I started with LightBound in June, 2008 as an Account Manager. and moved into the role as Sales Manager in February 2009. Prior to joining LightBound I spent 15 years in the information technology and telecommunications in a sales role working for Apple, Nortel, Cisco, Sarcom, and Network Solutions. I also spent a year working the security systems industry with Stanley Security Solutions. Much of my career has been working with customers develop WAN, Business Continuity, Server Collocation, and VoIP PBX Solutions. I was working primarily to develop the customer premise equipment solutions that connected to the service providers for data, voice, and Internet service. Most of the Indiana WAN providers that I worked with in developing customer solutions also provided Internet and voice services but did not provide server collocation. So customer were always dealing with multiple providers to connect to their on premise equipment. One of the reasons I really enjoy working a LightBound is that we can be a one stop shop to provide Voice and Data circuits over a single converged network to the end customer location as well data center services. LightBound is unique in that we are one of only a few Indiana VoIP providers in the Central Indiana area.
When I am not working with customers to help them with the Internet, Voice, and Data network solutions I enjoy spending time with my family, playing golf, working out, volunteering to help in the community and at church, and learning about my Catholic faith through my studies to become a Deacon in the Catholic church.
Today's tough economic times are causing many businesses to look at ways to reduce costs and improve productivity to gain a competitive edge. Some of the newer VoIP PBX Solutions provide both the ability to reduce overall costs and improve business productivity. If you have an older phone system that is paid off there may be some reluctance in looking at new VoIP PBX solutions due to tight capital constraints. If you have costs for annual maintenance and moves/adds/changes on your existing phone system you may want to consider reviewing expenses and comparing them with the cost of a hosted VoIP phone solution. You may find out that the cost of a hosted VoIP phone system may be less than the cost of operating your existing phone system. You may be able to take advantage of new voice technologies such as SIP voice lines that may reduce your overall costs. If you have not taken a look at these costs and need some help in analyzing consider contacting your LightBound account manager. You may be surprised to find you can both reduce costs and improve services! Lightbound is an Indiana VoIP Provider that offers Fonality trixbox PBX that can provide productivity enhancements to help your business save money and grow. Click on the examples below to see a short video to see what it provides:
If you have a Compellent or Scale SAN and desire to replicate for business continuity or data disaster recover LightBound offers Storage as a Service to meet your needs. LightBound can be the one stop shop to accommodate as we have Indiana WAN services with multiple carriers to provide a large circuit directly from your office to our data center to provide backup needs. A large circuit is generally needed as 100 GB takes 2.2 hours to replicate your SAN. If you have a SAN with another manufacturer and would like off site data backup service you can use a backup application to a NFS or CIFS share to back up remotely. If you need to also need a server platform to recoer we also offer hosted virtual server platform that can be paired with replicated SAN or can be used to restore backup data. If you would like some more information plan on attending our lunch and learn in April or contact one of our account managers.
Come hear about one of the most exciting stories in the technology industry in Indiana on February 10, 2010 @ 11:30 by attending LightBound's lunch and learn. Go to www.lightbound.net to register. Scale Computing has been recognized as one of the top 20 technology companies to watch in 2010. Scale is headquartered out of Indianapolis. LightBound is a Scale Computing partner having deployed their solution for managed storage services for use with managed servers hosting or server collocation. The Scale solution is a very cost effective solution for local storage (3 TB for $14K). LightBound managed storage services can facilitate a data disaster recovery plan through a high speed WAN connection to provide off site data back service to yield a very effective business continuity plan in event of a disaster. Come learn about what we have to offer!
LightBound offers Managed Servers Hosting as do several other Indiana Server Hosting companies. Why choose LightBound over others? See below for a few reasons:
1) LightBound has been supporting IP services since the mid-90's through their ISP service and has a fully redundant, high capacity Internet connection directly connected to the NAP, peeering with Equinix packet exchange. LightBound also has four connections to top tier Internet providers at the NAP so Internet service is going to be rock solid high speed internet in Indiana. LightBound has total control and visibility of it's Internet upstream connectivity. other providers may have several connections to ISP's. LightBound IS the ISP for managed servers hosting.
