Inside DiVitas

Evolving from VoIP to VoWiFi … Seamless roaming can cut costs to nil

by Chief Blogger

I started using one of those VoIP phone services about two years ago. There are many VoIP-doubters out there who like to bash these consumer services, whether or not they’ve ever tried a VoIP phone. Never mind them, the end user (that would be me) was really pleased with the service. The cost was the bomb. The voice quality was equal to that of a landline, which is important because one of my two lines was actually for business.

For the low-low price of just twenty-five bucks a month, per line, I was able to make unlimited phone calls. I work from home most of the time, which can easily translate to a hefty phone bill, even though my calls are almost strictly to call-workers. I’m not the only one who loved my VoIP service … my company was pleased as punch that my monthly phone expenses never exceeded $25.

Rave reviews aside, I recently ditched my business VoIP line because I’m getting a much better deal for unlimited calling. One that’s 100% free-free-free and also rivals the voice-quality of a landline.

So what’s changed? I became a DiVitas end user and started taking advantage of the fact that I work within WiFi range 99 percent of the time.

My DiVitas-enabled dual-mode device is the only business phone I use these days, even when I’m in the office. My deskphone has been disconnected and carted away for lack of use. My cube is wire-free. Frankly speaking, I don’t miss using a deskphone whatsoever. My DiVitas device behaves pretty much how it would if it were one of those regular 5-pound, wired-to-the-wall business phones. For example, I can simply dial a four-digit extension to reach a co-worker, I can transfer a call or I can put a call on hold.

At $00.00 per minute for intra-company communications, I think my DiVitas unlimited “phone service” is a pretty good deal. For personal use, my VoIP phone line is still holding its own. But truth be told, if not for my family’s need access to a telephone when my DiVitas-phone and I have roamed away from home, I’d ditch that one too in a New York-minute.

Converged mobile communications: WiFi kicks in when cell fails

by Gordon Young

I recently faced a unique challenge in which my mobile phone was both the problem and the solution.

Here is the dilemma I faced: What do you when you’re invited to the Riverbank Hotel in London for a presentation to six prospective partners? And you discover that the meeting room you’re using is three floors underground? And there is no GSM signal?!

Oh, and add to that, the topic you’re discussing is “mobility” and you need a functioning mobile phone because it’s part of the act?

Such were the conditions I was recently handed when I arrived at the Riverbank to give a sales presentation. Fortunately, I’m not the kind of guy to let something trivial like the absence of cell-coverage slow me down. I stood in front of the room and pondered, how am I going to show this?

The wheels were turning… my brain was hurting.

The first thing I said to the audience was, “Can somebody please phone this lady?” And then I rattled off a phone number. Everybody looked at me like I had three heads and responded, “Hey, we’re underground, we can’t make cell calls from here.”

Always one for a bit of drama, I whipped out my phone, which had already picked up the hotel WiFi, and placed the call. 

For the record, this act was totally raw. I didn’t even know the person whose number I was dialing – it belonged to the secretary of one of the delegates I was courting with my presentation.

My DiVitas phone worked like a charm. After completing the connection to this poor unsuspecting secretary, I made my greetings and put my phone, and her voice, on loud speaker and then slid the phone to the middle of the table so everybody could hear. The connection was seamless, the sound quality was perfect and the room was totally stunned.

That completely unrehearsed performance makes a good war story, but in truth what I did that day was effortless because the phone simply performed as advertised. I dialed a phone number and the DiVitas solution did its thing and found the optimal connection (in this case WiFi). Fortunately the lady I dialed –the only true risk in the demo – accepted the call, and she was kind enough to play along and have a conversation on loud speaker.

I should mention that several partners signed on that day. They were blown away by voice quality and equally stunned that I could make a call in the first place. Their business calls had to wait until the after the meeting when they could make the journey back to expensive GSM-ville.

Real-life cellular-Wifi seamless roaming

My DiVitas phone helps me sell

By David Smith

Being a sales guy, it goes without saying that I am by definition a big mobile-minute user. I’m one of those 4,000-minutes-per-month types. Adding to that, I’m a sales guy at DiVitas Networks, so it also goes without saying that I am a big user of our mobile-convergence solution.

A lot about being a mobile worker has improved dramatically since we deployed our solution internally and I officially became a DiVitas end user.

For starters, my DiVitas phone saves me countless cell minutes, especially when you consider that for years, my primary contact number has been my cell phone number. Regardless of whether I am on the road, or sitting in my home office, inbound calls primarily get placed to my cell. Every call is at least one cell minute spent. The minutes can quickly add up.

When I’m working at home – which I often do because I’m Atlanta-based and a couple of thousand miles away from the DiVitas HQ – those calls are now placed and received via WiFi. This means I am now spending way less time on the cellular network and simply enjoying the benefits of my $50 Linksys wireless router that was initially installed to extend my home network to include my family. Talk about fast ROI!

The other big benefit from being a DiVitas end user is that I get to show off the goods. Cutting costs is important to the folks running DiVitas, so I’m very glad for that. But for me, the sales guy, being able to put my money where my mouth is, well, priceless.

ust doing my job translates to an easy-but-effective live demo that I perform on a daily basis. I use my DiVitas phone when communicating with my customers on a daily basis, and I make sure they know that I’m using it.

