Etisalat IT Infrastructure - Case Study Example

IT Infrastructure Case Study al Affiliation) Introduction Emirates Telecommunications conglomerate, branded business Etisalat, is a United Arab Emirates founded telecommunications services supplier, at present operating within 15 nations across the Asia, Africa, as well as Middle East. As of February the year 2014, Etisalat is the twelfth leading mobile network operator within the globe, with an overall consumer base of over 150 million. Forbes Middle East within the UAE referred to Etisalat as the most influential corporation in the year 2012. The system that has been studied is voice over Internet Protocol at Etisalat. Challenges faced by the organization The company is faced by predicaments such as disconnected voice, as well as data networks, poor consumer service, skyrocketing operating expenditure, and difficulty within management. Consumers of Etisalat began facing interruption and deficiency in landline, Wi-Fi or 4G connectivity and then, did not have the capacity to open online sites on either their workstations or mobile phones. Numerous Etisalat consumers have grumbled that their World Wide Web connections have been improved to e-life packages exclusive of their permission being attained. Several complaints with reference to unauthorized upgrades and one Etisalat client said he lately got a call from a corporation representative who proffered him an Al Shamil World Wide Web connection to the upgrade of the e-life package. Etisalats e-life application brings together a landline phone, broadband World Wide Web and television services within a packaged offer (Wallingford 2005:43). Etisalat is taking the decrease and management of operating expenses by initiating reorganization and outsourcing strategies as a prospective strategy into consideration. These suggestions are supposed to help Etisalat to deal with the speed of development seen within the ICT divisions and face economic challenges, which telecom providers all over the globe, counting Etisalat are facing. This is because of the rising expenses of new-fangled technology essential for companies to augment their competitive edge within local and global marketplaces, escorted by drop within revenues of the international telecom business. Data set of connections has turned out to be critical to trade, and several would say possibly more significant than the voice system. Many businesses might do devoid of their tone of dialing for 30 minutes, but given that their servers or even routers malfunction, it would be a calamity. Home consumers utilize "data" with every email or Internet browser. There has been poor Internet coverage in numerous areas within the globe. Most times, utilizing Etisalat services through their network suppliers are frustrating because of the high drop calls rate, reduced network coverage, annoying Internet services, as well as unwarrantable charges. An individual can rarely complete a one-minute phone call with no bad signal obstruction. In addition, Etisalat network suppliers appear to only concentrate on cities and main towns leaving far-off regions with poor, along with network deficiency (Ganguly & Bhatnagar 2008:3). Dial-up, along with ISDN World Wide Web access services are payable by the hour, while the domestic and built-up cable and DSL Internet connections have a permanent monthly rate relying on speed. Supplementary Internet links, meant for business consumers, have traffic consumption plans and comparatively high rates while exceeding the apportioned bandwidth quota.  Technology Infrastructure Overview In the swift industry of telecommunications, convergence is a way of amalgamating of the long-established voice and information networks into a single shared transportation. The importance of this union is in effectiveness and expenditure savings. A main long distance delivery service representative affirmed at a main conference the inference of convergence within huge networks. Etisalat can utilize convergence through the Voice over Internet Protocol technology by utilizing one network within their business for all voice, information and additional applications. This is an actually pie-within-the-sky outlook since it almost certainly cannot always be 100% accurate. This is for the reason that a converged set of connections for every application would save within the neighborhood of seventy percent on management and 40-50 percent on maintenance and processes. Therefore, if providers, as well as consumers could even attain half this effectiveness it effects in remarkable savings on these key operating everyday expenditure (Dwivedi 2008:124).  These Voice over Internet Protocol phone systems turn up with very numerous security features intended to prevent illegal access. The systems are not as vulnerable to phreaking, as well as hacking as long-established phone structures are. This implies that any company can have a rest in the comprehension that sensitive company data will be entirely safe from hackers. In addition, these VoIP structures undergo usual upgrades, which fix the diverse security gaps that can be utilized by hackers to get access to the company’s information. Communication is typically one of the principal expenses for whichever company. At what time a business adopts Voice over Internet Protocol, they do not require to utilize the public switched phone set of connections. This hence means that companies do not need to spend cash installing and sustaining the electrical system, switching hardware, as well as the diverse components within physical communications. In