AES was invited, by Lincoln College board, to write a tender for the supply, installation and commissioning of a data network and telephone system with CADD for the 246 international students who are in residence.

The only facilities that the students had in the college before the upgrade was a telephone located in each room for local calls. The PABX was 20 years old and could only handle pulse dialling.
A data network existed only for the Administrative purchase to run the college.
Some students had extra phone lines installed into their rooms, which were directly connected to Telstra for a dialup modem to provide access to their respective Universities network.

The college consists of six multistorey buildings, three heritage-listed, and no backhoe trenching was allowed - only boring between buildings.

After the closure of the tender AES was again approached by the College Board to apply rigour and nominate a preferred supplier. None of the tender respondents were fully compliant in their response or had the expertise to undertake the whole project. The contract was divided into three sections and was awarded accordingly.

The backbone, for both data and communications, between buildings and their associated floors is fibre. Cross patching is possible to enable both Data and communications to maintain continuity should a fault occur. The wiring for both data and communications on each floor was installed in copper and capable of handling 100MB data speeds. A PABX was installed that used CADD accounting to keep abreast of the costs of the students’ international calls and provide security on hoax calls to other students within the college.

The project had a 9 week period during the Christmas break to complete the project.

During the project the board increase the size of the system from 252 outlets to 269 outlets for both data and communications.

The project was switched on, on the last day. Three errors were found and corrected within 1.5 hours. The system passed the test system acceptance program by midday.

AES, by recommending to the board that the project be split into three sections, was able to save $32,500 on the cheapest submitted tender price and provide the extra 17 outlets within the budget.