“This conference is a very valuable
tool to familiarize and provide confidence during negotiations.”
– Catherine Wallace, Manager, Network Operations, Graybar Electric Co., Inc.

"Excellent conference … lots of energy and valuable info"
– Ron Garske, Manager of Voice Technologies,
CUNA Mutual Group

"Very informative sessions ... lots of info delivered in a short time ... well organized"
– Paul Richards, Telecom Specialist, Department of Interior

"The concepts were clear and well presented. I came away with very practical action items."
– Addie Adams, Commodity Manager, Telecom Dana Corporation

"Covered a lot of topics – precise and fast paced."
– Cheryl Marsh, Senior Contract Specialist, Southern California Edison

"Packed with useful information that will empower me in negotiating future deals"
– Kevin Moore, Facility Engineering Manager – Verisign

"Can’t wait to get back to work and begin implementing some changes and writing my own RFP!"
– Nicole Cimino, Director Business Operations – Direct TV

"Topics are right on the money concerning 'real' issues. Fantastic information and useful too!"
– Shannon Sauro, Director of Telecom & Business Processes – SUNY-Brockport

"Great job! The subjects were right on target. I really liked getting insight into the tactics used by vendors and how to negate them, as well as learning the contract language that avoids gotchas."
– Jim Geoulos, Sr. Analyst-Procurement – American Airlines

The FCC recently made sweeping changes to the regulatory landscape that affect enterprise customers directly and will have a dramatic impact on the carriers’ costs, increasing some and shrinking others. You can count on the carriers to pass through cost increases. But do you know how to get the reductions too? What should your negotiation strategy be? Turn on your regulatory headlights and learn how to take advantage of the deal (and price) changes being wrought by the FCC.

Yes, price is important, but don’t let dollar signs get in the way of the other building blocks of your deal. If your services don’t perform … or your account team lets you down … or your ramp-up and ramp-off periods are inadequate … or your hands are tied when you want to engage a TEM provider … or any of a score of other issues … you have problems. Find out how to fix them with this on-target advice.

Alternatives to AT&T and Verizon are crucial in the battle for lower costs and are known for giving great deals. It is not about suddenly moving all of your services to a tier 2 supplier, but about using alternative suppliers for services where it makes sense. In this session we'll examine a range of alternative suppliers, provide advice on the services that you should and should not consider them for, and give you an up-to-the-minute scorecard to guide your decisions on who should get your RFPs and who should be allowed to win a piece of your business.

SIP trunking is a legitimate “game changer.” Done right, it saves serious money and frees you from the (expensive) grip of legacy ILEC POTS and PRIs.  But the move to SIP trunking is tricky … the technology must be understood, there is a new pricing model to evaluate, vendor capabilities and coverage need to be fully assessed, and your contract must give you the flexibility to move what you need to when you want to. Find out how to get it right the first time at this must-attend session.

Yes, the RFP route is the best, but in the real world you don’t always have the time or money (and sometimes both) to go that way. That’s where this must-attend session comes in as your speakers tell you what is realistic – and achievable – when you are under a tight deadline or a tight budget. The good news? Follow their winning advice and you don’t need to throw yourself at the mercy of your vendor.

Building on Wireless Deals 101, this session addresses the latest trends and best practices in wireless services. Topics covered will range from optimal approaches to optimizing wireless services, the top areas of wasteful spend and how to target them, mobile policy best practices, dealing with Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) trends, smartphone/tablet platforms/strategies and how companies are increasingly using mobile device management (MDM) solutions to manage security issues and to implement and monitor the cost reducing wireless policies their companies need.

With a Microsoft Lync and Exchange 2010 deployment as a point of departure, this experienced team outlines the key steps to build a business case for hosted or managed Unified Communications platforms, identify the business and legal risks you need to address before you move forward with a global deployment and tell you how to avoid or mitigate those risks.

Take your knowledge of SIP trunking services to the next level. This breakout session expands on SIP Trunking 101 and dives deep into SIP trunking’s features, SLAs, SBCs (call control devices, not the former ILEC), service provisioning and management and CPE certification. Plus, a candid look at the current and future technical and legal aspects of the service, and how SIP has upended the market for local services.

Moving corporate Web servers, email, or application development and testing environments to public clouds is now on the to-do list of many enterprise CIOs and CTOs. Public cloud services offer compelling benefits for the right use case but migrating key resources or processes to public clouds can still be risky. Join Joaquin and Marc to explore the key business, technology and legal issues you must understand before you move functions to the cloud, and get a foolproof road map to deal with them.

Communications deals require constant monitoring to make sure you pay the rates you negotiated, the vendor applies credits and discounts correctly, and your services are implemented properly. Join Justin, Hank and Julie as they highlight the key data points and show you how to save time through contract compliance programs and tools, including the right telecom expense management system. They’ll even throw in some useful pointers on how to handle disputes with your favorite carriers.

Global telecom deals present additional issues and considerations compared to U.S. deals. Challenges include: balancing global suppliers against national and regional suppliers, working in markets that are more and less competitive than the U.S., different approaches to commitments, dealing with local access costs and issues and the complexity of multiple currencies, all of which make global deals tricky. Attend this session to understand these differences and to develop a realistic view of what works and what won’t work when you negotiate a global deal.