2) LightBound provides a flexible, customized server hosting rather than just a few options. You can choose bare-metal and work with your internal IT staff or IT consulting firm to provide OS, development or application platform, or LightBound can provide all these services.
3) LightBound deploys security technologies at the VM level to secure your managed server from other environments. This has been designed to satisfy compliance regulations. This provides the most cost effective model for the customer versus dedicating server blade in a chassis to each customer.
4) LightBound has Data Disaster Recover/Business Continuity service to provde computer and phone directly for your internal staff to get to managed hosting services with 32 seats ready to go and capacility for up to 60 workstations. No worrying about a third party to deliver this service.
5) LightBound has 19 telecommunication carriers with facilities in the data center. If your business has multiple branches and terminates circuits in the data center to get to the managed servers cost efficienciences can be realized by choosing from the manay carriers to get the best cost.
Are you looking for High Speed Internet in Indiana for your Server Collocation and Managed Servers Hosting? LightBound can take care of this for your business. Our Internet is not like the DSL or Cable Internet offering that you get at your home. We have a 24 x 7 x 365 data center NOC staffed around the clock.We are a top tier business Internet provider with direct links to the NAP in Chicago and Ashburn, VA with direct peering connection with Equinix packet exchange.Through this the server is one hop away from Internal networks at Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and hundreds of others. We have two 2.5GB connections to the NAP, and each connection has two 1 GB upstream (for redundancy) to top Internet carriers.Our 2.5 GB connection to Chicago is also redundant with a diverse path.We have very large customers with high availability requirements so we have architected this network for premium service.That being said our pricing is not the cheapest, but we deliver the best value for your business, especially is your rely on High Speed Internet in Indiana.
There is a lot of buzz out there about cloud computing today, but is a "cloud" computing solution really what you need to run your business? Some cloud services are inexpensive, and may be well suited for test and pilot project, but it's not suited for running mission critical business applications. Mission critical managed servers hosting applications need security and high availability. The cost of services can vary wildly based on how secure and how available services are required for the business. The level of security and availability is dictated by business management and not technical managers. In most cases there is customization that must be done to meet the business requirements. Off the shelf cloud services don't meet the custom requirements as they are ordered over the web. If you want "custom" cloud services you need a provider who will take the time to ask you questions about compliance requirements for your industry, recovery time objectives, and recovery point objectives to come up with your specific solution. LightBound has the resources and technical staff to provide the cloud computing solution to meet your business needs.
If you are looking at VoIP PBX Solutions and VoIP Service Providers that say they can offer voice with QOS over the open Internet you need to beware. We have run into this several times and this is how the scenario goes.The provider that is offering voice services over the open Internet tells customers that they provide QOS in their router or phone system and if they have enough bandwidth it should not be a problem.The customer signs up for the service and then after several months they begin experiencing problems.The provider then tells them it’s the problem of their ISP not having QOS.The ISP (LightBound in this case) gets a black eye for not having “QOS” and then the provider tells them if they get their Internet directly through them the problem will be resolved.The customer is bound under contract for the voice service and then winds up having to pay for another Internet circuit that has QOS.
There is no way to provide QOS over the open Internet because there is not end to end control of the circuit. Once the data packet carrier voice leave the router or switch from your location there is no guarantee that other routers downstream will treat the QOS packet with any priority. Will voice work over the open Internet?Yes it will, sometimes, but there is no guarantee and it is on a best effort basis.LightBound is able to offer QOS to your office because the circuit is directly connected from the LightBound data center to your office and there is equipment that can be set up to provide QOS at each end.
