Success Story

OTE Group

OTE Group in Oman Deploys Sangoma Business Communication System to Achieve World-Class UC Setup

The Customer

OTE Group is one of the largest business groups in Oman with interests in exclusive distributorships of Automotive Brands, parts and accessories, as well as Consumer Electronics & Home Appliances. The group exclusively represents General Motors, Hyundai Motor Company, ISUZU Trucks, SsangYong Motors, Subaru Automobiles, Chery Automobiles, Shell Lubricants, Hankook Tires, Pirelli Tires, AC Delco Parts, LG Electronics, White-Westinghouse and Bosch Home Appliances among others. The company has branch offices, sales showrooms, service centres and parts outlets spread through the entire length and breadth of Oman. Over 2500 employees work in the company in various roles ranging from competent managers, supervisors and support staff.
Sangoma

Business Challenges

Prior to 2016, OTE Group primarily used Microsoft Lync for their internal communications in the company. The main challenge with this setup was that the customer was unable to upgrade Microsoft Lync 2013 based IP telephony system to Skype for Business Server (SBS) as existing phones deployed were not supported for SBS. This was a critical challenge as it led to dependency on the phone vendor to provide upgraded firmware for phones to be operational with Lync. OTE uses IP phones from multiple vendors and the presence of more than one Microsoft certified partner in the picture complicated this challenge further. The main challenges faced by the customer were:  Upgrade to a phone system that supports multiple phone brands  Avoid costly Lync licenses  Save on time and human resources managing the phone systems  Setup a professional and easy to maintain phone system for the company Due to the nature of their partnerships, the need for a state-of-the-art communication system was of paramount importance to the company. Having deployed Sangoma Session Border Controllers (SBC) with their Lync infrastructure, OTE group was familiar with the best-in-class quality and resilience provided by Sangoma solutions. The versatility of the products and the ability to scale had impressed them. In the year 2016, the company made the decision of implementing a Sangoma phone solution – complete with FreePBX and feature add-one (AKA commercial modules), IP phones and Gateways.
Sangoma

Solutions from Sangoma

Sangoma solutions deployed at OTE include about 340 Sangoma VoIP phones (mainly s500 and s300 models) in the customer environment. OTE also deployed a number of FreePBX 60 systems, a Vega 3000 Gateway, and several FreePBX commercial modules like Endpoint Manager and Extension Routing. Sangoma phones integrate with FreePBX like no other phones do. FreePBX phone apps are available readily on Sangoma phones right out-of-the-box without the need for additional licenses. Users can control complicated features like Call Parking, Follow Me, Do Not Disturb, Conference Rooms, Call Forwarding, Time Conditions, Presence, Queues, Queue Agents, Transfer to Voicemail, Visual Voicemail etc. directly from their phones without having to remember feature codes. Sangoma Endpoint Manager proved extremely useful to auto-provision and configure the multi-vendor phones in OTE’s environment. The FreePBX modules were deployed to achieve certain features that were critical for the implementation of certain organizational policies. For example, the extension routing module allowed them to easily control the dialing facilities for each extension. Using this module, they could restrict who could make international calls or mobile calls etc. OTE had several legacy Fax machines which risked becoming obsolete. They were added into the company’s IP network by using Sangoma Vega Gateway.

The Results

The deployment of the Sangoma solutions complete with FreePBX systems, commercial modules, Sangoma VoIP phones, Gateways and SBCs gave the OTE Group the control they needed when it came to managing their internal phone systems. In addition to achieving a world-class communication system that matches their company’s ethos, the customer has found a permanent solution to the business challenges that they faced:  Exceptionally lower costs, as installation of FreePBX systems and phones require a low one-time investment and no further need for additional licenses or renewals.  The EndPoint Manager, with its features for automated provisioning, automated firmware upgrades, managing extension moves-adds-changes makes handling the phone system remarkably hassle-free and requiring little maintenance. The OTE Group is extremely satisfied with their phone system and plans to extend this to their other branch offices giving everyone a chance to upgrade from analog to IP telephony and, thus, a modern, contemporary and superior business communication solution.