inrich consulting

VoIP Tender Toolkit - Part 1: Preparation

Richard Tucker — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 13:45:12 +0000

This is the first installment in the “VoIP Tender Toolkit” series. I hope the complete series will provide everything you need to prepare, issue and evaluate a 500 - 5,000 seat VoIP Tender. Template documents will be provided where helpful. This series is based on actual experience and incorporates my lessons learnt over the years. In this first part I will run through the considerations before you start; defining business objectives, activities and expected timelines, budgeting, and resources required.

Business Objectives

Start the entire VoIP tender process by defining your business objectives. Too often have I seen people forget that technology is a business enabler and that business objectives provide the focus of a tender not technical objectives. Business objectives provide the reference point to make decisions towards getting the best value for money tender result, this may not necessarily be the best value for money technical result! (indeed it may not even result in a VoIP solution!). In my experience tenders commenced with a technical objective too often result in a poor business result and are consequently deemed a failure.

The following table provides some common business objectives and the potential VoIP tender results. Hopefully this highlights the reason for stating business objectives rather than technical objectives.

Example Business Objectives	Potential Tender Results
Provide telephony to a new office site	Installation of a PABX, extension of services from an existing PABX or installation of hosted telephony service.
Lower telephony costs	Renegotiation of call rates, renegotiation of maintenance contracts, installation of lower cost telephony solutions (PABX, extended services or hosted services) or outsource of telephony support
Increase business efficiency	Integration of business software and telephony services (e.g. in call centre environments), solutions to save telephony administration time or new solutions to support under served business functions (e.g. home or mobile workers)

Activities and timelines
The activities and related timelines for preparing and releasing a VoIP tender are presented in the following table. In general, the timelines are the same for any size company over 500 ends. Larger or more complex requirements need more work but usually have more people involved. The first step “Preparation” is the focus of this post, and the remaining steps except “await supplier responses”! will be the focus of the next parts in this series.

Step	Timeline
Preparation	Month 1
Business requirements gathering	Month 1
User requirements gathering	Month 2
Technical requirements gathering	Month 2
Technical environment survey	Month 2
Tender strategy development	Month 3
Tender development and release	Month 3
Await supplier responses	Month 4
Tender evaluation	Month 5
Contract negotiation	Month 6

Yes, the above table provides an elapsed estimate of 6 months! I’ve seen slightly quicker, but never less than 5 months. In an organisation larger than 500 people it just is not possible to get agreement and approvals any faster. It can be up to 9 months if a second stage of tendering is completed. Organisations who try to complete a tender in less time often miss key detail, make mistakes, and end up regretting it.

Budget
Too many organisations spend loads of money on running a tender process only to find they can’t afford any of the resulting proposals. Having a budget to produce the tender will manage short term cost expectations and having an idea on the resulting proposal cost range will manage the medium to long term cost expectations.

Item	Budget range
Tender process	± 50%
Internal labour (see next section for details)	29 weeks of effort
Consultant labour	5 weeks of effort
Tender result	± 30%
“no frills” telephony	around £12 (per end per month over 5 years + call costs)
“advanced” telephony	extra £5 for call centre functions extra £5 for voice recording (per end per month over 5 years + call costs)
Legacy or existing system integration	10% of the overall solution otherwise not worthwhile

Please note I have provided a cost per end point per month over 60 months as this is a reasonable life span of a telephony solution. The estimates include ongoing maintenance costs but do not include call charges. VAT in addition. The budget accuracy of 30% for the tender result and 50% of the labour resources acknowledges differences in solutions and deal size (labour varies significantly more). Vendor finance options will only effect cash flow but not the total cost (there’s no such thing as a free lunch!). The number of sites in a solution wont have a significant effect on the budget accuracy as long as each site has at least 100 users.

