Smena Trading Migrates to Unified Communications Across Khabarovsk Region

Plans to Extend Reliable Cisco-Based Information Portal From the Far East to St. Petersburg
MOSCOW, Russia - June 2008 - Cisco announced today that Smena Trading, a leading Russian exporter of wood materials and timber to South-East Asia and Europe, has replaced its legacy Private Branch Exchange (PBX) telephone system with a new Cisco® Unified Communications system. The IP voice and data solution has replaced out-dated phone systems in branch offices of Khabarovsk and the Port of Vanino helping Smena Trading to boost efficiency of business processes, raise the quality of customer services and cut operational costs. Smena Trading has plans to connect all its global branch offices to the network in the future.

With a number of branches in Russia’s Far East, Siberia and St. Petersburg, Smena Trading needed a reliable, highly secure telecommunications network. As the company expands sales into new markets, easy integration with existing data systems and support for new services were also key considerations in selecting the right IP communications solution.

2K, a specialist in end-to-end network solutions, was awarded the project to build an advanced telecommunications network for Smena Trading. In the first stage, 2K built a unified communications system using Cisco Unified Communications Manager 6.0 Business Edition platform with the Cisco Unity Connection 2.0 voice mail system. All incoming calls to Smena Trading are now routed to a telephone operator’s console, which consists of a Cisco Unified IP Phone 7961G with an Expansion Module, a wireless headset and a fully integrated touch-sensitive LCD screen.

The updated infrastructure also means that each individual user at headquarters and in the local branch offices has Russian voicemail, a simplified internal and external dialing system and a common enterprise phone directory with a full index of names and internal phone numbers. Services offered by the network include access to an individual webpage where users can log-in and view their personal notepad, store speed dial numbers and use other services previously unavailable to Smena Trading.

“A common network based on Cisco Unified Communications is an ideal solution for companies with distributed infrastructure,” said Michael Chursin, regional manager, Cisco, Russia’s Far East region. “A few years ago, unified communications in the Far East were used only by large companies. Now, more small and medium businesses are choosing reliable and scalable IP infrastructures capable of handling the most challenging situations.”

Cisco Unified Ccommunications Manager 6.0 Business Edition with Cisco Unity Connection 2.0 is ideally suited to medium-sized enterprises (100 to 500 employees). Easy to install and operate, flexible and scalable, it helps enable a full range of services for voice and video, provides a unique single phone number to each user through Cisco Unified Mobility, and supports messaging and presence services through Cisco Unity Connection 2.0. The solution also allows the deployment of new services supported by the Cisco Unified Communications system, such as Cisco Unified MeetingPlace and Cisco Unified IP Contact Center.

Cisco Unified Mobility allows calls to be automatically forwarded to a mobile phone number if a user is out of office, helping ensure that the user does not miss any calls. Cisco Unified Communications also supports tuning and customizing of incoming call processing by helping users to indicate which calls they would like sent to their mobile phones and which are to be forwarded to voice mail, allowing users the freedom to screen their calls.

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