Situation

Managing growth

Advanced Drainage Systems (ADS) is an industry leader in providing drainage products and services to address the most persistent and challenging water management problems faced by cities, towns and rural areas. Communities around the world rely on ADS to improve their environments and the lives of their people.

Operating a global network of approximately 60 manufacturing plants and over 30 distribution centers, the Ohio-based company relies on audiovisual technology to connect its people, maintain processes, and communicate with customers, partners and other stakeholders. For a company of this nature, reliable communication technology is a business-critical asset.

Challenge

Fueling innovation

ADS has never been busier. From urbanization to climate change, global water resources are being taxed like never before, and the company has developed a sales and distribution platform, research capabilities and manufacturing facilities to meet its customers’ growing and increasingly complex demands. To maintain its leadership position, the company views collaboration technology as a business-critical asset – particularly in and around its corporate headquarters in the Columbus, Ohio metropolitan area.

The combination of rapid growth, sweeping technological changes, and new communication imperatives resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic all contribute to ADS’ increased reliance on videoconferencing. Yet ADS is not a communications technology company. It needs robust but turnkey collaboration solutions that free its staff to focus on their core strengths.

Solution

Conquering complexity

Given Advanced Drainage System’s growing reliance on collaboration technology, the company was immediately receptive to learning more about Pro-Tech Management, an AV technology support solution introduced by SVT in late 2021.

“At our corporate headquarters, we have three separate locations with a total of 12 meeting rooms, and we see ourselves adding more,” says Robbie Giesken, the ADS systems engineer who oversees Advanced Drainage’s videoconferencing capabilities. “We’re largely a Microsoft Teams environment, and that’s worked well for us, but as with any technology there are issues with hardware components, software updates and the like, and it’s important to be proactive in keeping everything in working order.” Pro-Tech Management’s promise to keep Giesken “100% aware, 100% of the time” resonated deeply with the IT professional.

After all, as any IT manager can testify, it’s a nightmare to be called in to a fix a videoconferencing technology glitch that presents itself at the very moment the technology is needed for an important meeting. Pro-Tech Management brings peace of mind to people like Giesken by constantly testing and retesting every connected device, from monitors to processors. When glitches do occur, the system immediately alerts customers to the issue. Subscribers are notified via email and on their custom Pro-Tech Management dashboard, giving them plenty of time to address issues before they become problems. Pro-Tech Management Subscribers can also avail themselves of remote troubleshooting by CX engineers or opt for onsite assistance when needed.

The Pro-Tech Management dashboard provides alert information, system diagnostics, and usage statistics in a concise and easy-to-understand format that ADS’s internal tech team found to be familiar and useful.

Result

Providing peace of mind

“Having Pro-Tech Management reach and out monitor our systems for me is beautiful,” says Giesken. The ADS systems engineer also appreciates the Pro-Tech Management dashboard, which provides both alert information, system diagnostics and usage statistics in a concise and easy-to-understand format. Coming from an IT background, “The dashboard format is very familiar and useful to me.”

When issues have occurred, “Pro-Tech is great about walking me through what’s needed to resolve the situations. There have been times when they really come through in a pinch, scoping in on issues that I might not know about.

“It’s just a great feeling to have someone other than myself monitoring the technology. It makes my job a lot less stressful.”