phone on the network to emergency services. By helping dispatchers capture the exact location of an emergency call, E-9-1-1 helps make emergency response more efficient.
The converged communications system also enables a number of productivity-enhancing services. The converged network permits four-digit dialing among municipal employees at all sites. It also powers an online employee directory - along with other directories such as calls placed, calls received and calls missed - which are accessible from the browser-screen of the Cisco IP phone.
The ease of moving IP phones on the new network is also paying dividends. The response time for "adds, moves and changes" has been reduced from a minimum of two weeks to a couple of days, or even hours. Because the phones are IP devices on a converged IP network, employees can simply unplug their phone and plug it in at a new location. The IP phone will reconfigure itself and all calls will be automatically routed to the phone extension, regardless of where it is plugged in on the network.
