Advanced Resource Technologies, Inc. (ARTI)

Advanced Resource Technologies, Inc. (ARTI) is an information services provider and systems integrator with expertise in providing LAN/WAN systems, IT security services, security operations and management, program management and logistics, and managed IT services. ARTI has 40 internal users in its Alexandria, Virginia facility and 250 employees contracted out to government sites and staffing call centers, providing administrative support and meeting the specific needs of the firms’ government and commercial customers.

“I spoke with other administrators who deal with the same cost and scale challenges that we face here at ARTI, and they all raved about ShoreTel on ease of use, ease of administration, and cost-effectiveness.”
- Matt Brady, Network Engineer, ARTI.

In early 2004, ARTI was planning to move its headquarters from one side of Alexandria to the other. With a legacy Panasonic PBX system that was over ten years old, the company recognized a need to move to a new technology and consolidate ARTI’s voice and data networks. The ability to integrate with legacy systems was important to the team at ARTI, since its infrastructure includes a mix of equipment.

“If we’d gone with Cisco, everything would have had to be Cisco — there is no vendor neutrality with them.”
- Matt Brady, Network Engineer, ARTI.

Based on an open, distributed architecture, the ShoreTel platform integrates with switches and routers from all the leading data vendors. ShoreTel provided ARTI with dozens of ShoreTel IP 210 and ShoreTel IP 560 Phones, as well as ShoreTel T1, 120, and 60 Voice Switches. With the help of ARTI’s integrator, which had previously only handled the organization’s data network, design and implementation took a mere two days. Other benefits include:

• ShoreTel Director’s Web-based interface streamlines management tasks, eliminating the need for outside service calls. IT staff can process moves, adds, and changes from anywhere on the network — even from home.
• Downtime is not a concern, as ShoreTel voice switches employ a unique call control architecture that distributes call processing on the network, ensuring uninterrupted service. Distributed call processing eliminates single-point failures.
• With ShoreTel Call Manager’s rich features, including advanced mobility and presence, ARTI employees spend less time playing phone tag and more time performing mission-critical, revenue-producing tasks.
• Improved customer service is enabled with operators able to see who is available at any given moment, connecting callers faster than ever to the right person for their need.

“The new ShoreTel system quickly paid for itself because I can manage it all myself — data and voice — instead of calling someone in for voice support, which is costly. I haven’t calculated it exactly but the return on investment is no more than about one or two years when it comes to the management savings alone.”
- Matt Brady, Network Engineer, ARTI.