DEAL!

An inside look at an IT contract.

Client: Berkshire Health Systems, Pittsfield, MA.
Services: Wireless Internet for patients and visitors.
Winning Vendor: Wayport.
Terms: About $40,000 annually in three-year contract signed October 2007.
Vendor Search: Six months, conducted independently by Joe Diver, chief information officer. “It was not a formal vendor search process,” he says.
Number Vendors Considered: Three, including AT&T and two local vendors.
Evaluation Tools: Diver considered customer service and current client base.
Why Public Wi-Fi: Berkshire serves a high tourism area, and many patients come for services expecting online access. The public wireless network will piggyback a pre-existing clinical network from Cisco already in place. “A lot of patients expect this,” Diver says.
Why Wayport: Security features and support services attracted Diver.
Deployment: Completed February 2008 at Berkshire’s two main facilities,Berkshire Medical Center and Fairview Hospital, a critical-access hospital.

—Gary Baldwin