Case Study: How a Real Life Tech Support Call Saved Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars

When Glenn Lippincott of Southern Company called DPS Telecom tech support, he wasn't planning on replacing his legacy Badger remotes with a new, custom-engineered network monitoring solution. He thought he had a simple question about his T/MonXM system. But as tech support chief Ron Stover walked him through his T/MonXM configuration, Lippincott saw a menu item that caught his eye. So he asked about it, and the answer helped him improve his network monitoring and save his company hundreds of thousands of dollars.

"DPS told us we didn't have to pay if it didn't work... It works and it's sweet."

- Glenn Lippincott, Southern Company

"Glenn called because his T/MonXM system seemed to be missing a software module," recalled Ron. "I wanted to double-check if it had been installed, so I told Glenn to look through the Installable Options list. While we were going over what was on his system he noticed there was a software module called 'Badger Interrogator.' And Glenn immediately asked, 'Hey, what's that?'"

DPS engineers developed a custom
solution to poll Southern Company's
aging Badger remotes.

Southern Company Had a Problem With Unsupported, Aging Legacy Remotes

Lippincott had good reason to be curious, because legacy Badger equipment had become a serious problem for him.
Lippincott works in the Birmingham NOC, where he oversees network monitoring throughout the Southern Company's operational area. Southern Company, a Fortune 500 energy producer and distributor, has a territory that extends through most of Alabama and Georgia and parts of Florida and Mississippi.

Lippincott's monitoring network includes over a hundred legacy Badger 1200 RTUs, polled by two Badger masters.

"It's an older system. Badger Technology went out of business and we didn't have support for it. There hasn't been an update in the software in 7 to 8 years. If the masters went bad, I'd be in trouble," said Lippincott.