Town Hall of Calonge transforms city-wide network with Alcatel-Lucent converged solution

Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) has been selected by the Town Hall of Calonge, Girona, Spain, to transform the level of customer service provided to its citizens by connecting all users within city hall through a voice and data converged network. The new network, with 10 Gigabit Ethernet technology capabilities, will support a comprehensive set of applications that provide advanced services to citizens of Calonge.

Alcatel-Lucent’s OmniSwitch family is at the core of this new IP-based solution integrated by Alcatel-Lucent business partner BC Sistemas. The new Town Hall network provides 250 employees with reliable, easy to deploy telecommunications services that improve the level of care citizens receive from city employees in nine local government buildings, including two head quarters and seven branches.

The deployment enables the Town Hall of Calonge to manage the network centrally and to provide citizens with access to a wide range of key applications designed to provide useful information to common inquiries. The Town Hall has also integrated voice over IP advanced services provided by the Alcatel-Lucent OmniPCX Enterprise communication server, which is delivering a significant cost reduction and improving overall performance of the different sites belonging to the Town Hall.

Based on 100/1000/10000 Ethernet technology, the new network provides increased switching capability and higher reliability. It is comprised of a backbone network based on 10 Gigabit Ethernet with a configuration that integrates several different Alcatel-Lucent’s platforms including two OmniPCX Enterprise IP communication servers, an OmniSwitch 7800, and nine OmniSwitch 6600 PoE, as well as the applications and services required to meet the main objective of the Town Hall.

Santiago Solá, IT Manager at Town Hall of Calonge, commented, “The objective of the converged IP infrastructure is to enable our employees to offer improved citizens’ care and that is the reason why we installed a communication systems network that would provide advanced technology and easily allow our employees to provide superior services. After the evaluation of different solutions, we chose Alcatel-Lucent due to the high service level and professionalism offered by their Business Partner, BC Sistemas, proven during the entire project”.

“BC Sistemas is honoured to be chosen by the Town Hall of Calonge and to continue to work with together on further projects,” added José Antonio Illarregui, General Manager from BC Sistemas. “We are pleased that Town Hall recognizes the benefits that the Alcatel-Lucent’s solutions provide. More over, the Town Hall is planning to deploy Wireless and Contact Center solutions in the near term, and we will support them with the best solutions available.”

Rafael Martínez Sánchez-Bretaño, Marketing Manager for the Alcatel-Lucent’s enterprise activities in Spain and Portugal said, “More and more organizations are realizing that convergence isn’t just about saving money, it’s about transforming and improving internal processes through greater collaboration and increased access to resources. The Town Hall of Calonge is a good example of a forward-thinking local government committed to providing the highest standard of service to its citizens. The installation serves as an excellent blueprint that other public sector organisations will most certainly follow.”