GEI Consultants, Inc. Adopts Nefsis Web and Video Conferencing for Inter- Office Meetings Nationwide

Read full-length story as published in Civil Engineering News

Founded in 1970, GEI Consultants provides a broad array of geotechnical, water resources, environmental and ecological science, and engineering consulting services to clients internationally. The company has completed more than 25,000 projects in all 50 states, across Canada, and in more than 20 countries. With 450 employees in more than 20 offices across the country, GEI Consultants has earned a reputation for solving complex geotechnical issues and has gained a strong presence in the environmental and water resources engineering consulting sectors.

With offices dispersed nationwide, GEI Consultants relied heavily on travel. Once a board member was unable to travel from the firm’s Sacramento, CA office to its headquarters in Woburn, Massachusetts for a board meeting, the firm quickly began looking into video conferencing solutions. A standalone, point-to-point (two-party) video conferencing platform was swiftly purchased to connect the offices, allowing them to conduct the board meeting as planned.

Problem: GEI Consultants sought a multipoint video conferencing solution to replace recurring business travel. Converting existing room-to-room systems to multipoint would have required the purchase of expensive infrastructure hardware.

Solution: Nefsis, an affordable, full-featured, multiparty web and video conferencing online service.

Business and IT Benefits: Nefsis video conferencing cut travel time and expenses. Nefsis delivered the high-quality video required, without the cost and complexity of previously required infrastructure hardware. Nefsis cloud-based online services were easy to implement and expand as needed.

Utilizing video conferencing at its headquarters, other offices in Boston soon used video conferencing to talk to their West Coast counterparts as well. In time, the IT department began to get more requests to set up video conferencing meetings, but to extend video conferencing capabilities to multiple offices, the existing system required reconfiguration of their entire network infrastructure. Realizing this was going to be an extremely costly project requiring the purchase of additional infrastructure hardware and dedicated bandwidth, the IT Systems Support department began to research a more up-to-date solution.

Utilizing Cloud Computing

GEI Consultants came across Nefsis web and video conferencing — a cloud-based video conferencing technology that required no expensive hardware, network re-engineering, or months-long implementation. After researching Nefsis’ cloud computing approach and its benefits, GEI support staff purchased Nefsis Professional based on its video quality, low entry cost, and easy implementation. Nefsis runs over GEI’s existing network and quickly deployed without any network reconfiguration.

Using laptop computers, the IT staff added off-the-shelf webcams and shipped the configured system from headquarters to each remote office. Installation was as simple as that. Instead of using costly, large-screen LCD monitors in each office, the participants have the option to connect the laptop to an existing office projector for conference room viewing.

Nefsis allows GEI Consultants to connect multiple parties into a single online video conference in real-time. Built-in diagnostic tools also help support staff to test the network bandwidth and video quality at each location remotely.

Edwin Villafana, system support specialist at GEI Consultants states, "Since Nefsis is web-based and uses standard web URLs and a point-and-click interface, you just turn on the computer and it works. I also enjoy the scalability and easier maintenance of the system. I don’t have to worry about adding new office locations. The Nefsis cloud automatically manages it for me."

Improving Inter-Office Communications

Within weeks of purchasing Nefsis, GEI Consultants was ready for its company-wide training. A live presenter taught a technical writing class from the Connecticut office to more than sixty people from five other offices. The presenter was able to see and interact with the participants in each office. The class proved to be such a success that GEI Consultants plan to hold regular trainings for their employees.

Nefsis has allowed GEI Consultants to expand their video conferencing capabilities to company groups such as the 401K committee and the shareholders.

"Conducting telephone conference calls just about every month with a group that large can get unwieldy, making it difficult to have real dialogue," said Benjamin Sawa, Project Manager of Operations. "We really noticed a big difference when we changed to a video conferencing format. Having the visual really helped keep the flow of the conversation going, and there’s a real advantage to being able to see the body language of the participants."

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