addition, the corporation will handle every communication requirement that is the internet, online functions, software, and etcetera from one Voice over Internet Protocol application, which then means that a smaller quantity of workers will be required (Singh & Raja 2010:156). A corporation will never stop being in correspondence with the workers since these Voice over Internet Protocol phone structures are extremely flexible. Employees will have the capacity to take their Voice over Internet Protocol phone structures with them while not in the office, utilize laptops, and etcetera. This, therefore, implies that work is able to be undertaken all through the day utilizing emails, voicemails, practical phone numbers, faxes, and etcetera. These Voice over Internet Protocol systems thus result in augmented work rates, improved productivity and hence higher productivity within a comparatively short period of time. A corporation that desires to increase its trade activities to other nations such Etisalat have adopted Voice over Internet Protocol phone structures. This is for the reason that Voice over Internet Protocol systems have worldwide conferencing features set up inside (Abdallah̄ 2007:82). They permit Etisalat to interrelate with customers and workers from everywhere in the globe in actual time and at a portion of the fee, which is incurred with corporeal communication structures. Etisalat has an easily synchronized company activities right through the diverse branches. This effects in greater efficiency and advanced levels of consumer satisfaction. Etisalat functions incessantly on consumer insight-founded and focused proposals and the improvement of positive consumer experience across every touch point. Comprehending its consumers and guaranteeing positive connections with them during their life phase is a core capability to compete within EGs areas. On the technology border, EG aims to strengthen its place as the most honorable and dependable operator through greater set of connections and quality of services. Daring one of the utmost margins within the trade, EG has resolutely established more than a few strategic plans to sustain strong productivity. Important efficiency development objectives have been laid out across the company that will be put into operation in the outlook through procurement actions, operational effectiveness, commercial synergies, along with capital structure maximization across the Grouping. The technology at the back of Voice over Internet Protocol has existed for a only some years; early on incarnations of Voice over Internet Protocol were inundated by mottled service, jumbled and dropped phone calls (Davidson 2007:69). Only within the last small number of years has Voice over Internet Protocol service improved sufficiently to make it adequately dependable and steady for business utilization. In actuality, businesses such as Etisalat are finding out that a well-designed and employed Voice over Internet Protocol system can offer call quality, as well as reliability, which competes with mobile phone or even landline calls. Etisalat has the aptitude to benefit from Voice over Internet Protocol since is its low down cost. Within the conformist telephony globe, numerous phone lines, forum calling features, as well as long distance fees create many additional charges. Etisalat has the capacity to have an abridged infrastructure. Etisalat has better efficiency since Voice over Internet Protocol treats voice similar to any other type of data, so consumers can affix documents to actual voice messages or take part in virtual conventions using shared information and videoconferencing. Etisalat also has flexible connections since the corporation has its individual VPN and coalesces it with Voice over Internet Protocol; it has been able to can set up an entirely functioning office wherever there is a connection of broadband (Cherrayil 2013:2). Recommendations In summing up, Etisalat is supposed to integrate Voice over Internet Protocol phone structures into their assortment of departments so that it can continue being competitive within a constantly shifting business environment. Etisalat ought to be ready to deal with the deficiency in security features, which are constructed into the existing Voice over Internet Protocol systems. With knowledge and an obligation to security, any business is able to get pleasure from the cost savings safely, which Voice over Internet Protocol offers. Voice over Internet Protocol utilization is supposed to rise over the subsequent few years. Since the amount of business Voice over Internet Protocol phones put on the market will grow considerably each year, 40 percent of the companies do not have detailed plans for making their Voice over Internet Protocol deployments secure. On the other hand, ignoring safety measures is not prudent, since the more prevalent Voice over Internet Protocol turns out to be, the more probable it is to be aimed for Internet criminals. The majority of Voice over Internet Protocol resolutions are lacking incorporated safety measures features, and Etisalat ought to take this critically to steer clear of future predicaments. References ABDALLAH̄, R. (2007). The internet in the Arab world: Egypt and beyond. New York, Lang. CHERRAYIL, N. (2013). Etisalat fires silent salvo in VoIP calling market. Gulf News. http://gulfnews.com/business/telecoms/etisalat-fires-silent-salvo-in-voip-calling-market 1.1141787 DAVIDSON, J. (2007). Voice over IP fundamentals. Indianapolis, Ind, Cisco Press. DWIVEDI, H. (2008). Hacking VoIP. San Francisco, Calif, No