Help your customers understand why workplace noise affects productivity and profitability. And how they can fix it.

Today, work happens everywhere — in busy open-plan offices and contact centers, at home, even coffee shops. This flexibility is great for business and people, but with it comes a new challenge: noise. Distraction caused by noise reduces productivity and well-being and, in contact centers, detracts from a positive customer experience.

Studies show that it takes 23 minutes to recover from distraction, and over 58% of employees are distracted multiple times each day. That represents a significant impact on your customers’ businesses you can easily help avert through proven noise reduction strategies and products.

Plantronics engineers solutions that help people manage the noise around them so they can be more effective — no matter where they work. Together, we can help your customers reduce distractions caused by noise so their businesses can thrive.

Plantronics in South Africa offers several solutions for managing noise. This week we focus on the Voyager 6200 UC, a Bluetooth® neckband headset with earbuds that offers professional-grade audio and versatility. 

On any given day, you might need to collaborate with colleagues remotely, field calls from customers or listen to music to help you focus on your latest project. Now there’s a headset that’s flexible enough to meet the demands of your role inside the office and out. Voyager 6200 UC offers everything you’d expect from Plantronics — active-noise canceling, clear voice transmission and premium audio — in a versatile Bluetooth® neckband headset with earbuds. Intuitive controls make it easy to use, and the neckband vibrates to signal an incoming call. Voyager 6200 UC is so comfortable and low-profile that you can use it all day long, in the office and on the go. 

IT Managers

The professionals in your organization have different roles, responsibilities and work styles, so why offer them all the same headset? Now you don’t have to. New from Plantronics, Voyager 6200 UC is the first Bluetooth® neckband headset with earbuds built to enterprise standards. With its premium audio and versatility, users will want to wear it — and stay connected — everywhere they go.

Flexible Workers

With premium features and professional-grade audio, Voyager 6200 UC is a Bluetooth® neckband headset with earbuds that has the versatility to go beyond the office. Transitioning to your next conversation is easy: Connect with colleagues working remotely, listen to music to focus distraction-free or drop an earbud to tune in to the conversation around you. You can count on Voyager 6200 UC for outstanding audio every time, everywhere.

Hear and be heard clearly with these features:

• On-demand active- and passive-noise canceling let you focus on your call or work.
• Four omnidirectional microphones with enhanced digital signal processing (DSP) deliver superior background noise canceling.
• Premium hi-fi stereo lets you immerse yourself in your favorite music.
• Wide band audio provides high-quality PC telephony.

About Plantronics

Plantronics is an audio pioneer and a global leader in the communications industry. We create intelligent and adaptive solutions that support our customers’ most important needs: experiencing and facilitating simple and clear communications while enjoying distraction-free environments. Our solutions are used worldwide by consumers and businesses alike and are an optimal choice for open office environments. From unified communications and customer service ecosystems, to data analytics and Bluetooth® headsets, Plantronics delivers high-quality communications solutions that our customers count on today, while relentlessly innovating on behalf of their future. For more information visit www.plantronics.com/za 

©2018 Plantronics, Inc. Plantronics, SoundGuard, aptX and Voyager are trademarks of Plantronics, Inc. registered in the US and other countries, and Plantronics Hub is a trademark of Plantronics, Inc. The Bluetooth trademark is owned by Bluetooth SIG, Inc. and any use of the mark by Plantronics, Inc. is under license. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. 01.18

1 Oxford Economics, “When the walls come down – the evolution of the workplace.”
2 Plantronics Noise in the Workplace Global Study, 2017.
3 The Cost of Interrupted Work: More Speed and Stress Study from the Department of Informatics, University of California, Irvine, 2008.

XIAMEN, CHINA / DALLAS, USA Spetember 14, 2017   Yeastar (https://www.yeastar.com), a leading manufacturer of VoIP PBX systems and VoIP Gateways, today opens up the Beta Program for its brand new, feature-rich Cloud PBX, the first cloud-based IP-PBX of its product line. Inheriting a good number of advanced features from its predecessor, S-Series VoIP PBX, Yeastar’s robust premise-based IP-PBX, Yeastar Cloud PBX delivers high functionality, accompanied with central manageability and superb scalability, benefiting from cloud.

