CNET Networks

CNET Networks, a San Francisco-based media firm, delivers a variety of information on all things technology-related, from consumer product reviews to breaking news and interviews with top industry executives. With 400 employees in its Bay Area headquarters, it also has offices in Chicago, Los Angeles, Kentucky, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and London. Because CNET covers all aspects of the technology world, it makes sense that when it came to choosing a new phone system, the company would demand best-of-breed IP technology.

“We knew that whatever we chose, we would have to stick with it for the next 10 years.”
— Don McGill, Director of Client Services, CNET.

Several years ago, CNET was in the process of consolidating a number of offices into a single location in San Francisco, which also meant consolidating into a single phone system. They had been using a traditional PBX from Avaya and had considered IP telephony solutions from Cisco and Nortel. With a small telecom staff, the CNET team put the focus on finding a simple, streamlined solution that was feature-rich and offered easy deployment and management.

“ShoreTel is straightforward to use for both users and for telecom staff.”
— Don McGill, Director of Client Services, CNET.

CNET worked directly with ShoreTel to set up 400 users in the San Francisco headquarters on the new IP phone system. Over six months, CNET replaced its analog phones with ShoreTel’s 530 IP phones. Since the initial deployment, CNET has expanded the system to locations in Chicago, Los Angeles, Kentucky, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and London. Today, more than 1,600 CNET employees worldwide rely on ShoreTel. Benefits include:

• Immediate return on investment (ROI) with the first deployment, which required no additional cabling and saved CNET about $100,000; selling the company’s two-year-old Avaya phone system added to this.
• Huge savings with least cost routing, toll bypass, consolidation of long distance calling, and the deployment of ShoreTel Converged Conferencing.
• Productivity gains achieved with every call, as employees can use one-click dialing to any CNET location worldwide. Tight integration with Microsoft^® Outlook^® lets them manage voicemail and email from the same interface.
• Maximizing of limited telecom resources, as CNET’s staff can easily deploy and manage the system from anywhere on the network via ShoreTel Director’s browser-based interface.

“We had payback on the ShoreTel system the day we moved in.”
— Don McGill, Director of Client Services, CNET.