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In this blog, we follow up on part 1 in our series with answers to more of your top cloud migration questions. Our second installment focuses on the specifics of handset migration, and how migration to MiCloud Connect affects your communications features, functions and configuration capabilities.
Once again, here are Q&A versions of the responses Joe Herde, Director of Product Marketing for Mitel MiCloud Connect, and Scott Brodie, a Mitel sales engineer, provided to audience questions in a recent webinar on cloud migration.
What if my current handsets are not compatible with MiCloud Connect? Do I have to purchase new ones?
Right now, we’re offering a number of incentives to help more of our customers migrate from their on-premises Mitel solution to MiCloud Connect, which is our flagship global cloud solution. And there are great incentives related to handset upgrades.
In North America, we include a free handset upgrade for customers who aren’t already using compatible phones, such as Mitel 6900 series or 400 series IP phones. We even include free shipping for the upgraded handsets.
We’re also offering other incentives, such as free installation, free implementation and special pricing for monthly subscriptions to further reduce the costs of transitioning to the cloud.
For details about all of our various incentives to help with cloud migration, reach out to your Mitel partner, and they’ll be happy to provide the information you need.
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Will I be able to retain my current communications functionality if I transition to MiCloud Connect?
Absolutely. After you migrate from your Mitel on-premises solution to MiCloud Connect, you will be able to do everything you were doing before. Plus, you’ll have access to a world of new capabilities that are available through MiCloud Connect.
We can maintain all of your existing functionality after the transition because the MiCloud Connect platform is very versatile. We can even implement all of your current features and functions in the same way they’re implemented in your current Mitel solution. For example, if your current solution is set up to alert technicians when a voicemail message is left, or to escalate voicemails to multiple devices or email addresses, we can build that same functionality into MiCloud Connect. Even your choices for music while people are on hold can be loaded into the MiCloud Connect platform so the user experience is identical.
How do you manage the cloud migration process?
We’ve put a number of people and processes in place to ensure we complete every cloud migration in the most effective and efficient way possible and deliver all of the requested features and functions. Our dedicated team of cloud migration experts covers the complete migration path so every aspect of your transition to the cloud is considered and addressed.
We also use tools that help to automate and accelerate your transition to the cloud. In fact, we’re testing migration tools in the field right now, and they’re getting tremendous feedback.
The migration tools we work with automatically detect all of the functionality that’s being used on the network and generate an audit report. You can then confirm the report includes all of the functionality you currently have and determine whether there are any capabilities you no longer need. Once you’ve verified the list of features and functions you want to continue using, we create the cloud versions of those same capabilities.
The migration tools also help us to quickly and easily replicate your current feature set. For example, we can extract details about button programming on your phones and how button labels and phone lines are set up, then simply upload that information into the new cloud system. These kinds of efficiencies dramatically reduce the amount of time from discovery to go live.
By making decisions based on the audit report, you can ensure you’re only paying for the functionality you’re actively using and that the number of users you’re paying for matches your current staffing numbers. We’ve had cases where customers had purchased 100 licenses at one point, no longer have that many users but didn’t get around to cleaning up the system programming. Migrating to the cloud is an excellent opportunity to rectify those types of discrepancies.
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Can I combine my on-premises PBX and phones with applications that are hosted in the cloud?
We do have cloud-based applications, such as Mitel MiTeam Meetings, which allows you to take advantage of seamless, real-time video conferencing and collaboration on a subscription basis. But, in the end, we’re trying to get our customers to the point where they can access all of the available cloud features and functions at an affordable rate and turn them on and off as needed.
Fully migrating to the cloud gives you considerably more flexibility to meet different users’ requirements for voice, chat, video, file sharing and other features, and to accommodate different work styles. You can also mix and match service plans. We don’t limit you to one subscription for the entire company.
Can I manage all of my users and locations and make programming changes to MiCloud Connect?
Because MiCloud Connect is provided as a managed service, you have a lot of flexibility. We can manage these tasks for you, your Mitel partner can manage them, or you can take care of these tasks yourself. It just depends on how you want to set up the service.
There’s also a lot of flexibility in terms of how individual settings can be configured. For example, permissions can be set in the way that best matches your users and the way your business functions. You may want to set permissions company-wide, based on users’ locations or their role in the organization.
Part 3 in our cloud migration blog series is coming soon
Keep an eye out for our final blog post in the series where we share Joe’s and Scott’s answers to questions related to MiVoice Office 250 migration, how Mitel ensures cloud solution compliance, security and availability and interoperability with other vendors’ products and solutions. You can watch the full webinar on how Mitel can help you future-proof your communications technology here.