Yeastar Cloud PBX provides a powerful Yeastar Management Plane (YMP) and easy to deploy dedicated PBX instances for solution providers and telecom resellers to easily start their hosted PBX business. Yeastar Cloud PBX inherits the essence of our robust premise based IPPBX that has been improved over the last eleven years and evolves into a scalable, reliable, and fully-fledged communication services platform.

Highlights of Yeastar Cloud PBX

• Solution providers and telecom resellers are able to take advantage of YMP to start their hosted PBX business easily.
• Provide hassle-free creation and management of PBX instances as well as a dashboard displaying comprehensive view of the YMP status.
• Capacity including users and concurrentcalls can be increased or decreased flexibly and effortlessly for each individual instance.
• Stay connected with Linkus Mobile Client, which empowers remote workers and traveling employees with constant connectivity.
• A wealth of business-enhancing features is designed to address the full spectrum of your business requirements. 

“With cloud technology becoming prevalent everywhere, Yeastar keeps the tradition of innovation to deliver the next-generation cloud telephony. With extensive feature sets, seamless scalability, and centralized management, YMP will go above and beyond your expectations,” said Alan Shen, CEO of Yeastar. “The Yeastar team is dedicated to meet any highly specific and personalized business needs. That’s why we open up this beta program to solicit feedback and better our offering.” 

The benefits of cloud telephony have been recognized throughout the world. South Africa is no exception. South African businesses are embracing cloud telephony technologies with great enthusiasm now, and thus the market for cloud PBX systems has grown rapidly in South Africa. Yeastar has been providing South Africa cutting edge VoIP products for long. This Beta Program is also fully available to customer in South Africa market.

The beta tester selection will last until mid-October, and the beta test period is the remainder of this year. The official release of Yeastar Cloud PBX is scheduled for the 1st quarter of 2018. Yeastar invites enthusiasts to participate in this program to provide feedback so that Yeastar can fine tune this product to perform up to the market’s standard. 

More details about Yeastar Cloud PBX can be found here. Beta tester application begins today; anyone who wants to take Yeastar Cloud PBX for a test run can read more about the Beta Program here, or sign up directly here. 

About Yeastar

Yeastar specializes in the design and development of innovative telecommunications equipment, including VoIP PBX systems and VoIP gateways for the SMB. Founded in 2006, Yeastar has established itself as a global leader in the telecommunications industry with 1,100 channel partners and over 100,000 customers worldwide. Yeastar products have been consistently recognized in the industry for their high-performance and innovation.

For more information about Yeastar or to become a Yeastar partner, please visit https://www.yeastar.com.

To slash your office call costs immediately and drastically, simply switch to VOIP connectivity. It is easy and quick to switch to this widely used, reliable and proven method of telecommunications that delivers reliability, quality, freedom from the copper network and significantly reduced costs.

What is VOIP?

"Essentially, VoIP (voice over IP) is an Internet phone," explains Anthony Kinnear, Sales Director of Business System Analyst at Formula1 Technologies. "Instead of your voice being transmitted via the old circuit-switched landline copper networks, it is transmitted via the Internet. For this reason, it is also known as 'Internet calling'."

"Just like a landline, a VOIP system will allow your office staff to phone anywhere, anytime. You could, therefore, also call it a 'virtual' landline," says Kinnear. "However, unlike a landline, it will cost you much less, because VOIP calls do not attract copper network telephone charges, no matter where you phone to." 

How much cost-savings will a VOIP system deliver?

Switching to VOIP will deliver huge savings on all your calls. If you phone a landline number from your VOIP system, you will enjoy a 59% saving on current Telkom rates. The cost of calls to cell phone numbers will immediately be reduced by 48%, and the cost of phoning another VOIP number is slashed by 74% savings.

