Global Voicemail
Migration
How Cisco IT Developed
Migration Strategy for Global
Voicemail System
A Cisco on Cisco Case Study: Inside Cisco IT
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Overview
ƒ Challenge
Save costs and vendor management by migrating to a Cisco
Unity® platform, requiring interconnection among multiple systems
on a global platform, without negatively affecting users
ƒ Solution
Focus on Cisco Unity voice messaging first, and rely on Cisco
Unity Bridge for interconnectivity to existing messaging servers
ƒ Next Steps
Continue migration of current voice mail to a Cisco Unity platform,
in preparation for full Unified Messaging deployment in the future
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Program Goals and Objectives
ƒ Migrate to Unity® Voicemail for reduced costs, ease
management
ƒ Stop paying $7M per year for voice-mail services
ƒ Remove 184 Avaya systems: Reduce voice-messaging
servers by more than 70%
ƒ Replace with 55 Cisco Unity systems: Consolidate
systems to approximately 94% fewer locations
ƒ Be our own best customer: Develop a Cisco® Best
Practice implementation that can be used by our larger
customers
ƒ First step toward Cisco’s ultimate goal: Unified
Messaging
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Background
ƒ Program Unity is a joint initiative between Cisco® IT
and the Cisco Enterprise Communications Software
Business Unit (ECSBU) to replace Cisco IT’s existing
global Avaya Octel voice messaging system with a
Cisco Unity® system—the largest Cisco Unity
deployment ever undertaken globally
ƒ Program Unity includes these other initiatives:
Adoption of standard global dialing plan (8+7 digits)
Consolidation of Cisco CallManager servers to a Centralized
Call Processing (CCP) model in select data centers
Migration of IPCC agents and call routing applications to a
limited number of CCP CallManager clusters
ƒ First step toward Unified Messaging
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Cisco Voice Messaging Environment March 2003
Approximately 184 Octel Voice Messaging Systems
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Cisco Voice Messaging Environment Post Cisco Unity Deployment
55 Cisco Unity® Systems Deployed Worldwide
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Challenges
ƒ Migration planning
Business goals and objectives
Legacy user information
User policies
Migration site order
ƒ Message addressing issues
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Challenge - Migration Planning
ƒ Before developing any technical migration solution, first
determine:
Business goals and objectives
Preliminary expectations for migration
User policies, including how to handle legacy voice system
information
ƒ These decisions help to drive eventual migration
strategy and communications planning
See the Cisco® IT Unity Deployment Communications Strategy
and Training Strategy case studies for more details
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Challenge - Migration Planning
ƒ The following factors were considered when deciding
the order in which sites would migrate to Cisco Unity®:
ƒ Which sites would offer the team the best learning
experience?
ƒ Which sites would help to validate the solution
architecture and solution infrastructure?
ƒ When/Where Cisco® IT Regional teams could receive
migration training?
ƒ Which sites would potentially have network topology
issues?
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Challenge - Message Addressing Issues
ƒ In legacy environment, a Serenade international
gateway server was used to route voice messages
between critical Octel Aria servers in the U.S. and all
Octel Serenade servers.
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Challenge - Message Addressing Issues
ƒ This Serenade gateway presented some numbering
plan challenges for the migration process. Essentially,
the team was working with two separate legacy
numbering plans for voice messaging.
ƒ Management of the Octel systems was outsourced to a
team from Avaya. Clearly documenting the migration
steps and frequent communications helped to facilitate
Avaya’s efforts in modifying the existing Octel systems
during the migration.
