NetStar beds down Crown hotels deal

Cisco gold partner NetStar has won a multi-million dollar deal to roll out a unified communications system across Crown's Melbourne hotels.

The multi-stage project will see NetStar deploy 7,500 Cisco handsets at the Crown Towers and Crown Promenade hotels, along with Crown Metropol, which is set to open mid next year.

NetStar said it has completed stage one of the project, rolling out 2,100 IP phones and messaging to Crown Towers and Crown administration staff, as well as a new contact centre platform for hotel reservations and customer service.

The Cisco handsets installed in Crown Towers hotel suites delivered guest such applications as room service, housekeeping, local weather, attractions and entertainment, via a touch screen handset, in the guest's preferred language.

NetStar claimed the technology "will transform each guest room into its own service centre, offering customers interactive and up-to-the-minute information on the hotel and the local area."

Crown's executive general manager for management information systems, Ric Lamb, said Crown "was looking for a partner who could meet the challenge of integrating the new system with [its] existing PABX system.

All stages of the project were expected to be complete by 2011.