To make phone calls to other branches or remote offices on your company's VOIP network is free.   This means your company can make unlimited "internal phone calls", regardless of whether the extensions are at branches or remote offices in South Africa or anywhere in the world.  

A simplistic example will illustrate the possible Rand savings. Let's say a company makes 500 Telkom to Telkom calls per month and each call lasts on average 5 minutes. The cost of these calls from a Telkom landline would amount to R2,125 per month (500 calls x 5 minutes x .85c per minute Telkom rate). However, if these calls were made from using a VOIP solution at just .35c per minute, the cost would be slashed to just R875 per month, delivering a R15,000 savings over a year. Please visit http://f1tpabxsystems.co.za/voip-sip-phones/ to see the calculations.

The savings that will be achieved on calls to cellphone numbers and VOIP numbers on other networks will be even more pronounced, while the cost of calls to extensions at branches or satellite locations are eliminated entirely, regardless of their location.

This all adds up to some impressive savings available to your company immediately.   

More benefits of switching to VOIP

In addition to these significant cost savings, VOIP will also delivers other benefits.

All companies that have experienced the frustration of lost business and productivity resulting from the wide-spread copper theft problem in South Africa will appreciate the benefit of being freed from the dated copper landline network. 

Switching to VOIP also provides an opportunity to access faster Internet speeds through fibre, wireless, LTE and DSL fast Internet connection networks. Faster Internet speeds from the right connection network for your needs will deliver always-connectivity and increased productivity.   

How easy is the switch to VOIP?

Switching to VOIP is as simple as taking two steps. First, contact a VOIP service provider that is an expert in VOIP solutions and can provide a full and professional audit of your unique current and future office phone requirements. Based on this audit, recommendations can be made for the right system for your office, number of users and features required. This system can then be rented through a cost-cutting lease tailored to your exact needs, while still providing you with the flexibility to change or upgrade as you need to.

The second step is simply providing the go-ahead, where after a professional team supplies, installs, maintains and services the new VOIP office telephone system and provides tech support during the lease period, after which you can renew or upgrade to new equipment. 

"It's that easy!" concludes Kinnear. "We are very excited to bring businesses this quick and simple way to drastically reduce costs, while also improving productivity. We invite businesses in Gauteng to contact us for a friendly, free, no-obligation audit of their office phone requirements and our best recommendations on how to slash these costs while boosting productivity with the latest advancements in VOIP telecommunications and Internet connectivity."  

Note to the editor

About Formula 1 Technologies

Formula 1 Technologies Office Automation is part of the Formula 1 Technologies Group and has service centres throughout the country, with qualified specialists trained both locally and internationally. The complete and highly specialised office automation solutions provided to our clients realises our business philosophy and company slogan "First Time. Every Time. On Time." With over 3 decades of experience in the ever-evolving telecommunications, information technology and office automation industry, we have been recognised as the Number 1 OKI Distributor in South Africa, as the second biggest Toshiba Distributor in the country, as a Platinum Samsung Partner and as a selective Xerox reseller. We offer distribution lines for all office automation brands and are actively involved in Cheez Kidz, a non-profit organisation (NPO), associated with 5FM. 

For more information please visit http://f1tpabxsystems.co.za/voip-sip-phones/ or to arrange an interview, please contact:

Formula 1 Technologies Office Automation
Tel: (011) 680-3443 Formula
Fax: (086) 248 3212
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

When it comes to telephony solutions, there are many options to choose from and business owners are indundated with multiple calls per day from various solution providers who are all prett much selling the same thing.  With all these options, business owners tend to make the wrong choices, going with the cheapest provider or the most familiar brand and often-times regretting their decisions a few months into their contract, leaving them helpless to change their fate for the forseeable future without incurring additional costs.

ESAPARTNER has taken on new initiative in the sales and support of telephone systems for the business market with a team certified in the sales and maintenance of multiple telephone system brands, and skilled in building solutions that do more than just save companies money but transform the way that companies communicate by taking their communications into the future, tailor-making each solution to individual business requirements.