So as an example using the above table, a 500 user solution including 50 call centre seats including voice recording, will cost over 5 years about £270,000 to £500,000 + call costs + internal and consultant labour + integration costs (500 “no frills” × £12 × 60 months + 50 “advanced” × (£5 call centre + £5 voice recording) × 60 months = £390,000, 70% = £273,000, 130% = £507,000).

Resources required

The following table provides a breakdown of the labour estimate in the previous section. As usual the estimate is a guide and will hopefully be useful in preparing your own estimates.

Role	Activities	Weeks effort ± 50%
Project sponsor (accountable for the tender outcome)	Essential input to Preparation stage, Tender Strategy Development Stage and signoff and steering for key decisions.	3
Project manager	Manage and co-ordinate activities and resources from beginning to end.	16
IT resources	Key input to technical requirements gathering, technical environment survey and tender evaluation stages.	3
Business representative resources	Key input to business requirements gathering and tender evaluation stage.	3
Procurement resources (may include legal and finance representation)	Key input to tender development and release, tender evaluation and contract negotiation.	4
	Total	29

Consultant time was estimated at 5 weeks, this covers assistance across all stages of the process, but in particular insight and experience in the tender development and release, the subsequent evaluation and contract negotiation. Unless your company has specific VoIP tender experience I would not recommend excluding this resource as the benefit will far outweigh the cost when compared to the overall solution budget.

Summary
Successful preparation for a VoIP tender will mean your business objectives have been clearly defined, a schedule defining tasks, timelines and resources will have been developed and expectations on the approximate financial values resulting from the tender will have been managed with your project sponsor.

Part 2 in this series will cover business, user and technical requirements gathering.

The compatibility issue of business to business telepresence

Richard Tucker — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 22:25:31 +0000

John Bartlett over at No Jitter has a great summary of the issues faced with business to business telepresence compatibility when compared to single codec based video conferencing.

He captures the key issue nicely with “… we are left with a basic incompatibility between the way the telepresence systems are designed. Telepresence systems use multiple cameras looking out at a single room to create an image for the far end. Some systems use two, some three and some four cameras and screens… When we mix two vendors’ systems which are designed around different principles, we will get the disconnects that these separate design decisions create. Mismatches of … screen layout, image ratio, eye contact lines and more may make these connections substantially less immersive … single-codec video conferencing market has none of these issues beyond the basic connectivity and QoS requirements…”

No doubt with time standards will emerge to allow business to business telepresence but in the interim it is an important limitation (albiet outweighed by other advantages) to understand.

Microsoft announces Windows Mobile 6.5

Richard Tucker — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 22:10:51 +0000

Microsoft has announced Windows Mobile 6.5 with forecast availability for second half of this year. Some new features will no doubt be automatically disabled by enterprise customers, such as the online backup, online media uploading abilities and the online applications marketplace, but other enhancements will no doubt tickle the fancy of tech savvy users including the new touch sensitive interface.

Vendor finance may provide a solution

Richard Tucker — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 22:59:04 +0000

There have always been finance options available for technology solutions however given the current economic environment perhaps these will become more attractive to both vendors and customers (vendors who may not want to appear to be discounting their products and customers who are short of cash). For example a new financing solution from Cisco provides deferral of payments for 6 months… no doubt the devil is in the detail but if you are considering a project or if you have just delayed a project it may be worth checking with your potential suppliers about the options available.

Tandberg HD camera for Microsoft OCS

Richard Tucker — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 22:31:54 +0000

Tandberg has claimed the release of the first high definition (720p) camera for use with Microsoft OCS. The beta program will start in late Q1 2009. The camera is connected via USB and includes inbuilt microphone and autofocus.

Existing Tanberg/ OCS interoperation includes the ability to call between Tandberg room or telepresence systems and an Office Communicator desktop client with the added features of shared contacts (which you can add Tanberg virtual meeting rooms to), shared presence and multiple points of presence (so your Tandberg and Office Communicator client can share the same identity).

