R2 Unified Technologies

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of IT for a computer software company. We create CRM business solutions for hotels and the travel industry.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with R2 Unified Technologies?

We were changing data centers, migrating from our Miami data center to one in Boca Raton, and hired R2 Unified Technologies to help us out.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Their involvement included a combination of a networking team and storage VMware virtualization. R2 Unified Technologies basically built our whole data center anew. When we started off with them, our infrastructure consisted of four Cisco plates and two VNX storage devices. Today, we have over 30 Cisco plates and our storage devices are now EMC XtremIO and Unity devices. Our partnership grew and they now manage our entire data center.

What is the team composition?

Once we got to the implementation phase, there were four or five people assigned to us. My main point of contact is their CTO.

How did you come to work with R2 Unified Technologies?

We met them for lunch and learned that they were offering Cisco solutions and storage with EMC, which we were interested in. They got to know our pain points and proposed to help us with the migration of data centers. Their quote included the hardware plus the implementation and migration. It included what we wanted, so we decided to choose them.

How much have you invested with them?

I’ve spent over $10 million on their services.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in April 2014 and the collaboration is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

They’re proactive in doing what’s needed for the project and will transparently communicate if there’s something they forgot or something that we need to adjust. They’re honest and clear on the good and the bad.

How did R2 Unified Technologies perform from a project management standpoint?

Project management has been great. We’re also in the same building with R2 Unified Technologies, which helps a lot. We use either phone, email, and they have a ticketing system. They also have a person that will oversee everything, including the engineers, and communicates the status of the project with everybody. When a task is complete, they send a detailed email summarizing the work that was done.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They go above and beyond what they signed for and won't nickel and dime us. If a task is way outside of scope, they’ll tell us it’s for another phase.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There’s nothing that comes to mind that R2 Unified Technologies needs to improve.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be open and don’t hold anything back thinking that they’re going to take over your environment. R2 Unified Technologies is there to help.