AWARD CONSULTING - Key Persons
Andrew Ward studied Mathematics & Computation at Oxford University before joining Metaswitch as a software developer. After 3 years writing code Metaswitch realized he was better at talking than coding, and so banished him from London and sent him to work in customer support in Alameda, CA. Andrew discovered that California had much better weather than England, and then he met a girl, so he decided to stay.
Ultimately he spent 14 years at Metaswitch, supporting Metaswitch's customers across the US and Canada, and was responsible for establishing the Metaswitch Commissioning Team which handled all new customer installations and switch migrations.
By 2015 Andrew was VP Operations but had long harbored a dream to start his own business, and so he gave 3 months notice and left to start something new. His initial experiments with 3D printing were not exactly successful so he started Award Consulting a few months later, and has been focused on growing the business and serving our clients ever since.
"One of the most valuable traits I've seen in using Award Consulting is the fact they are always moving the needle on every project and ticket we engage them on. I've never had to remind them about a pending list, prompt them on unanswered items or prod them to move faster. Also Andrew has a pretty cool accent that I'm sure makes him smarter."
Job Titles:
- Client Support Technician
Dan was born and raised in rural, southeastern Oklahoma. Growing up in the heartland gave him a passion for helping others, and the wonder presented in science fiction gave him a passion for technology.
Dan spent 6 years with Murray State College as an instructor of Computer Information Systems, teaching students the fundamentals needed to pursue their CompTIA A+, Cisco CCNA, and Microsoft MCSE certifications. Along the way, he managed to persuade a few students to join him on the dark side, where they have cookies and Linux.
His next stop was a 10 year tour as Chief Information Officer for a Federally Qualified Health Center. There, he had the opportunity to leverage technology to assist in improving patient lives and health outcomes, especially for underserved and at-risk populations.
After a short sabbatical, Dan decided to pursue advanced network engineering and found that service provider networks would be a great place for that. He is currently pursuing a CCIE and plans to seek a JNCIE after.
Darrin began his career at Nortel Networks, working on both wireless and wireline switches - working in as a support engineer, installation manager and in various management roles.
He later spent time at Santera, Genband and Tekelec, working in support, professional services and as a technical trainer, before joining Metaswitch in 2006.
In 11 years at Metaswitch Darrin worked as an installation and project manager, technical trainer and a translations engineer. He also had the distinct pleasure of working for Andrew for 15 months, and for some reason he's crazy enough to come back for more.
Darrin brings experience in a broad range of older switching platforms - alongside his Metaswitch expertise - and of course his skills as a trainer and project manager are invaluable.
David joined Award Consulting in 2021 as a newcomer to the telecommunications industry. Prior to that, he had six years' experience in middleware support for Java-based enterprise applications in Unix-like environments for Wachovia Bank and Wells Fargo. The experience gave him the tools to serve customers in highly available systems. He also has communications experience on the side with 15 years of writing about sports and sports analytics.
Since joining Award Consulting, David has distinguished himself by leading our roll-out of STIR/SHAKEN services, taking ownership of our LERG refresh translations service, and as our subject matter expert in the NetSapiens platform.
David has lived the itinerant life of a Navy spouse as his wife is a musician in the US Navy. He has lived in four states (and counting) plus Naples, Italy as a part of that journey.
"We would recommend you to anyone needing Metaswitch help. And we would advise them to use your services sooner than later."
Job Titles:
- Client Support Technician
Ever since high school, Natasha has known she wanted a career in IT. As a sophomore she won 1st place in North Dakota for the Girls Go CyberStart cybersecurity competition. Her Governor awarded her the "ND Governor's Summit on Education - Innovative Student of the Year" for leading her CyberStart team to victory, showing leadership, and pushing forward into the tech field.
She attended Dixie Technical College in St. George Utah, studying IT where she got her CompTIA A+, Network+, Security+, and Amazon Cloud Practitioner certificates. She now lives in Cedar City, Utah. Natasha joined Award Consulting in 2022 and is building her new career in the telecommunications industry.
