How does a school choose a technology vendor that they have never worked with?
July 1, 2008
@mom2cjm on Twitter asks:
Trying to choose a vendor to provide my wireless network…any help out there?
I solicited advice from my team to help understand how schools should choose a technology vendor. I got this thoughtful 3-point evaluation criteria from my manager of network services:
1. Length of time the company has been in business and producing the product you are interested in. The longer the production time, the more mature and stable the product generally is. You never want to buy a first year car and this same philosophy holds true with technology as well.
2. Ongoing costs/Warranty - Compare the warranty of each unit (how long is the initial warranty), and what are the support hours? Do they have a toll free number to call? Some smaller companies may have email only support. What are the maintenance costs for the unit for a year (ie software upgrades, etc)?
3. Ask for at least 2 references (aside from the case studies on their website) and call and talk to them. How long they have had the wireless, how much their support costs were, how expensive was the install, etc)?