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Victor, N.Y.-based Finger Lakes Technologies Group
Inc. (FLTG), an affiliate of The Ontario & Trumansburg
Telephone Companies (OTTC) and a Cisco premier certified
partner, is rich in tradition and history, as well as a model
of stability in the communities it has served for more than
100 years. That tradition also underpins its wholesale
and channel initiatives, which make up one of the fastest-
growing arenas for the independent telco.
In the 1920s, Hovey H. Griswold purchased OTTC, which
is currently the second largest independently owned tele-
phone company in New York State. And in 1995, his great-
grandson Paul Griswold founded FLTG to offer deregulated
services such as telephone systems, network engineering
and Internet services to residential and business customers.
To this day, OTTC and FLTG are family owned and operated,
with more than 15,000 business and residential customers.
While maintaining its status as a fifth-generation family-
run business, the company has kept technological innova-
tion at its heart, delivering next-generation communica-
tions, cloud and hosted services, and data networking solu-
tions to residential and business customers in more than
30 markets in upstate New York. It operates the largest
private fiber network in state too, having invested $19 mil-
lion to build out more than 2,500 route miles. It also has
17 interconnects with major carriers throughout the nation,
to provide coast-to-coast connectivity for business custom-
ers. It’s been a certified ISP since 1995, a VoIP provider
since 2006, and a wholesale operator since 2010.
On the channel side, the FLTG Carrier & Wholesale
Services Channel supports a breadth of products and
services for other telecommunications carriers, VARs,
agents and other partners.
“Our channel push began as a strategic initiative
meant to help us reach new segments,” said Jessica
Nava, director of carrier sales at FLTG. “We started out
with just one or two strategic partners, and now we have
more than 60 partners that we work with, on everything
from traditional voice and data to mobile backhaul and
outdoor DAS for wireless companies.”
Recently, the company’s hosted unified communications
and collaboration suite has taken off for business customers,
Nava said. FLTG plans to offer the service in a white-label
format to partners by the end of the first quarter of 2016.
Another growth area for the company’s channel busi-
ness is in colocation and data storage. Its secure data
storage facility consists of 700 acres encompassing 64
former nuclear warhead bunkers in Romulus N.Y., which
was one of the country’s army depots during the Cold War.
And, FLTG has been a Cisco Premier Partner since
2000, and has more than 100 Cisco certifications. That
means that its channel partners can sell hardware and
make use of FLTG’s extensive data networking expertise.
“This is a niche opportunity for our agents,” explained
Nava. “They can tap an already fully developed retail prod-
uct offering to put together a voice, data, Internet and
infrastructure sale. We fulfill so many requirements from
a certification and engineering perspective for these guys,
and can act as a professional services team.”
Also on the support front, the company has a so-
phisticated NOC that’s fully manned with an advanced
engineering staff around the clock, where it carries out
proactive and reactive network monitoring for its entire
network services portfolio.
Overall, the channel is contributing significantly to the
company’s fast-track growth trajectory. It now has 140
employees, having doubled in size in the last five years. It
also recently opened a new headquarters building – com-
plete with a patio outside with built-in grill, a café and a
training room – and, it’s been repeatedly named one of
the best places to work in Rochester and in N.Y. state.
“We’re excited about our company culture and our
growth opportunities,” said Paul Griswold, president and
CEO at FLTG.
ROFILE
anaged
Services
IP
Telephony
IP
Telephon
AHistory of Innovation
By
Tara
Seals
Tradition and Cutting-Edge Innovation Define Finger Lakes’
Channel Approach
72
Channel
Vision
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January - February 2016