2024 has been another busy year – not just for Vital, but for many of the partners and customers we’ve been fortunate enough to work alongside this year.
With the silly season just around the corner, we’ve put together a highlight reel of our 2024 projects, partnerships, and achievements.
Below, you’ll find highlights including:
- An overview of our big wins of 2024: Joining Transpower’s TransGO network refresh, building partnerships in the utilities sector, bringing 500 Fonterra trucks onto our digital radio network, and seeing a significant Net Promoter Score increase.
- Info about a few of the projects we’ve delivered this year: Undergrounding fibre in Rongotai and delivering radio coverage inside a dam!
- A run-down of what we’ve been up to internally this year: Celebrations, anniversaries, and giving back to the community.
- Key dates and contact info for over the holiday period.
Thank you from everyone here at Vital for your support this year. We hope you have a safe, relaxing summer and we’re looking forward to a great 2025.
Have a great summer!
The team at Vital
Hot off the press: Vital joins TransGO
We’re thrilled to share that we signed an 11-year partnership agreement with Transpower last week to provide Radio Relay Links as part of their TransGO network refresh. Vital will design, build, maintain and manage over 26 digital microwave links supporting Transpower’s tele-protection signalling and other critical services between substations and other Transpower sites.
Vital in the utilities sector
This year, we’ve continued to build on our long-term partnerships with utilities customers and have taken on some exciting new projects. Working with Lexel, our teams tackled an awesome project to bring IP connectivity into three Lodestone Solar Farms, plus their head office and a datacentre. We provide both primary fibre and additional redundant connectivity, with more feasibilities underway. Our ability to partner seamlessly with other providers means we can service renewable energy projects in every corner of the country.
500+ Fonterra vehicles join our digital LMR network
To keep tankers connected while transporting milk from A to B, Fonterra needed better coverage than what their drivers were getting on the cellular network. Working with Dove Communications, we welcomed over 500 Fonterra vehicles onto our nationwide digital radio network this year.
Our NPS is on the rise!
Another win we’re proud of this year is our improved net promoter score (NPS) results. Vital’s customer NPS increased 19 points to +41 in 2024 and our employee net promoter score (eNPS) reached a fantastic +30. Making Vital an awesome company to work with (and for) has been a focus for our teams over the last few years and it’s great to see our efforts reflected in our NPS.
Our biggest fibre job of 2024 – going underground in Rongotai
If you travelled between Wellington City and the airport earlier this year, you’ll know about the Rongotai Road intersection upgrade. What you may not know, is that the poles carrying our overhead fibre were removed during the work and our OSP team undertook a huge project to move our fibre in the area underground.
The team did a fantastic job, putting in some long hours to complete the transition from the overhead to underground network. Their hard work and planning paid off when we successfully switched over to the new fibre in March without any unplanned disruptions to customers.
Bringing voice communication into a dam!
Our networks connect people in all sorts of remote and hard to reach places. In 2024 we worked with our partners over at One NZ to bring voice communication inside a hydro power station. Working with One NZ and the end customer, Meridian Energy, we designed a solution (using LMR coverage augmented with Vital Locate for Health and Safety monitoring) that could get into the hydro power station and keep the people working inside connected.
A few Vital milestones
2024 has been a milestone year for Vital, not only did we celebrate 20 years of being listed on the NZX, but we also turned 30! While a lot has changed since TeamTalk was established back in 1994, including our name, we’re proud to still be designing, building, and operating top-notch LMR, linking, and fibre networks all these years later.
Giving back to the community:
The Vital team are big on giving back to the community. Our staff get one paid volunteer day to use each year, and we support Life Flight’s amazing work by providing radio comms, volunteering at their golf days, and attending fundraisers. Over the last 12 months we’ve also supported Wellington Women’s House via a free internet connection, and our staff are well on the way to filling two Christmas Star Boxes for the Wellington City Mission.
Vital over the holiday period:
While our networks don’t take a break over the holidays, our people do.
We’re nearing our holiday work restriction (black-out) period. This year, our black-out period runs from Thursday 19 December 2024 to Tuesday 7 January 2025.
NOC support during the holidays:
Our Network Operations Centre [NOC] will continue to provide 24/7 network support throughout the holiday period. The usual fault reporting process will apply.
Email:
faults@vital.co.nz
Phone:
0800 101 900 (option 2)