The other advantage we offer is direct support for the entire solution around the clock 7 x 24 x 365 through our NOC. LightBound offers Internet Service Indiana through a direct connection to your company location through a circuit that is a T1 or higher. LightBound also provides the voice services through our class 5 voice switch in the data center.If there ever is an issue with our voice switch or circuit the NOC technicians are monitoring around the clock.We are the provider of the Internet, Voice server, and PBX solution, so if you have issue there is one number to call.We manage hundreds of circuits and have processes in place that quickly resolve issues with telecommunications. Others vendors who offer VoIP PBX Solutions with VoIP Server Providers are agents and most likely don't have a NOC, or the breadth and depth to provide to support the service around the clock, but you may want to check with them
LightBound will be adding a third data center for server collocation before the end of the year. This is a great site for data disaster recovery. The new site will be at 800 Oliver Ave, and is located just South of 731 W. Henry Street. This new data center is about 800 square feet and will have 26 cabinets. This data center is using some new designs and technologies. First it will be powered with a separate power feed and generator from the 731 W. Henry Street data center. So if customers want some redundancy this will be a good option. Flywheel UPS technology will be deployed. This technology has advantage of being less prone to problems due to not having to maintain batteries. Hot row containment cooling will also be used in this data center. Cabinets are configured so there are two rows of cabinets with the back facing each other and enclosed on both ends of the row and all above with heat venting out. There front of cabinets are facing out. This would be a great site for WAN consolidation due to access of carriers, 24 x 7 x 365 availability as well as having seasoned WAN engineers available to monitor and support.
Learn about LightBound's complete voice solution for all your business communication needs. Fonality's full featured VoIP PBX Solutions, with integrated voice messaging and call center functionality costing a fraction of comparable systems, will be demonstrated. LightBound IP Converge provides voice services and Internet over a single circuit that works with your current voice system whether it takes analog, PRI, or SIP. Why pay for a separate PRI circuit or analog voice lines when you can get voice over your Internet connection from LightBound, one of Indiana's top VoIP Service Providers?
I just met with a customer this week who was moving offices and in the move decided to outsource their support of servers and phones. Unaware that LightBound offers managed servers hosting through our new VM and shared server platform they looked to a competitor. We let them know that we are going to be offering this platform in Q1 2010 and possibly before the end of the year. They currently have Indiana VoIP service with us but were using their own phone system. We let them know that we offer VoIP PBX Solutions through Fonality's trixbox solution. By provider management of both their phones and server infrastructure the customer now has more cycles to support and develop their application to make money for their company.
I just finished a webinar on Fonality trixbox VoIP PBX Solutions with a K-12 education prospective customer. There were two features that they IT director really like. He thought the chat feature was a very usual feature built into trixbox Pro HUD. He thought that staff could use this quick method to communicate without having to play voicemail tag. He also liked the idea of the presence management through the HUD. He has staff distributed in five buildings over a dispersed area and liked the ability at a glance to see who is on line, and to quickly click an icon to chat, call their land line, cell phone, or email. Another feature he liked was managed servers hosting services that could be provided in support the solution for him. As long as he has high speed Internet in Indiana and direct WAN connection to the LightBound data center almost all support can be provided remotely over the Internet. In the event that on-site support is needed LightBound partners with the AME Group which can service all customers in Indiana within a 4 hour response time. The final thing he liked was that the Fonality trixbox is about half the cost of traditional VoIP PBX providers. With costs being tight for schools this is a great solution to consider to increase functionality at a low cost.
LightBound is one of the VoIP Service Providers in Indiana that can deliver SIP voice through dedicated WAN connections to customer sites. The end voice service is delivered as SIP or through a gateway as digital (PRI) or analog. LightBound also offers long distance with our VoIP offering. Many times we get comparisons with other providers who offer long distance services at much lower costs for outbound interstate long distance calling than LightBound. The initially looks like a much lower cost. The catch is when customers have a lot of toll free or intrastate calling. Typically these costs are much more than interstate calling. When all is averaged out with the competitor's different costs LightBound's long distance cost is usually very competitive. LightBound is an Indiana PBX provider for Fonality trixbox Pro so we can provide the voice service and also all the business phone system needs. With our long distance service we can round out a complete solution for all the voice needs.
I had a customer who recently was coordinating a renewal of a managed WAN project through us. They had multiple contract renewal dates for 10 different locations. They also had 5 contracts with different renewal dates. They desired to have a single contract for all WAN locations that co terminated at the same date. Due to contract end dates of existing contracts they asked if we could do a 39 month contract to target a start and end date for a contract to meet a renewal date in February. We were able to do that as opposed to most carriers who are limited to 12, 24, or 36 month contracts. The customer also wanted to minimize duplicate circuit costs to locations for the new circuits they were ordering. Here is where we shine by being able to order the new circuits as close to the old circuit termination date and have the wiggle room to extend old circuit disconnect dates if (or most likely when) the new carrier circuits are delayed. Why hassle with trying to coordinate all of this yourself? LightBound's Indiana WAN consolidation service can help ease the hassle of coordinating new circuit installs, coordinating contract service dates, and monitoring and troubleshooting. Leverage our years of experience in dealing with telecommunication carriers so you can concentrate on business applications that can make your business more profitable!