The company based in Cape Town, South Africa services more than 200 PABX customers in Cape Town and throughout South Africa, spanning across the various brands that they represent - Yeastar, Samsung, NEC, Avaya, Far South and even hosted asterisk-based business and call centre telephony systems. The technical team servicing these clients are all specialists in their fields with certifications and expertise on each of the products to provide clients with peace of mind from the very start.

Being multi-vendored in the PABX industry gives ESAPARTNER's the edge as they are able to suggest products based on specifications and not based on brand-limitations. As a result, ESAPARTNER does not provide out-of-box solutions and each solution is tailor-made to meet individual business requirements. When tailor-making a solution, the company into account network infrastructure, security, and compatibility, breakout speeds and contentions, system usage and requirements and various other factors that relate to the operation of the system and then build a solution to ensure that each factor is covered.

VoIP has been a very competitive market for many years with major service providers competing aggressively for the lowest call charges and the best solution for the South African market. In between the major players are the wholesalers and resellers, competing for their portion of the pie which we know as Voice Over IP.

ESAPARTNER came into the VoIP market in 2013 after becoming a well-known name in the office automation and PABX industry, servicing well over 1000 clients. Since then, ESAPARTNER has grown its VoIP and Telecommunications department, internally known as ESACONNECT and is servicing a significant slice of the market with high-quality VoIP and IP technology. As their clientele has grown, so has the company's technologies with the company offering a full range of VoIP and internet products including hosted PBX, gateway solutions, ADSL, VDSL, LTE and fibre. 

The company is increasing its clientbase in the VoIP sector of the market while also gaining marketshare in the internet and bandwidth sector, to meet the demands of increasing data consumption in the country. ESAPARTNER has partnered with various upstream providers in its aim to provide its clients with the best solution based on technology and not brand.

Based in Cape Town, ESAPARTNER services the Western Cape but also has a footprint throughout South Africa with various SME and corporate clients using a variety of internet and VoIP products offered by ESAPARTNER. The company supports all its clients on a level 1 and level 2 technical scale with strategic partners who offer 3rd level technical support.

For more information regarding any of the VoIP and internet products provided by ESAPARTNER, contact the company on 021 552 5233 or visit the company website on www.esapartner.co.za

Cape Town-based end-to-end business technology company, ESAPARTNER, recently launched their new hosted PBX platform along with a brand new and very interactive hosted PBX quoting tool on www.cloudcallsolutions.co.za, offering clients a full hosted PBX quotation upfront, making it possible for clients to purchase a brand new hosted PBX system without all the sales talk. "We want to change the way businesses purchase their telephony solutions and with everything going online we chose to pioneer an online method of purchase", said Thanasi Papaioannou the company's MD. 

With the new online platform, clients receive an option to purchase the hardware they need for the hosted PBX cash without any requirement to sign up to long hardware rental agreements. ESAPARTNER states that an additional function will be added in the near future allowing users to calculate their rental costs for rental options on the hosted PBX hardware. This can be expected towards the end of 2016.

The new hosted PBX solution offers three packages for each sector of the market:

• Cloudcall Lite - R50 per extension
• Cloudcall Business - R85 per extension
• Cloudcall Call Centre - R450 per extension

Each package caters for a different sector of the business market from small and medium enterprise through to large corporate or call centre, however, the entire suite of hosted PBX packages offer clients a wide variety of features over and above the standard features offered by on-premise PBX solutions such as voice conferencing, video conferencing, desktop softphone integration, POPI compliant call recording (at R99 extra) and various other operational functions making using and managing the Cloudcall hosted PBX simple.

Although the online platform only offers cash options, site users are guaranteed quick responses once they generate a quote where they will be able to request rental prices for 1,2,3 and 5 year terms to remove the initial capital investment and provide a truly affordable transition to their new futureproof communication system.