Cloud vs. Premise
The following is a side-side comparison of how the Thinking Phone Networks ThinkingSuite ecosystem compares to legacy premise-based communications systems. ThinkingSuite unified communications services provide dramatic ROI and near-immediate payback and allows enterprises to significantly improve business processes, enhance collaboration, and be more responsive to customers. All at a fraction of the cost of legacy premise systems.
Key considerations that are important to take into account when comparing cloud-based communications delivery models to premise systems include:
- An all-inclusive subscription fee vs. expensive on-premise equipment, licensing fees, and associated maintenance
- Ability to reduce or completely eliminate capital intensive upfront and ongoing hardware costs
- Ability to reduce ongoing OPEX costs
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- Ability to reduce or eliminate IT support and staffing
- Ability to eliminate costly, disruptive, and time consuming upgrades
- Ability to eliminate ongoing software maintenance
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Thinking Phone Networks
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On-Premise Legacy PBX
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Upfront Costs
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No initial capital expenditures beyond IP phones
and enabling network components.
Eliminate or reduce costs associated with employee resources and hardware and software maintenance costs. |
High initial capital costs for onsite hardware and software.
Additional costs for maintenance agreements.
Additional costs for internal management staff. |
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Future Scalability
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Quick and easy extension adds, moves, and drops.
Quick and easy addition of new sites, locations
and users.
Ability to scale subscription up or down to respond to current and future business needs. |
Limited to maximum number of users allowed on the purchased system.
New equipment, maintenance agreement, and
management staff required for each new location. |
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Upgrade Flexibility
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Seamless, automatic and frequent updates included in subscription fee.
Enhanced user acceptance and reduced/eliminated
training costs due to frequency, transparency and
incremental nature of upgrades. |
Features can sometimes be added beyond initial, purchased functionality.
Additional functionality may add to system complexity.
Additional functionality may result in integration or management issues. |
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Feature Set
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Best-in-class IP PBX feature set today and in the future.
Ongoing development of new features and
functionality including integration of third-party
applications. |
New features/functionality limited to equipment capabilities and resource availability.
New features may be offered – but at additional cost. |
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Implementation/
Deployment Speed
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Rapid deployment – In just a few days or weeks.
Eliminates need to acquire hardware, configure it, and test.
Easily and quickly add new users, new sites/locations, features/functionality.
Ability to deploy incrementally and quickly as
business dictates. |
Typical installation can take many months and is costly and resource intensive.
Additional equipment needed for remote offices. |
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User Adoption
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Thinking Phone Networks familiar user interfaces
speed user adoption.
Actionable usage reports readily highlight any
user adoption gaps, allowing quick resolution. |
Poor adoption rates despite end user training and enhancement to user interfaces.
Poor user adoption especially true of remote offices and sites. |
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Support
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Included in Thinking Phone Networks subscription.
Potential for reductions in overall support costs,
including head counts and third-party support
personnel.
Ability to pro-actively redeploy IT resources
to other projects.
Ability to eliminate technical support costs.
Ability to greatly reduce help desk staff
because of enhanced usability. |
Additional costs for maintenance agreements.
Additional costs for internal staff, third-party support contracts, or consulting fees. |
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Security
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Thinking Phone Networks fully monitors
service delivery and provides QoS service
guarantees. |
Owner assumes all responsibilities and potential risk. |
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