Customer Solution Case Study
/ / Leading Dutch Telecommunications Company Boosts Systems for High-Performance Solution
Overview
Country or Region: The Netherlands
Industry: Telecommunications
Customer Profile
Incorporated in 1989, KPN is the Netherlands’ largest telecommunications service provider, with revenues of €11.94bn (U.S.$14.35bn) for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2005.
Business Situation
KPN wanted to refresh its network infrastructure, used for handling media-generated phone traffic, which was reaching the end of its life cycle and no longer enabled KPN to provide new solutions to its customers.
Solution
KPN migrated to Redwood's Digital Network Xchange (DNX) media gateways, supported by Microsoft® Windows® 2000 Advanced Server, and Microsoft SQL Server™ 2000, part of Microsoft Windows Server System™ integrated server software.
Benefits
n Ability to process 50 per cent more calls, leads to increase in revenue
n Decrease in operating costs
n Three times faster software development cycle improves competitiveness
n Boost in efficiency with improved manageability
n Future-proofing though the introduction of new, next-generation services / "With this system, based on Microsoft technology, we can handle more calls concurrently to a factor of one and a half. The ability to handle 50 per cent more calls equals 50 per cent more revenue.”
Joop van der Wijngaard, Manager, Voice, KPN
Dutch telecommunications company KPN is a market leader in providing mass calling services for companies in the Netherlands. Reality television producer Endemol Nederland, the creator of the "Big Brother" reality TV show, is one of its major customers. KPN's systems handle thousands of viewers' calls during the broadcast. It wanted to replace an antiquated legacy system with a new platform that would allow it to handle more calls concurrently. Working with United Kingdom (U.K.)–based Microsoft® Certified Partner, Redwood Technologies, KPN implemented a next-generation network services system, supported by Microsoft Internet Information Server 5.0, Microsoft Windows® 2000 Advanced Server, and Microsoft SQL Server™ 2000, part of Microsoft Windows Server System™ integrated server software. The company can now handle an average of 50 per cent more concurrent calls. The system is scalable to handle growth and the roll-out of next-generation services. Furthermore, development work is now three times faster.
Situation
KPN, the market leader in segments of the Dutch telecommunications industry, operates a fixed telephony network in the Netherlands. It serves approximately 7.4 million fixed-line subscribers and 1.7 million Internet customers in the Netherlands, as well as 17.7 million mobile customers in the Netherlands, Germany, and Belgium. In addition to local, national, and international telephony, the telecommunications company offers retail and wholesale access services on the Dutch fixed network, as well as Internet services for the Dutch residential and business markets.
One of KPN's major Dutch customers is reality television producer Endemol Nederland, the creator of the popular "Big Brother" reality TV show. The Big Brother programme is a major interactive television experience that sees a group of people selected to live in a house under constant television camera surveillance. Every week one of these housemates is evicted from the house, as viewers call in to vote for which contestant they want to eliminate.
KPN provides the telephony network that handles the many thousands of calls that are made during the one-hour duration of the television programme. With up to 600 calls per second, the company must process extremely large volumes of inbound phone calls and text messages from viewers. The service must also register each vote and update the results throughout the duration of the television programme.
To support this mass calling service, KPN had traditionally relied on a legacy system that was popular amongst telecommunication providers, but was near the end of its life cycle. The company wanted to replace this system with a next-generation infrastructure solution that was both scalable and could support both its mass calling service and other value-added network services.
KPN has built a reputation as a leading mass calling service provider, so it was critical that the solution was reliable and robust to handle high volumes of calls. Any system downtime to the mass calling service would not only potentially impact the revenue of the company, but would also have an adverse impact on its brand.
Joop van der Wijngaard, Manager, Voice, KPN, says: "If during a live television broadcast our calling infrastructure was to fail, that's not just one call, but thousands of calls. That's lost revenue for the company, and the story would appear in all the newspapers. Reliability is important for the reputation of our company. We required sophisticated, specialised, and robust technology to handle millions of calls coming in during a very short space of time."
Solution
KPN researched the market for a solution provider with the right combination of technology and expertise for its specific needs. After a rigorous tender process, where KPN reviewed a number of solution providers, the company chose a solution from U.K.-based telecommunications specialists and a Microsoft® Certified Partner, Redwood Technologies.
Redwood proposed its RTSinfonia communications architecture, with its Digital Network Xchange (DNX) media gateways and RedResponse mass calling applications. These applications incorporate fixed-charge and time-based billing mechanisms for participants using mobile, fixed-line, and online communication.
The entire system is supported by Microsoft Internet Information Server 5.0, Microsoft Windows® 2000 Advanced Server, and Microsoft SQL Server™ 2000, part of Microsoft Windows Server System™ integrated server software. Further application development is completed through the Microsoft .NET Framework.
The result is the Netherlands’ largest mass calling solution, establishing KPN as the leading provider of mass calling services in the region. The solution, a converged services platform that incorporates hardware and software, supports Text-To-Speech services, mass calling, and tele-voting.