LightBound will be expanding to a third building for server collocation in November. Customers who desire some redundancy in data centers can house equipment in separate buildings. The new building will be at 800 Oliver Street, one half block south of 731 W. Henry Street. It will be on a separate power service and generator from the building on 731 W. Henry Street.
LightBound also offers off site off site data backup service which can add a level of redundancy to your operation. Servers at the data center can be backed up and customers with circuits at T1 level or higher can have their server data backed up at their corporate locations. The backups are done over the network between data centers at the Henry Street complex to the administrative office at 2500 E. 46th Street.
If you are looking to improve disaster recovery and business continuity LightBound has the data centers and backup services to get the job done!
Businesses have to plan for operating in event of a disruption in business operations at their main facilities. This planning is commonly referred to as business continuity. Since most business rely heavily on IT it would make sense to plan on having critical resources available over the Internet. Internet is highly available so employees can access when they are on the road traveling away from the office or working at home. To keep the business up and running it would pay off to have your critical information backed up using off site data backup service and using server collocation to have backup servers or primary servers This would surely help in data disaster recovery if the primary location was every effected by a power outage, damage of equipment, or theft. The data housed on equipment at the data center or back up service could be restored and get the business up and running at the main facility. LightBound can be a one stop shop for business continuity needs providing WAN, Indiana Server Hosting, and Internet Service Indiana.
Does your current PBX use a PRI circuit? Are you on the verge of needing to add another PRI because you are at capacity for phone lines? If so you may want to consider VoIP Service Providers that provide SIP voice circuits. PRI comes with 23 voice lines, but when you need the 24th you mustpurchase another PRI, and 23 more lines, even though you need only one line. Wouldn't it be much more cost effective just to buy the single voice line? Most SIP providers can do this, and deliver SIP to the PBX through a gateway device that connects to your to the PRI interface on the PBX. Additional cost savings can also be realized as SIP can be delivered over your data WAN, eliminating the need for separate voice network. If you are looking for an Indiana based VoIP provider who can deliver SIP LightBound can get the job done!
If you use Salesforce CRM in your business and are looking to increase productivity and sales this about migrating to Fonality trixbox VoIP PBX Solutions. trixbox Pro Unified Agent Edition has seemless Integration with Salesforce SFA. If you have an incoming call from a high potential sale you can quickly identify the opportunity form the Salesforce record and give that prospect the priority needed to close the deal. Save time in agents and sales reps logging calls to Saleforce as they are automatically logged. You can increase the reach of access by using SIP and the Fonality HUD on your sales reps laptop can work anywhere they have Internet access. trixbox VoIP PBX Solutions works with SIP protocol. LightBound is an Indiana VoIP provider that can deliver SIP voice over business class private circuits as well as the Fonality trixbox solution. Do you want to learn more? LightBound will be hosting a lunch and learn on 12/2/2009 form 11:30 am to 1:00 pm at 731 W. Henry Street showing off integration trixbox Unified Agent Edition and Salesforce SFA. Contact jshinkle@lightbound.net if you want to reserve a spot.
I've had a few companies asking about video conferencing to help with communications in event of the H1N1 virus. They told me that limiting interaction among branches can help with spread of the virus. This is one strategy that can help in event of a major business disruption that effects the work population. In order to accommodate this a solid WAN must be in place to support the video conferencing. This can go a step further by also using VoIP PBX Solutions that can work anywhere your employees are. This can help if they are working at home or remote locations due to sickness or weather related issues. There are even desktop and PC based video conferencing for key managers and executives. The key to supporting this is to make sure that each person in the company has High Speed Internet in Indiana at their homes along with a strong VPN solution to be able to conduct business communications even when the workers are not at home. Having a plan in place where employees can get work done using IP communications is essential for business continuity as we approach the season for rougher weather and illness.
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