SACEM Chooses Verizon Business to Deliver Advanced Communications Capabilities

SACEM, the French private nonprofit collective rights management organization, has chosen a Verizon Business voice-over-IP (VoIP) solution to streamline its voice and data communications. Verizon IP Trunking is providing the association with a quick and easy means of deploying IP telephony across its French operations. As a result, SACEM has already reduced its overall communications expenditure by 25 percent.

SACEM (Société des auteurs, compositeurs et éditeurs de musique), manages the copyright and distribution interests of authors, composers and publishers in France. The association has more than 128,000 associate members and collects authors' rights for copyright material used in film and TV, record production, videos and on the Internet, as well as for live performances at public events and other sites open to the public.

The association, which is privately run but is funded by and aligned with the French government, has more than 1,425 permanent employees working from 89 delegation offices throughout France plus seven additional departments that cover country regions located outside of Paris.

Given the dominance of digital media in today's market, SACEM decided to overhaul its existing communications infrastructure to ensure that its own technological capabilities would mirror those of its associate members. In particular, the company wanted to upgrade its technology infrastructure to an IP-enabled environment to simplify network management and achieve cost efficiencies.

SACEM chose Verizon Business' VoIP solution as it offered a quick, flexible and easy migration path to a VoIP environment. Verizon IP Trunking's centralized, multisite design enables customers to deploy a centralized IP PBX hub in one location, and then simply extend VoIP as well as unified communication and collaboration services to other sites across an IP network.  There is no need for in-country TDM voice trunks or expensive gateway equipment. 

The six-month project is now complete, and SACEM is currently running more than 2,800 Verizon VoIP extensions across its operations, giving all its associates a four-digit extension code.  Leveraging an easy-to-use Web portal, SACEM can also run enterprisewide reporting, manage the company's dial plans and quickly administer features.

Vincent Nortier, project leader at SACEM, said: "SACEM has a long-standing relationship with Verizon Business, which made our VoIP transition decision very easy. Verizon Business' innovative and cost-effective IP Trunking solution has enabled us to quickly transition to IP-enabled communications - and realize the benefits. We have already seen a fourfold reduction in the cost of calls to fixed telephony lines, and a threefold reduction in calls to mobile devices. In addition, we have dramatically simplified our communications infrastructure, making day-to-day management much easier."

Jeff Rallet, regional sales vice president for continental Europe at Verizon Business, said: "Verizon IP Trunking is a great solution for companies that wish to quickly and simply move to a VoIP communications environment. It's always gratifying for us to help our customers realize concrete return on investments within a limited time frame.  We expect to continue to support SACEM with new and innovative technologies that help their business do business better.  It's particularly important for government-funded organizations to be able to show they are spending money wisely, and realizing cost and management efficiencies goes a long way toward doing that."

About SACEM
SACEM is a private non-profit Collective Rights Management Organization (CMO) with the mission to provide protection, representation and service for original music composers, authors and publishers. SACEM collects authors' rights and redistributes the payments to the rights-holders in France and in the rest of the world. More information at: www.sacem.fr

About Verizon Business
Verizon Business, a unit of Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ), is a global leader in communications and IT solutions. We combine professional expertise with one of the world's most connected IP networks to deliver award-winning communications, IT, information security and network solutions. We securely connect today's extended enterprises of widespread and mobile customers, partners, suppliers and employees - enabling them to increase productivity and efficiency and help preserve the environment. Many of the world's largest businesses and governments - including 96 percent of the Fortune 1000 and thousands of government agencies and educational institutions - rely on our professional and managed services and network technologies to accelerate their business. Find out more at www.verizonbusiness.com.

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