Arizona has launched a statewide, converged Internet Protocol communications network designed to improve service and save money by replacing the state"s aging communications infrastructure.

The new network replaces several being used by nine state agencies for voice and data with a single communications infrastructure based on IP, according to DJ Harper, spokesman for the Arizona Government Information Technology Agency, which is overseeing the project.

The state also just completed the installation of 5,000 IP phones from Cisco Systems Inc. at those agencies. Within two years, the state plans to install IP-based phones in the other 100 state agencies, Harper said.

"The basic project is part of an overall telecommunications revamping in the state to transition our traditional PBX-based telephones over to a new IP-based phone system," he said. The new network provides additional functions and saves the state money "based on having one network to oversee, instead of a voice network and separate data network."

One of the agencies that has already adopted the new system is the Arizona Department of Revenue.

The DOR wanted to replace three key systems, or small PBXs, that served its nine-story headquarters building because workers in one department needed an outside line to connect to co-workers in another department -- and incoming calls could not be transferred from one department to another, Harper said.

The Cisco IP-based telephony system removed those problems, he said.

"This helps Arizona by streamlining the business of government," said Phil Calzadilla, regional manager at Cisco, the equipment manufacturer for the IP network.

"Generally there will be costs savings by reducing capital expenditures and expenditures on circuits, so instead of paying for a voice, data and video circuit they"re going to have one cost for an IP circuit. ... That will reduce [the] costs of doing business there," he said.

Calzadilla said the savings would vary by agency.