Here’s the routine, and I literally do this all the time: I make the call and walk out to my back yard and then back to my office again. I tell the customer “I’m going to do a presentation … I’m going to tell you when I roam to cellular and then back to WiFi, and just know that I’m not doing anything to initiate it.”

It gets them every time. They think it’s cool as heck and now the solution is pretty much selling itself. Everybody we talk to wants it, no exception. This is absolutely something they need.

FMC matures to become Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC)

A day in the life of a mobile-convergence end user

by Vivek Khuller

Here at DiVitas, we’re eating our own dog food. We’ve deployed “Project Alpo” throughout our Mountain View, Calif. headquarters, and now nearly every DiVitas employee is a mobilized worker who is benefiting from the very solution our company has worked so hard to develop.

Eating the dog food serves a variety of purposes. Alpo end users provide valuable, real-world feedback to the product development group. We’re a vocal bunch that continually dishes out suggestions for improving upon the DiVitas Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) experience. We tell them what’s working, what’s not and we point out any nifty features that we think future DiVitas end users will appreciate. We are helping produce one extremely fine-tuned product!

Better yet, being an Alpo user allows us to realize first-hand how being mobilized can make you a better worker. From marketing to sales to engineers to executives running the company, the DiVitas Mobile UC solution is making us more available, productive employees. 

This blog is a case-study dedicated to providing a glimpse into the life of a DiVitas end user and highlights real-world use-cases for our Mobile UC solution.

Joy of one number

by Kamesh Velu

As an SQA Lead in an energetic startup like DiVitas, I have a job that is both demanding and interesting, and it’s typical for an average successful startup! With this semi-workaholic lifestyle, I find myself away from my home phone most of the time. I was really missing the fun of talking live with my friends. As I was so wrapped up with my work at the office, most of the time communication with them was just returning their voice mails, and receiving theirs back. Most of the time it was just droopy chit-chat like, “hi, how-are-you and bye.”

To overcome my social issue, I tried configuring my home VoIP phone to simultaneous ring my home and cell phone. This way I could pick up the call from either one. I had kind of solved my problem, but it wasn’t the greatest solution because of my patchy cell coverage. You know, notoriously bad in-building cellular reception interfering with the conversation. The other downside is it impacted my cell bill big-time because now most of my calls were being routed to my mobile phone vs. home phone. Every call cost me at least one minute of airtime.

But once we deployed the MCA solution internally, my social life changed for the better! I now have all of my numbers routed to one phone – my DiVitas handset – and now I am back to having all those lively buddy-buddy talks with my friends. What did I do? It was kind of similar to what I had done previously with the simultaneous ring, but this time I configured my home phone to simultaneously ring my DiVitas MCC number on my dual-mode phone instead of my personal cell number. The best part is that DiVitas uses WiFi when ever it is available so my cell bill has pretty much evaporated, and the voice quality is great.

And although being “always available” was originally motivated for personal reasons, having a DiVitas device has made me a more productive worker (this is a good thing as this is why DiVitas issued the phone to me!). Whenever I step away from my office, say, to a coffee shop, I don’t have to worry about missing important work calls because the MCC seamlessly roams to cell once I’m out the door and beyond WiFi range.

Now I have my home number, cell number and my office number follow me where ever I go!! I’m always within reach, whether it’s a friend, family member or co-worker trying to get a hold of me.

DiVitas reveals Mobile Unified Communications (Mobile UC) on InteropNet 2007

High-Tech Zoo, Interop Las Vegas ‘07

by DiVitas Chief Blogger

Have you ever been to the zoo and observed one of those “native habitats”? The kind where animals casually go about their business, like this is really the Kalaharai Desert and yah, we lions just downed this piece of sirloin steak we’re devouring. Roar.

Interop has an exhibit like that, except there’re techies, not lions, on display. And they’re ripping into code, not flesh. It’s called InteropNet.

Shoved neatly into the far left corner of this year’s Interop tradeshow floor was the usual inconspicuous cluster of equipment, cables, tables and hunched-over techies working on laptops. This is the InteropNet NOC. All of the action was behind a glass ‘look-but-don’t-touch’ barrier -- the equipment as well as the volunteers and vendors who keep the multi-vendor network humming.

InteropNet has been around for about 20 years and is comprised of equipment offered by about 25 different vendors. Everything is cobbled together with great care and expertise for what Interop refers to as “the ultimate networking challenge" – creating the InteropNet.

Eager, hand-selected volunteers and vendors appear each year (note: there is an application process) with a goal of demonstrating leading-edge, unprecedented interoperability.

Participating vendors each supply InteropNet with a key component required to craft the demo network. Among this year’s vendors were WLAN vendor Xirrus providing the network’s WiFi, Network General and cPacket providing network monitoring and management, Juniper providing security, Extreme providing core switching/routing and Gigamon providing the data access switch for aggregating and distributing traffic. Each piece of equipment used in this year’s Las Vegas InteropNet can be viewed via the InteropNet tour link.

For our part, the DiVitas MMC solution provided the mobility component for the VoIP/SIP-based Voice Services Group, which also included Avaya, Qwest and Spectralink.