Great Amman Municipality cuts travel costs and improves business results with Microsoft Unified Communications

In cooperation with Microsoft Jordan, The Greater Amman Municipality officially launched the Microsoft Unified Communications project. His Excellency Omar Maani, Mayor of the Greater Amman Municipality and Mr. Sayed Hashish, Microsoft Regional General Manager, North Africa East Mediterranean & Pakistan (NEPA) were present at the launch. H.E. Maani highlighted the importance of strategic partnerships with organizations in the IT sector to achieve higher productivity levels and increased cost savings.

Sakher Al Khreisha, IT Executive Director, Greater Amman Municipality, stated, "GAM is committed to playing an active role in helping Jordan achieve the objectives of His Majesty King Abdullah II, who wants to make the Kingdom an information and communications technology hub for the region. Mayor Maani is also keen to support a restructure of the municipality's management and improve efficiency with an investment in innovative technologies. With both important factors in mind, GAM deployed a unified communications solution from Microsoft for 35 of its users, including the Mayor and his senior management team as a pilot project, which was highly successful and resulted in productivity gains by all senior managers."

Eng. Muhammad Ali Al Qatarneh, Head of the Technical Development Department at the Greater Amman Municipality, stated, "The systems integration work at the municipality was handled by Professional Advanced Infrastructure Solutions (PAIS), a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner and a Microsoft Voice Specialized Partner for unified communications. The project was officially launched two months ago and is now in use by most of GAM's senior Directors and Managers".

With the new unified communications tools, the users at the municipality can now communicate with instant messaging, voice and video-conferencing features, and are able to switch seamlessly between various communications channels. When users log off their office networks, calls can automatically go to their mobile devices without having to set up manual call forwarding.

GAM also aims at achieving estimated savings of 45% on travel and 35% on telephony, as well as productivity gains by senior managers, after deploying Microsoft Unified Communications.

Othman Baniahmad, Microsoft Jordan Public Sector Lead, stated:
"Given pressures on public spending in the current global economic climate, the Greater Amman Municipality, which employs a large number of people, was concerned at the rising travel budget for staff and the growing burden of communications costs. Microsoft's unified communications solution will provide the municipality with significant savings on travel costs and telephone charges, reduced carbon foot print, improved internal communications, and a foundation for wider collaboration within the public sector."

Wajeeh Al Mesherky, CEO of PAIS, stated: "We handled the first deployment of unified communications in Jordan, and have brought our specialized knowledge to the implementation for the municipality, which is the largest in the country so far."

This agreement demonstrates Microsoft Jordan's commitment to support the Government of Jordan in adopting technology that will improve the efficiency and productivity of public sector employees, in addition to helping develop local experience and capabilities, which are key to building a vibrant economy and enabling the country to achieve the objectives outlined in the National ICT strategy.