Wijngaard says: "Redwood proposed a converged services platform that was very attractive to us. Traditionally, telecommunications firms will operate one system for a service such as tele-voting, and another that handles a service such as directory enquiries. A converged services solution is superior to operating disparate systems because it allows us to run everything on a single platform. Also the server operating system, applications, and hardware were all included in the one package, so there are apparent cost benefits in terms of maintenance of this solution. Instead of maintaining and integrating disparate solutions, KPN only needs to maintain one platform."
Commenting on the importance of the Microsoft solutions, Sean Taylor, Managing Director, Redwood, said: "To date, UNIX-based solutions have been the de facto choice for the telecommunications industry. We selected Microsoft solutions for a number of reasons, including the familiarity of the environment to any user, the range of products within the Microsoft portfolio, its strong support from open hardware component providers, and cost. Our solutions are renowned for their reliability and the Microsoft server infrastructure has provided the reliability and resilience for the solution to handle high call volumes in a revenue-critical environment."
Benefits
Increased Revenue Opportunities
One of the immediate benefits KPN realised was the greater speed with which it could handle volume call numbers, which resulted in an increase in revenue. For many services, such as tele-voting, callers are charged a flat rate for their call, which is known as a drop charge. To make more money, it is therefore essential KPN can handle as many calls as possible within the shortest time frame.
Wijngaard says: "With this system, based on Microsoft technology, we can handle more calls concurrently to a factor of one and a half. The ability to handle 50 per cent more calls equals 50 per cent more revenue. As a result of the increased speed of this new system, we deal with more customers and, at the end of the day, increase revenue.”
Robust Infrastructure Provides Business Consistency
The solution from Redwood relies on Microsoft server technology, which provides a completely redundant and robust system, an essential requirement for KPN.
"Our mass calling service works in tandem with a live television broadcast and must handle the voice calls and text messages that come in during a strict time period. If the platform collapses in that time-frame we are in trouble," says Wijngaard. "For instance, if we handled the calls for tele-voting during a 10 minute television programme, the phone lines may only be open for that short 10 minute period to handle hundreds of calls. If we're off line for five minutes, that's potentially half our customer revenue lost. It's essential we have the infrastructure in place to support this volume of calls.
"Reliability is critical to our business. We had very high expectations and we haven’t been disappointed," adds Wijngaard.
High-Performance Solution Reduces Operational Overheads
The Digital Network Xchange (DNX) system, which integrates with the Microsoft server system, has enabled KPN to decommission a number of legacy systems used for running value-added network services. This has assisted KPN in reducing its operational expenses significantly.
Accelerated Development for New Services
Part of the Redwood RTSinfonia solution was a power Service Creation Environment, RTComposer, which works on a Microsoft Windows desktop using the .NET Framework. RTComposer is a graphical drag and drop interface that KPN developers use to build services. RTComposer and the .NET Framework allow services to be built for both circuit switched networks, as well as next-generation packet switched networks. Services such as switching, fax, text-to-speech, conferencing, speech recognition, broadcast, and database integration can all be supported.
Using this new tool, KPN has been able to develop and roll out new services in days, rather than weeks. If a TV programme requests a mass calling service to handle an expected high volume of calls, KPN is the only carrier in the Netherlands equipped to provide such a service on the day of request.
Complex services can also be developed quickly. For example, if KPN wanted to introduce a new location service to its fixed and mobile customers allowing them to call in and locate a nearby restaurant, the development capabilities of the new platform, combined with the .NET Framework, have made it a straightforward process to create such an application.
"It's much easier to programme applications for the new platform,” says Wijngaard. “Programming on the last platform was difficult, time-consuming, and labour intensive. The new platform makes application development quite simple, with an easy user interface. This saves us a lot of time and money. On average, depending on the sophistication, our development cycle is three times faster.”
Increased Capability to Enhance Services
The telecommunications industry is one of the fastest moving and innovative industries in the world. Today, most carriers are adding new services to the traditional fixed line voice calls, such as video calling and Internet-based services. KPN is no exception. The provider is looking to the future and developing these next-generation services, including Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). In order to create these, it's essential to lay strong foundations with a robust and scalable server infrastructure.
Wijngaard adds: "The most appealing aspect of the whole solution is that it is a converged services platform. There were initial concerns from some departments whether Microsoft products would provide the stability we required, but now its operating system and database technology underpins the Redwood mass calling solution, providing essential reliability and resilience in a way that is both seamless and invisible to us."
David Parry-Jones, Director, UK Telco, Media and Entertainment, Microsoft said: "Microsoft is pleased to be a key component of this large scale, mission-critical telephony project with leading telecommunications provider KPN. This project illustrates our ongoing commitment to the telecommunications industry, both solution specialists and providers."
Microsoft Windows Server System
Microsoft Windows Server System is a line of integrated and manageable server software designed to reduce the complexity and cost of IT. Windows Server System enables you to spend less time and budget on managing your systems so that you can focus your resources on other priorities for you and your business.
For more information about Windows Server System, go to:
www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem