CASE STUDY

Western Growers Case Study

A Seamless Upgrade From Legacy Avaya to Microsoft Lync, enabled byAudioCodes
Microsoft Lync Delivers Audio, Video and Conferencing Services Throughout theWidespread Organization

BackgroundWestern Growers (WGA), based in Irvine CA, is an agricultural trade association
representing growers, packers and shippers in California and Arizona. WGA provides
comprehensive insurance, government advocacy, and employee training services
to its members throughout the region. Their Pinnacle subsidiary group is a leading
third party administrator for self-funded health benefit plans. The company maintains
offices throughout the Southwestern United States

Challenges
Western Growers’ IT department wanted to modernize its existing legacy Avaya IPTsystem voice communication platform for its headquarters and branch offices. It
decided to add Microsoft Lync to the existing legacy Avaya platform for those locations.
Michael Williams, WGA’s Director of IT, brought in Datalink Networks consultants toreview the existing environment and deliver a Lync 2010 design.
“The environment here at Western Growers was based on a legacy Nortel system. It
was upgraded through Avaya, but was still very limited in its functionality outside ofdoing anything other than what a basic phone system would offer,” says Williams.
“We did have a call center running on it, we did do some server call routing, but it wasvery, very limited. So that’s why we started looking into unified communications: how
can we upgrade our system?”

The Project
The Datalink Networks design team proposed a Lync Enterprise pilot that would deliver
audio, video and conferencing services throughout the organization. The pilot would
retain the legacy Avaya system and local PRI circuits, integrating them with MicrosoftLync using an AudioCodes Mediant Media Gateway. The rich collaboration featuresof Microsoft Lync were a key factor in the decision, providing all WGA employees witha comprehensive suite of communication capabilities encompassing I/M, presence,audio, video, messaging, data collaboration and conferencing services.
Williams says they initially set too small a scope for the pilot, by focusing at first juston WGA’s sales team.
“We found that really would be limiting the scope and the feedback, so we opened
it up to the entire company. At that point, we went back to Datalink Networks andasked that they come in and do a demonstration of Lync so that we could get thedepartments to rally behind it and see who really wanted to participate. We needed
those people who were actually going to use the software and then give us their truefeelings.”

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The pilot was expanded to 25 people from different departments
throughout the organization, including staff who were out in the field.
WGA’s management team approved the pilot, and the work began. As
part of the network design, an AudioCodes Mediant Gateway was tasked
with interconnecting the existing PRI lines and the legacy Avaya system
to the Lync 2010 Servers. With this design, the Mediant 1000 is installed
in a “drop and insert” architecture, between Western Growers PRI lines
and the Avaya and Lync servers, effectively routing all inbound andoutbound voice traffic to the intended destination system.
Williams plans to upgrade his Lync 2010 environment to Lync 2013, andwhen this is complete he is well positioned to add SIP trunk connectivity,adding Session Border Controller capabilities to the existing AudioCodes
Mediant 1000 through a software upgrade. “A key benefit of selecting
the Mediant 1000 was the ability to provide both gateway and Session
Border Controller services on the same platform,” said Williams.
Williams says the project was a resounding success.
“The pilot was built pretty much so they could do a complete installation
after it was finished,” he says. “So after the overwhelming response thateverybody wanted to move forward, and we got everything approved –reallywe were just adding high availability.”“You’d want to make sure you use aquality vendor like AudioCodes so that if
you have a problem, you have experienced
people behind you.”
Michael Williams
Director of IT at Western Growers
AssociationThe Solution
The result is one unified corporate communications system that enables legacy Avaya users and Lync users to seamlessly
communicate, preserving all of the existing corporate voice and messaging functions.
“AudioCodes media gateways have the ability to transition legacy PRI lines, connecting them to Microsoft Lync. The gateway
routes those calls and decides whether they continue on to my legacy PBX or on to Microsoft Lync. It makes those decisions
for you,” says Williams.
When asked whether the AudioCodes media gateway was important to his network, Williams noted “I would say it’s anextremely vital piece of equipment because it’s going to control every line I have coming into the building. You’d want tomake sure you use a quality vendor like AudioCodes so that if you have a problem, you have experienced people behind you.”
Williams is impressed: “It’s been great. It automatically does the routing, so as we transition those people to other offices,
we move them to Microsoft Lync phones. We make a quick fix inside the gateway, and now our legacy phone transfers thosecalls over to the Lync phones and nobody knows the difference. They just know that I’m dialing a four-digit extension I’ve
had for 15 years and it just works.”
Shortly after the initial deployment, Western Growers expanded their operation to a second building.

CASE STUDY

Western Growers integration to Lync with AudioCodes Mediant 1000
“We only had a few weeks to deploy this,” says Williams. “So rather than having to buy another legacy PBX and deploy that,
we got an AudioCodes Survivable Branch Appliance (SBA) that would tie into our larger AudioCodes gateway we have here in
the Irvine office. Once we tied the two together, we brought in another 50 end points.”“The people in the new office have Lync phones, being served by the AudioCodes SBA so if anything happened to our Irvine
HQ office, they’re still up, they’re running, and they can make phone calls.”

Results
Western Growers used the capabilities of Lync to migrate customer service employees from the main office to a “homebased” office. Many of the department personnel were commuting over two hours daily to the main office. In order to saveon commuting time and travel expense, WGA provided each agent with a Lync phone tied to WGA’s main number, and a thinclient to support data requirements. The program has enabled customer service agents to work at home, with full access toresources of the main office and has saved WGA thousands of dollars per month in office space. WGA’s customer service
personnel can communicate with Corporate through instant messaging, voice and video services and take full advantage ofLync services, while still fully communicating with the legacy Avaya system.
As WGA continues to add employees and locations, they will look to Lync-enabled communication devices to provide thissupport.
“The plan here at Western Growers is to expand the Lync network, and eventually replace our legacy PBXs in the field. We
will be installing more AudioCodes SBA’s similar to what we did in a near-by office. When we complete this transition we will
have four-digit dialing for everyone in the company through Lync clients, desk phones, and mobile devices. I don’t care what
office you’re in, I don’t care where you happen to be at that moment, I dial your extension, Microsoft Lync will find you,” saysWilliams.

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About Western Growers Association
Western Growers, based in Irvine CA, is a trade association serving the agricultural and specialty crop industry in California
and the Southwestern United States. WGA provides comprehensive insurance, government advocacy, and employee training
services to its members throughout the region.

About Datalink Networks Inc.
Datalink Networks is a leading consulting and engineering company specializing in Microsoft Lync and Private Cloud services.
Datalink Networks has designed and deployed Lync systems for commercial and public sector clients throughout the Westfor over 5 years. Datalink Networks offers comprehensive Lync Services, from consulting and design, to deployment andmaintenance support. Datalink Networks is a Microsoft Certified Lync Voice Partner and is also Certified as Lync andExchange Planning and Deployment Partner.

About AudioCodes

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AudioCodes is a VoIP technology market leader focused on converged
VoIP & data communications and its products are deployed globallyin Broadband, Mobile, Enterprise networks and Cable. The company
provides a range of innovative, cost-effective products including Media
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Applications. AudioCodes’ underlying technology, VoIPerfect HDTM, relies
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