"We greatly appreciate the quick responses, high quality information and availability for hands-on fixes and improvements. Without realizing it, I think we've come to think of Award Consulting as something of an extension to our own team."
Job Titles:
- Senior Technical Consultant
Nathan has been in the communications industry for over 30 years, including 15 years at Big River Communications, an early-adopter of the Metaswitch softswitch platform back in 2004. At Big River Nathan took leadership roles as an engineer, architect and project manager in the implementation of a nationwide voice and data network.
After leaving Big River, Nathan was Senior Director of Engineering at Smart City Telecom, the exclusive provider of data & telecommunications to Walt Disney World in Florida, before joining Award Consulting in August 2020.
Nathan brings valuable technical expertise in IP and transport networks (alongside his experience with voice switches), plus significant leadership experience in running large voice networks, which will be an asset to our clients.
Job Titles:
- Technical Consultant
- Metaswitch As a Customer Support Engineer
Paul is based in the United Kingdom and has over 40 years experience working for both telecom service providers and equipment vendors. He began his career at British Telecom working on radio and optical transmission systems before moving to Cable & Wireless supporting their national and international voice switching systems.
After 20 years with service providers he joined Nortel Networks Professional Services providing voice switching support, complex fault resolution and new system integration for European telecom service providers.
In 2010 Paul joined Metaswitch as a Customer Support Engineer. Working from their London offices he provided Out of Hours support to North American customers for software upgrades and hardware migrations.
Paul brings a wide technical knowledge coupled with an understanding of a service provider needs. His Metaswitch support experience and location in the UK are ideally suited to providing Out of Hours support for US and Canadian service providers completing upgrades and migrations.
Rita started her career as an archaeologist, but when that didn't generate enough income to support a family, she moved to telecommunications, working for a CLEC provider in the northeast for 7 years. She led their translations group for soft switches covering LATAs from Maine to Virginia.
Rita moved to Metaswitch as a technical trainer in 2007, then hopped over to working on live switches in the Commissioning Team. From 2015-2020, she led the North American translations team, setting up new deployments, and augmenting existing ones.
Retiring in November 2020, Rita has now come partway out of retirement to join Award Consulting on a part-time basis.
"I literally cannot think of a single thing you could do better. You're prompt, you're dependable. You guys are a model of everything a contractor should be."
Job Titles:
- Senior Technical Consultant
Stephen began his telecom career writing SS7 code. Since that time he has worked for a number of service providers and equipment vendors.
Along the way he was a co-founder and CTO of a CLEC in Texas focusing on business phone service and built out a network using Metaswitch equipment. He was also co-owner of a Wireless Internet Service Provider and a dial-up Internet company in the early days of the Internet. He was a founding member of the North Texas Linux User Group.
Stephen spent 11 years at Metaswitch in the support organization as a Customer Support Engineer and a Support Manager where he was engaged in both large and small service providers both in the USA and in Latin America and developed his hands-on expertise across their product line.
His wide experience in the industry gives him a perspective of both technical details and making things work to the practical side of business. He still loves getting his hands dirty doing real work in networks.
"We have been more than pleased working with Andrew and Stephen. Everyone on our team feels like not only are you providing excellent service, but you are going above and beyond. I cannot think of one improvement that we could ask for."
Job Titles:
- Client Support Technician
Tyler started his post-college career as an English teacher, but, after a few years, he decided that role did not mesh well with his personality. He then made the difficult decision to change course, and began working on his CompTIA A+ certification. Upon landing his first IT position, which involved phone support for network cutovers, he decided he had found the next step on his career path, and shortly after he began working on obtaining his Network+ and Security+ certifications.
Tyler entered the telecommunications industry upon joining the Award Consulting team in 2024, and is working to grow his skills in this exciting field.