Unified messaging ASP powered by Dimension Data

International communications management company, Conexys, has chosen Dimension Data to power its innovative outsourced unified messaging solution in SA.

Conexys SA, the wholly owned local subsidiary of Bermuda-based Conexys Corporation Limited offers an outsourced application service provider (ASP) solution. Through a partner network, it provides Web-based e-mail, digital, voice and fax services. It also offers value-added services such as text-to-speech translation, which enables users to listen to their e-mail via mobile phone or landline.

"As a new brand in the South African market, we had to ensure we had a reliable, scalable infrastructure," says managing director of Conexys SA, Andrew Hill. "We also needed to work with a company that could offer excellent engineering skills so that we, in turn, could guarantee strong service level agreements and up-time for our clients.

"In addition, Dimension Data offers top storage technology skills, vital to a business like ours that handles huge volumes. When you`re entering a new market, it makes sense to use established brands for credibility, which was another reason for partnering with Dimension Data," explains Hill.

Conexys SA tasked Dimension Data with establishing a storage-centric, highly available, disaster-tolerant computing and storage infrastructure and complex to host the ASP`s solution, iCommand. The infrastructure is now in place and testing is in its final stages.

iCommand provides a secure, reliable and scalable message management platform, accessible over wired and wireless communication devices. Voicemail, e-mail and fax messages converge into a single, customisable mailbox that can be accessed with any communication device - telephone, mobile phone, PC with Web connection and wireless PDA - anywhere in the world. The platform can also be used to good effect as a marketing tool as it provides the opportunity for businesses to deliver customised Internet content to their customer bases.

"We could not simply duplicate the architecture as laid out in other Conexys POPs such as Toronto," says Hill. "There are significant differences in attitudes and usage levels between the two countries, the local telco monopoly being a major example. We therefore had to re-design the architecture for local conditions.

"As it is difficult to predict the extent to which our solution will become successful locally, we needed complete scalability. Dimension Data designed a `plug and play` infrastructure to which we can simply add capacity as we grow."

Due to the mission-critical nature of Conexys SA`s business and Dimension Data`s services expertise, Conexys is to use the global systems integrator`s support services via Dimension Data`s Paarl Operations Centre.

"We developed an architecture to satisfy the `capacity on demand` philosophy of Conexys," says Frans Nijeboer, Enterprise Systems Manager at Dimension Data. "This architecture was then used to build an infrastructure consisting of multiple, heterogeneous processing platforms and operating system environments.

"We catered for Conexys` current and future business needs, addressing three business criteria in particular," he says. "The first was flexibility and growth capacity. Secondly, we addressed storage availability and data management - the storage area network (SAN) will provide easy data management as well as configuration management of the systems. Finally, we addressed availability and redundancy, as Conexys` business is a 24x7x365 operation."

The Dimension Data solution encompasses Sun Solaris, Compaq Alpha/Tru64, Compaq StorageWorks SAN & MA8000, Compaq Proliant DL380 with W2K TS, Checkpoint Firewall-1, Veritas Netbackup and Cisco networking products and technologies.