For many organizations, the network has quietly become one of the biggest barriers to growth. It is the almost invisible nervous system of the enterprise, yet when it fails or becomes overly complex, it is the only thing anyone talks about. As projects expand, offices multiply, and cloud adoption accelerates; IT teams are finding the network is an increasingly difficult piece of the puzzle, and hard to control.
This is a common narrative for many IT professionals: You are tasked with ensuring uptime and security, but the operational drag of managing multiple systems often pulls you away from strategic initiatives. When your team is stuck coordinating vendors and managing support tickets, they aren’t focusing on the projects that drive the business forward. We recently worked with a customer in the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) industry who found their business in this position. Their journey from operational chaos to a unified, future-ready platform offers a blueprint for any organization struggling to scale.
The High Cost of Complexity
Growth is the goal for every business, but for IT infrastructure, growth often equals complexity. Our AEC customer was experiencing rapid expansion through annual mergers and acquisitions (M&A). While this was great for their market share, it was a nightmare for their network topology.
They were adding 20 to 30 new locations every single year. Because they lacked a unified strategy, they ended up juggling 20 to 30 different carriers. This created a complex web of connectivity that was nearly impossible to manage.
The impact on their daily operations was serious:
- Operational Chaos: With so many carriers, simply identifying where a fault originated became a time-consuming project. Finger-pointing between vendors slowed down resolution times.
- Inconsistent Infrastructure: In this fragmented environment, delivering consistent connectivity across the business was a struggle. New offices had different setups, different service-level agreements (SLAs), and different support contacts.
- No Unified Visibility: Without a single solution, proactive monitoring was impossible. The team couldn’t stop issues before they started because they couldn’t see them coming.
- The “Firefighting” Trap: Their small IT team was constantly reacting to immediate crises. Critical staff members were bogged down in administrative tasks rather than executing on their roadmap.
This is the reality for many enterprises today. The network becomes a constraint rather than a platform for innovation.
How 11:11 Network as a Service Changed the Game
The turning point came when this customer decided to move to 11:11 Network as a Service (NaaS). The goal was not just to buy bandwidth, but to fundamentally restructure how they consumed and managed connectivity.
By partnering with 11:11 Systems, they were able to turn a fragmented, carrier-heavy environment into a unified platform. Here is how the transition reshaped their operations.
End-to-End Aggregation and Management
The most immediate impact was consolidation. 11:11 Systems consolidated all their connectivity under a single provider. This meant moving from dozens of carrier contracts to one.
This shift provided a single SLA and one dedicated team responsible for monitoring, management, and support. For the customer’s IT team, the relief was real. They no longer had to chase down specific regional carriers when an issue arose. They had one number to call, and a partner who took ownership of the outcome.
Performance Backed by a Global Backbone
Reliability is non-negotiable, especially for an industry like AEC where transferring massive file sizes is part of the daily workflow. Unlike many providers who simply resell connectivity, 11:11 operates its own global backbone network.
This infrastructure enabled regional hubs, multiport connectivity options, and optimized performance for their critical workloads. It ensured that the network wasn’t just simpler to manage but performed better for the end users.
A Broader Services Stack
Consolidation often stops at connectivity, but true efficiency comes from aligning the entire infrastructure stack. This customer was able to align connectivity, colocation, cloud, disaster recovery, and security under a single relationship.
This created meaningful consolidation. It simplified operations because the systems were designed to integrate seamlessly. It also simplified procurement, smoothing out budget approval cycles, and reducing the administrative burden on the finance and IT departments.
From Constraint to Platform
The results of this transformation were significant for this customer. The network is no longer a bottleneck preventing the organization from scaling. Instead, it has become a robust platform that supports their ambitious growth.
With the operational noise silenced, the customer’s IT team shifted their focus back to strategy. They are now successfully executing their SD-WAN roadmap and expanding their colocation and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) footprints. M&A activity continues, but integrating new offices is no longer a logistical nightmare.
Is It Time to Rethink Your Network Strategy?
Every IT leader reaches a point where the status quo is no longer sustainable. If you recognize your own organization in the challenges faced by this customer, it might be time to evaluate your approach.
Consider 11:11 Network as a Service if you are currently:
- Managing multiple carriers: If your footprint is growing and your vendor list is growing with it, you are likely losing efficiency.
- Scaling through acquisitions: If you are adding new offices or global projects, you need a standardized deployment model.
- Planning strategic initiatives: If your SD-WAN, colocation, or IaaS projects are stalled because your team is too busy keeping the lights on.
- Struggling with visibility: If you don’t know what is happening on your network until a user submits a ticket.
Delivered in partnership with AWS, 11:11 Network as a Service offers the security, scalability, and support required to modernize your infrastructure.
We would welcome the opportunity to share more about this customer’s journey and explore how the same model could help simplify and strengthen your own network. If you would like to learn more, reach out to your 11:11 Systems representative to schedule a brief conversation.
