A 36-year reputation for quality execution and customer care doesn’t just build itself. General contractor Security Vault Works (SVW), a Powerhouse Company, has spent the past three decades supplying services and capabilities including commercial contracting, architecture and engineering and turnkey implementation. When their legacy MPLS network wasn’t meeting the same standard of excellence that their services always delivered, it was time to lose the loose screws. SVW turned to Windstream Enterprise to replace outdated systems with next gen solutions that would keep their pledge of “best in class” customer service.
Laying out the blueprint
Security Vault Works’ mission is straightforward: Make the customer happy. This premier industry leader intently focuses on delivering top-notch project expertise and general contractor services to prominent financial and retail clients. There is no project size too large, no location too obscure and no scope too wide for them to handle.
With such a customer-centric goal to deliver quality service nationwide, SVW found themselves heavily reliant on a highly functioning network and communications tools. “Our ship would sink without these items,” said Dustin Ziesman, systems administrator at SVW.
As an IT team of one, Dustin worried that the company’s dependence on singlethreaded MPLS lacked the reliability, scalability and cost structure to meet growing demands, or to keep their customers satisfied. Whenever an outage occurred—which resulted to be more than 10 each year—email and phone systems went down too.
MPLS was unable to supply the bandwidth required to support the increase in network traffic driven by more data use, more employees, more customer interactions and more software applications to keep everyone connected.
But adding more MPLS bandwidth would prove to be cost prohibitive, on top of an already unreliable legacy network and voice system.
Dustin also recognized that it was becoming increasingly complex and time-consuming to support an on-premises security solution all on his own. Network security is a fundamental requirement today, particularly with the growing number and complexity of cyberthreats impacting every industry.
Aware of these challenges, SVW called upon Windstream Enterprise for their technology and expertise, to solve for these problems and to construct the perfect solution.
“Over the past 10 years, the Windstream Enterprise team has been outstanding to work with. They are highly responsive and knowledgeable.” Dustin Ziesman, Systems Administrator, Security Vault Works
The road to the future…is under construction
Windstream Enterprise hopped right in by proposing SD-WAN Concierge with high bandwidth Ethernet and cable broadband to provide the much-needed resiliency and flexibility that an older network cannot support. Implementing this dual connection allowed Windstream Enterprise to support SVW’s growing use of big data and cloud services. The automated failover of active/active would prevent any debilitating network outages and ensure all applications were running at peak performance.
Windstream Enterprise also recommended Managed Network Security (MNS), a comprehensive suite of cloud-based managed security services that can be applied to SVW’s network to minimize network threats and maximize uptime. Deploying this cloud solution would provide the 24/7 data protection they needed.
Windstream Enterprise installed Dynamic IP voice services to create a single network combining phone services and high-speed data, rather than separate networks for each. Dynamic IP runs over SVW’s SD- WAN network for an unfailing, scalable and flexible solution.
Enacting all of these new solutions can come off as intimidating, but Windstream Enterprise stood by SVW throughout the entire process, offering a demo and hands-on assistance until they felt confident with the products.
A superior foundation for a superior customer experience
Since implementing their SD-WAN and Ethernet through Windstream Enterprise, Dustin can ensure a better experience for SVW customers and employees alike.
The dual connectivity from SD-WAN Concierge resulted in outages reducing by 90%—from 10+ to one per year. SD-WAN Concierge positively increased resiliency with redundant, diverse connections at each site for seamless failover and business continuity at all locations.
Upon deploying MNS Cloud alongside the SD-WAN solution, Dustin was relieved from the burden of firewall maintenance. Whenever a change needed to be made, he had untethered access to a crew of security experts at Windstream Enterprise. His one-man IT operation finally had a team of experts to lean on. “This was worth its weight in gold to offload,” said Dustin. “Having a dedicated network team to manage and make changes on the fly makes it much easier than doing it all by myself.”
High bandwidth Ethernet and broadband cable also helped transform business by delivering a high-speed network, rock-solid performance and precise control, along with the security expected by their customers. Better yet, these improvements did not break the bank— the cost of the solution is about the same as their previous solution, but at a significantly greater value due to the improved resiliency and bandwidth.
Built for tomorrow
With a fully managed SD-WAN, MNS and voice solution in place, SVW can remain focused on serving customers and building their trust.
Post-deployment, Dustin is pleased with the service he’s receiving from Windstream Enterprise. As SVW continues moving things into the cloud, a greater priority is put on the speed and dependability of their network. Dustin agrees, “A reliable network becomes more essential for our team to remain productive and efficient as we continue to grow and support our customers.”
“SD-WAN from Windstream Enterprise has been the perfect solution to meeting our needs for increased resiliency and scalability.”
Dustin Ziesman, Systems Administrator, Security Vault Works
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