Starch. GANGULY, S., & BHATNAGAR, S. (2008). VoIP Wireless, P2P and New Enterprise Voice over IP. Chichester, John Wiley & Sons. http://public.eblib.com/EBLPublic/PublicView.do?ptiID=470209. SINGH, R., & RAJA, S. (2010). Convergence in information and communication technology: strategic and regulatory considerations. Washington, D.C., World Bank. WALLINGFORD, T. (2005). Switching to VoIP: [a solutions manual for network professionals]. Beijing [u.a.], OReilly. Appendix A (Academic Honesty) Blog 1 I have learned from this project that businesses require finding out precisely what hardware the set of connections infrastructure is made up of and more significant, if it will sustain technology, which can perk up voice superiority. For example, routers along with switches, which support virtual Local Area Networks and transfer shaping, go an extended way in the direction of carving out sufficiently dependable bandwidth to put off degradation of Voice over Internet Practical connections. I also leant that VoIP unites company’s numerous locations counting mobile employees into one converged communications set of connections and offers an unparalleled variety of telephony sustenance services, along with features. A number of the problems that I stumbled upon included comprehending what some of the terms integrated in VoIP and how the technology works within businesses. Given that I were supposed to carry out the research afresh and write the project would take come up with a schedule that I would use to write out what activity relating to the project I would carry out at what time and for how long. I would additionally desire to look into supplementary topics related to the project that I would pursue that may be easier to understand and write a project about including the research and information gathered. Blog 2 Voice over Internet Protocol has the aptitude to turn a typical Internet link into a means to place free of charge phone calls. The useful upshot of Voice over Internet Protocol is that by utilizing some of the complimentary VoIP software, which is obtainable to make World Wide Web phone calls, getting around the phone corporation and its fees completely. I also gained knowledge that Voice over Internet Protocol is a world-shattering technology, which has the prospective to completely redraft the globes phone systems. For Voice over Internet Protocol technology to work, it needs the utilization of similar protocols, which the Internet utilizes. Therefore, voice over Internet protocol implies that voice travels by means of equivalent protocols utilized on the World Wide Web. A number of the predicaments that I came across while doing the project took account of the load of research I had to carry out and reading that I had to do so that I could understand my project. If I were told to do this assignment afresh, I would make sure that I selected a subject, which I fairly recognized with and not a novel topic that I had to start reading about because of the assignment. Blog 3 This assignment has helped me understand that Voice over Internet Protocol has numerous advantages when weighed against the long-established phone structure. The main rationale for which individuals and companies are particularly turning to Voice over Internet Protocol technology is the charges. VoIP is required to be inexpensive, but most individuals utilize it without charge. Given that an individual has a PC or laptop with a microphone, as well as speakers, and a good World Wide Web connection, he or she can communicate by utilizing Voice over Internet Protocol at no cost. This can additionally be probable with a cellular phone and home telephone. There are numerous ways of utilizing Voice over Internet Protocol technology and everything relies on the place and the manner within which an individual will be having calls made. I faced various problems when I was undertaking the assignment such as not being able to understand everything that I read about the project because some of the terms were technical and I had to do extra reading, which took more time than I had anticipated. I were given the opportunity to do the paper anew, I would prefer to make sure I read on research carrying out techniques so that I am able to have an undemanding task in doing the research and spend more time to perfect my project. Blog 4 This assignment has given me the knowledge that VoIP is a somewhat newfangled technology, in addition to it has by now attaining extensive acceptance and utilization. The Voice over Internet Protocol technology still has to go through a lot of improvements and it is anticipated to have key technological advances within Voice over Internet Protocol in the near future. Voice over Internet Protocol has so far demonstrated to be an excellent candidate for substituting the Plain Old Telephone Structure (POTS). The Voice over Internet Protocol system also has drawbacks, in addition to the several returns it brings. In addition, its ever-increasing utilization globally is creating new-fangled considerations adjoining its regulations, as well as security. I encountered several predicaments while doing the assignment including not being able to understand some information and had to seek help from individuals who had knowledge about my project so that I could make sense out of the project. If I were supposed to undertake the assignment once more, I would simply choose a topic that is not too complex to work with and guarantee that every component of the project would get equal concentration in terms of research and the actual writing of the assignment. Read More