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Solution
ƒ Migration Strategy and Process
ƒ Cisco Unity® Bridge
ƒ Standardized Global Voice-Messaging Numbering Plan
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Solution - Overview of Migration Strategy
ƒ A global flash cut was not a viable migration strategy
for the following reasons:
Would cause a Day 2 support spike and further delay migration
off Octel systems
Could not guarantee uninterrupted voice-messaging service
Would affect Cisco® IT support staff with training and service
requests
ƒ More realistic strategy: convert 75% of users ASAP and
the rest in separate phases, maintaining networked
voicemail at all times
ƒ Cisco Unity® Bridge creates a “hybrid” environment of
Octel- to-Cisco Unity messaging interoperability
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Solution - Overview of Migration Strategy
ƒ Key Decisions:
ƒ Legacy voice messages and distribution lists were not
carried over to the new system
ƒ Develop Distribution List Manager (DLM) tool for users to
recreate and maintain their own distribution lists
ƒ Focus on ensuring directory data integrity from onset,
in order to reduce support calls and improve productivity
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Solution - Migration Strategy
Three Phases:
ƒ
Phase 1: Migrate 75% of Cisco® users rapidly
ƒ
Cut over a series of small to medium-sized sites to test
migration processes and user communications
ƒ
Focus: Migrate largest sites in EMEA and Asia-Pacific
regions, simultaneous cut over of San Jose and Research
Triangle Park campus locations
ƒ
Phase 2: Migrate all sites outside of United States
ƒ
Phase 3: Migrate remaining sites in the United States
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Solution - Migration Process
ƒ Three primary components: Data Cleanup, Data Load,
and Site Cutover
DATA CLEANUP
SITE CUTOVER
Pre-Enroll
Cisco Unity®
Avaya
Implementation team receives
Avaya data
Data cleanup was
an iterative monthly
process completed
in advance of the
global data load
Avaya data is split into sitespecific files
DATA LOAD
Pre-Migrate Data Cleanup
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Migration Process - Data Cleanup
ƒ Avaya data files are split into site-specific files
ƒ Data is associated with employee information in the
Cisco® Telephony Number Management (TNM)
database
ƒ Each site is assigned its own site code
ƒ Data is verified to be accurate and in consistent format
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Migration Process - Data Load
ƒ One-time step of importing “cleaned” voicemail data
files into the Application Foundation Software (AFS)
database
ƒ During data load, all Moves/Adds/Changes are
suspended to insure data integrity
ƒ After this initial data load, site migrations are managed
from the Cisco Unity® Migration Console
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Migration Process - Site Cutover
ƒ Site implementation of Cisco Unity® system starts at
this point, and sites are migrated by site code
ƒ During Cutover, users move through progression of
three different states: Bridge, to Pre-enroll, to
Cisco Unity
ƒ User enrollment, training, communications, and support
occur during this phase
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Solution - Cisco Unity Bridge
ƒ Cisco Unity® Bridge preserves networked voice mail
during migration. Cisco Unity Bridge servers are
located in San Jose and configured to communicate
with the Octel servers.
ƒ During migration, Octel subscribers are configured as
Bridge subscribers in order to allow for recorded name
information when addressing to them. The Cisco Unity
Bridge maintains a permanent directory of Cisco Unity
subscribers and a NameNet directory of Octel
subscribers.
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Solution - Cisco Unity Bridge
ƒ A single Cisco Unity Bridgehead server is configured to
centrally manage all Cisco Unity Bridge subscribers and
delivery locations during the Octel migration phase.
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Solution - Standardized Global VoiceMessaging Numbering Plan
ƒ Key goal: Standardized global voice messaging
numbering plan to ensure alignment with global dial
plan.
ƒ Telephony and voice mail are now considered part of the
same dial plan. Users can dial 8 plus seven digits to call
a person at another site or for addressing a voice
message. All mailbox addresses also have seven digit
alternate extensions in Cisco Unity®.
ƒ San Jose is exception site: Users continue to call and
address messages using five digits.
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Next Steps and Anticipated Results
ƒ Global implementation of Cisco Unity® Voice
Messaging began in June 2004. Migrations are
expected to finish in July 2005 to make this a
13-month program.
ƒ Anticipated results include validation of global design
solution and obtaining feedback to guide future
deployments.
ƒ Learn from the initial voicemail deployment, and
prepare for full Unified Messaging deployment after
Microsoft Exchange 2003 and Outlook 2003 are
deployed to all end users.
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Resources
More information is available at the following URLs:
Cisco@Work Messaging page: This page also
includes the other Cisco Unity® deployment case
studies in this series.
ƒ
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/about/ciscoitatwork/index.html
Case Study: Architecture and Design Solution
Case Study: Communications Strategy
Case Study: Training Strategy
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Resources (Contd.)
ƒ
Steps to Success page: Intended as a step-by-step
resource for Cisco partners for selling and delivering
service and support throughout the network cycle.
http://www.cisco.com/go/stepstosuccess
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To read the entire case study, or for additional Cisco IT case studies on a
variety of business solutions, visit Cisco on Cisco: Inside Cisco IT
www.cisco.com/go/ciscoit
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