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IP.4.IT Special Coverage: The "Google-ization" of IT: Page 4 of 5

Although IT departments may initially be reluctant to bring apps like Wikis into the enterprise, eventually user demand for such easy-to-use yet powerful apps will drive them behind the firewall anyway. A flexible service-based architecture will make it easier for companies to bring in a best-of-breed Wiki application that will deliver real value quickly, rather than wait for enterprise app vendors--ranging from Microsoft to SAP to Siebel--to add (typically crippled) Wiki functionality to their application suites.

Rich media publishing is another application built to ride on top of emerging converged networks. Enterprises have already made an investment in backbone and infrastructure to support voice over IP; with the right approach, they can basically get audio and video distribution for free, said Darrin Coulson, senior VP, worldwide field operations for vendor Sonic Foundry. "What the world is demanding now is a 'Tivo' style way of watching presentation material," he said, which is something more enterprises are able to deliver today via a converged IP network infrastructure.

Supporting innovative new applications may be the direction IT is headed, but managing the bottom-line costs of this new architecture may still rule the day--at least for the near term. Memorial Hospital in York, Pa., re-architected its entire network beginning about two-and-a-half years ago to converge data and voice onto a single IP-based network, leveraging technology from Trapeze Networks, Spectralink, Siemens and others, said hospital CIO Cliff Weaver.

Apart from the flexibility that a wireless network provides in a hospital environment, Weaver saw cost savings as a major driver as well. "One of the main reasons we went with an IP-based solution was to reduce [network admin] headcount to maintain and troubleshoot the [converged] network," he said, noting that it takes only 1.5 full-time headcount--part of the hospital's data network staff--to manage the wireless voice network. In addition, Weaver was able to cut telco costs by 90 percent, keeping a bit of spare landline bandwidth for redundant backup.

"Our biggest lesson learned was that most wireless data networks today are not designed to carry voice," Weaver said. "We spent a significant amount of time re-architecting and re-mapping out wireless network."