Recently I was invited along with some other industry peers/friends to tour the ShoreTel Sky data center head quartered in Dallas Texas. For Mark and I we figured there would be nothing better than leaving the Midwest at this time of year to go to sunny Dallas.
Since the
M5 acquisition by ShoreTel a couple years back, there has been a lot that has changed inside of ShoreTel and that statement in itself is a gross understatement. To see where this started and then to tour this facility was an amazing transformation to absorb. It's as if they took a concept from the "Flintstone Age" and over the course of a couple years turned it into a Jetson's like solution. I realize now more than ever after this tour why Mitel wanted to acquire ShoreTel and moreover why the industry is a buzz for where they are headed... They truly are doing some amazing things.
Unfortunately in this public post I can't talk about everything we saw there and what the future holds for ShoreTel. What I will say about the "stuff" we saw is it's going to be a very exciting ride and the way we know the UC manufactures now is going to quickly change.
The facility we toured was CyrusOne. I've been to data centers before, however I was told on our tour that this is a category 5+ secure facility and there is only one more security ranking above that and that there are only handful of those in the country. So needless to say the security here was like something I've never seen. Considering we do business with Military Contractors and deal with high level security pretty regularly this experience was amazing. (To give you an idea of the experience, at one point one of my peers had to use the little boys room. We all had to be escorted to the bathroom together as if we were back in kindergarten again).
There are handful of CyrusOne facilities spread out around the world and half of the Fortune top 20 use them. One of the Fortune top 20 was in the cage directly next to ShoreTel. CyrusOne for obvious reasons does not advertise who is using what facility so I will keep that confidential. All I can say is everyone has heard of this company in the United States and more than likely your money at one point had passed through them. To think that ShoreTel chose this facility to secure over 20 million dollars of equipment makes a very big statement regarding the commitment to quality and uptime for the future of it's product set.
The progression of ShoreTel premise along with
ShoreTel Sky is happening very quickly. There are so many pieces being completed with a very careful attention to detail. You typically don't get to see the future of an organization as we were allowed to here. This tour enabled us to see behind the scenes of what lies ahead and it only reaffirmed to us all in attendance that what the leadership is doing is indeed working. I'm excited to be a part of what lies ahead for ShoreTel and can't wait to talk about what we saw as it becomes available very, very soon!
About the Author:
Joe Rittenhouse is the President of Business Development and a managing partner of
Converged Technology Professionals Inc. His expertise is in business consulting/therapy specializing specifically in VOIP, Cloud Services, and Contact Centers. Joe’s experience in the IT demographic encompasses over two decades. Outside of work, Joe is a Husband and father of four. Joe is also a self-proclaimed seasoned tour veteran of the Grateful Dead.