Government Organizations Globally Select Unify to Build Engaged Cities and a New Way to Work

RESTON, Va., July 9, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Unify today announced that an increasing number of government organizations around the world deployed Unify solutions to transform business operations and citizen engagement.

Unify's next-generation collaboration technology cultivates an Engaged City and allows governments to service citizens through any channel – including rapidly growing mediums, such as social media, while reaping the benefits of immediate savings, and heightened employee productivity.

"We have undertaken an innovative and bold approach to significantly change the way we deliver frontline service to our citizens," said Mark Neilson, head of Customer and Information Systems at Newport City Council. "A new IT and communications infrastructure was top of our requirements list and we selected the perfect partner in Unify and the OpenScape Portfolio for both telephony, and contact center technology."

City government population is growing at a staggering pace and demands for services are rapidly mounting. Several trends are driving the creation of engaged cities, such as today's increased preference for digital engagement, the emergence of the public cloud infrastructure, and the proliferation of mobile devices.

According to a recent New Way to Work Index, 94 percent of respondents work with virtual team members. Only 4 percent of respondents with successful teams had team members all in one location.

"In today's distributed workforce, there's a real need for enhanced productivity tools across multiple platforms to support the new way to work," said Paul Lang, senior vice president, Global Marketing, Unify. "Governments, in particular, are increasingly large and complex, and cities are dealing with a new set of challenges that require seamless communication and collaboration. Citizens aren't likely to call the city to report a pothole—they will instead Tweet about it or post a photo of it on Instagram. Technology is critical to cities' ability to respond quickly, at the first point of contact, to ensure a high level of satisfaction with government agencies."

Here's how the Town of Enfield, CT; city of Scottsdale, AZ; Oadby and Wigston Borough Council in the United Kingdom; Wakefield Council in the United Kingdom; and Mannheim, Germany are creating engaged cities. Read the full case studies on Unify's website.

• The Town of Enfield, Connecticut, implemented Unify OpenScape Voice on the OpenScape UC Server to serve its workforce, government offices, public safety departments, and school system. As a result of the project, Enfield expects to see a savings of $1.43M over the next five years, with a Return on Investment of 106 percent and a payback within six months.

• Wakefield Council in the United Kingdom upgraded its communications infrastructure with OpenScape Voice and Contact Center. The upgrade enabled the the migration of over 2,500 employees into more flexible working environments, resulting in $2.7M savings in utilities and unused office space. Additionally, 225,000 commuter miles per year were saved—equivalent to 65 tons of CO2.

• Scottsdale, Arizona, upgraded its IT infrastructure with Unify's OpenScape solutions, which enabled streamlined communications and greater mobility capabilities. The city provided employees with a single phone number by which to communicate, resulting in increased workforce productivity.

• The city of Mannheim, Germany, simplified and modernized its communications infrastructure with a custom implementation involving OpenScape and third-party solutions. The project increased reliability and availability to 99.999 percent, and provided budget security due to calculable communication costs for each workstation.

• Oadby and Wigston Borough Council in the United Kingdom updated its IT infrastructure with OpenScape Office LX, which enhanced staff productivity and collaboration, resulting in faster response times, and a reduction in call abandon rates.

To read more about Unify solutions and services for engaged cities, visit the Unify website.

About Unify
Unify is one of the world's leading communications software and services firms, providing integrated communications solutions for approximately 75 percent of the Fortune Global 500. Our solutions unify multiple networks, devices and applications into one easy-to-use platform that allows teams to engage in rich and meaningful conversations. The result is a transformation of how the enterprise communicates and collaborates that amplifies collective effort, energizes the business, and enhances business performance. Unify has a strong heritage of product reliability, innovation, open standards and security.

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SOURCE Unify