Cisco - 64% of world’s mobile traffic will be video by 2013

Richard Tucker — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 18:18:48 +0000

Cisco has released research on mobile data traffic growth under the banner of the Visual Networking Index. Some of the key points include:

Global mobile traffic will exceed two exabytes per month by 2013.
Global mobile data traffic reached one exabyte per month in half the time that fixed data traffic did.
Nearly 64 percent of the world’s mobile traffic will be video by 2013.
Mobile video will grow at a CAGR of 150 percent between 2008 and 2013.
Mobile broadband handsets with higher than 3G speeds and laptop air or data cards will constitute more than 80 percent of global mobile traffic by 2013.

OCS 5 day hosted trial - no fuss opportunity to learn

Richard Tucker — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 14:15:51 +0000

I’ve just completed the 5 day OCS hosted trial and am pleased to report it provided an insight that I would recommend to anyone interested in OCS. The online signup process was followed by an email providing logon details, voicemail box numbers and a download link for the desktop Office Communicator client. The daily email outlining key features was clear and consise. Features covered by the trial include:

Instant Messaging & Presence using the Office Communicator desktop client
Email & Unified Messaging using Outlook Web Access including voice command access to your inbox and playback of email messages (Outlook Voice Access)
Peer-to-Peer Voice & Video using the Office Communicator client
Desktop Sharing
Web-based IM, Email, Presence & Desktop Sharing using Office Communicator Web Access (this uses a web based client for access rather than a downloadable desktop client… key for workers using home or public computers)

Large enterprises considering evaluating OCS will get evaluation trials from their suppliers quite easily, however if you just want a no fuss trial to understand what OCS is about then the hosted offer will serve you nicely. If you have more time to commit you can also download 180 day trials that you host on your own hardware.

Integrate your Polycom room and Microsoft desktop video solutions

Richard Tucker — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 00:11:18 +0000

If you have a Polycom video conferencing environment and Microsoft OCS environment then OCS R2 will reportedly let you integrate the two.

I’ve seen alot of demand for the ability to bring Microsoft Office Communicator users into Polycom video conference rooms - the best example being remote workers at home or in a hotel who want to join a room based video conference.

Of course Polycom have PC based web conferencing tools such as Polycom CMA Desktop… but if you are an OCS house already having one desktop video solution will only be a good thing. Shared presence and contact lists are among the features released.

Polycom QDX6000 low cost video conferencing

Richard Tucker — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 23:54:07 +0000

Polycom has released the QDX6000 a DVD quality (4CIF or 704 × 576 pixel) video conferencing unit for US$3,999 list (I can see this online for as low as US$3,199). This is around half the cost of the high definition (720p or 1280×720 pixel resolution) HDX8000 system. Camera, table microphones, AES encryption ability and dual monitor support are included.

For organisations with an existing Polycom environment the QDX6000 may slip in nicely to those low bandwidth remote sites that wont support high definition conferencing, while still integrating into Polycom central management and bridging systems.

If your organisation is new to video conferencing then this may provide a cheap entry point, but before diving in you will need to consider the approach and costs for bandwidth required (IP or ISDN), display devices (plasma/LCD screens) and ongoing maintenance and support costs.

And for all organisations don’t forget that setting up your room system by applying the same principles as telepresence rooms will provide a far superior video conferencing experience: screen sizes that support lifesize images; cameras at eye height; lighting that completely illuminates participants faces; and sound proof rooms and if required blackout blinds covering external facing windows.

Microsoft Release 2 for Office Communications Server… tomorrow

Richard Tucker — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 20:22:29 +0000

The official launch for Microsoft Office Communications Server Release 2 is tomorrow… get the details here.

Some of the new features include call distribution via the Response Group Service (including longest idle, round robin) and the option to front end the service with a voice prompt for callers to select an option.

Group Chat provides chat room functionality together with archiving abilities.

There are new features on the mobile client and a new attendant console for reception staff.

Microsoft has some curious short videos on YouTube to help convey the concepts. I’ve embedded the call distribution video below.