Raiders tackle retail communications networking

The Oakland Raiders professional football team needs to communicate more than plays and formations.



The Raiders operate 12 Raider Image retail stores throughout California, an online store and a corresponding fulfillment center. Effective voice and data communications are critical for streamlined coordination and ideal performance in these locations.



“To properly support our stores’ usage of POS, administration and telephony, we needed a secure private network at a reasonable cost,” said Matthew Pasco, VP of IT at The Oakland Raiders, in an interview with Chain Store Age.



The Raiders initially selected San Francisco security and communications platform provider NetFortris (then known as Telekenex) for its ability to provide a range of networks and hosted voice-over Internet protocol (VoIP) solutions. These included multiprotocol label switching (MPLS) and fiber networks.



“This combination was a must to keep communications secure,” said Pasco. “Not to mention the fact that working with one vendor for all of these areas kept complexity down and made it much easier for our IT teams to manage service and uptime for our end users.



From the NetFortris Core Platform, the Raiders utilized NetFortris Cloud PBX and Private PCI-Certified MPLS Network. These solutions provided increased network reliability and performance as the Raiders migrated from legacy frame-relay to MPLS communication networks.



In addition, a legacy on-premise phone system was replaced by full-featured, cloud-based private branch exchange (PBX) to enable greater flexibility, and expensive point-to-point T1 connections were replaced with secure fiber. Raider Image stores utilize the PCI-certified MPLS network for POS transactions.



The IP networks were installed first, followed by the phone system. Voice calls route through the NetFortris private network, not the public Internet. Call traffic is automatically prioritized over data traffic, and the system’s configuration streamlines the addition or deletion of users, lines, and locations.



“This design allowed us to obtain and maintain PCI compliance more easily,” said Pasco. “We're also able to remotely support all our store locations effectively.”