VoiP new-comer upgraded and ready to take on NZ

UFONE, an Auckland-based business VoIP (Voice-over Internet Protocol) provider, recently completed a major upgrade to keep their services and are now focused on expanding their presence in the market.

"This lengthy process involved redesigning our core network to include new state-of-the-art high-availability switches and routers," says UFONE CEO Nigel Rayneau.

"UFONE runs a system providing VoIP and Internet services to our customers and to be successful we need to set up our infrastructure to be as reliable and resilient as possible.

This major project required three months of meticulous planning and implementation.

It involved redesigning UFONE's core network to include new state-of-the-art high-availability switches and routers which could replace their old equipment.

In order to achieve a Telco level of reliability, the minimum requirement begins with having two fully functional independent data centers.

Each centre must have the ability to operate the entire system independently in case the other fails for any reason.

Another vital requirement is multiple upstream paths of connectivity to each data center and the ability to automatically switch between upstream paths.

Maintaining a high degree of efficiency also means anything that is likely to fail has a duplicate which automatically takes over in the event of a failure like power feeds, network interface cards, and linked internal storage drives (RAID drives).

So, even if a server hard disk fails catastrophically, there would be zero impact to the end customer.

"These are all baseline requirements which are not only costly to purchase and set up but require a high level of networking expertise and knowledge to maintain," says Rayneau.

"Improving reliability and resiliency usually means capital investment in better equipment, but also having staff expertise in line with specialised and complex equipment being deployed.

For the remainder of the year, UFONE's major goal will be to capitalise on their new infrastructure and capabilities, by expanding their services to larger and more demanding corporate customers.