Case Study: Cornerstone Telecommunications
One of the biggest industries in the world right now is the telecommunications market. And the UK's two biggest players in that market are O2 and Vodafone, with 549 million customers between them across the globe.
So when the two telecomms giants signed the Cornerstone agreement aimed at pooling their network infrastructure across their UK, Ireland, Spain and Germany markets, Alifabs was understandably excited and proud to be awarded the contract for manufacturing the new Cornerstone equipment cabinets.
Actually, Alifabs did more than just build the cabinets. It also played an integral part in their design, based on a comprehensive understanding of the customer’s requirements and the fact that the cabinets were going to be housing equipment in a variety of different environments.
To accommodate all these environments, in fact, it was decided that three different cabinet designs were needed. Patriotically dubbed Spitfire, Harrier and Vulcan, all three cabinets are thermally managed, and enable the customers to install their equipment in up to 15 different permutations, in accordance with client demands.
What's more, despite their flexibility, Alifabs has ensured that even the largest cabinet, Vulcan, can be deployed under permitted development planning regulations - a fact which really boosts the speed of the network roll out process.
In a move typical of Alifabs' 'open door' policy and desire to go above and beyond the call of duty, we held an open day at our factory in Malton, North Yorkshire aimed at Cornerstone teams involved with everything from planning to logistics, installation and maintenance.
The idea was to assist Cornerstone staff in learning how to install and manage the new cabinets, and the event was a resounding success, with around 70 people - including, also, representatives from the Clarke, Mono, CSL and Tyco partner organisations - attending over a three-day period.
Visiting the site on the opening day, Rob Crutchley, Head of the 02 UK & Vodafone UK Network Share, had this to say: "I am delighted to see that the close working relationship between Alifabs and the site design team has resulted in the development of these outstanding solutions, which enable us to bring together our networks to deliver the highest quality network at the lowest cost".
Another day, another satisfied customer. Oh, and the next time you find yourself in the middle of the countryside but unexpectedly able to make a call on your mobile, spare a thought for Alifabs. For chances are it's one of our cabinets that's helping to make it happen!
