Independent Telecom & Cloud Broker
We spent 20 years on the other side of that table.
Twenty years inside carriers, UCaaS, and cloud providers showed us exactly how a quote gets built — and what it leaves out.
We learned where the margin hides, and why the rep in front of you can only ever recommend one answer. Gateway is built on the opposite arrangement — no carrier allegiance, more than 200 providers, no cost to you.
Gateway Telecom Advisors started life as Executive Technologies, a St. Louis firm built around enterprise PBX systems for some of the region's largest employers. That was the whole business — until the industry stopped being about phone systems.
Over the following two decades the practice widened with the market: cloud voice and UCaaS, then business internet and SD-WAN, cybersecurity and SASE, contact center platforms, cloud and data center, and telecom expense management. Every category was added the same way — by consultants who had already sold, engineered, and supported it on the provider side.
Today that full portfolio works on the client's side of the table. Relationships with 200+ providers mean real competitive options, transparent side-by-side comparisons, and a process built around what the client is trying to accomplish — not a quota. Based in St. Louis, serving clients nationwide.
Headquarters
St. Louis, MO — Serving clients nationwide
Focus Areas
UCaaS, CCaaS, SASE, Network, Cloud
Provider Access
200+ providers under one relationship
Gateway does not hire from outside the industry and train up. Every consultant working a Gateway account brings a minimum of twenty years selling the complete product portfolio — voice, network, security, and cloud — across a multitude of service providers. Not one product line. Not one carrier's line card.
Every consultant arrives with at least two decades selling the full portfolio across multiple providers. They have quoted these platforms, lost deals on them, and supported them after the sale.
Initial certification and training across every product category is required before a consultant works an account — and ongoing training as platforms, providers, and pricing change.
The job is to find what the business actually needs and help you make the right decision — including saying so when the right decision is to stay exactly where you are.
The same consultant renegotiates your contract at renewal and applies pressure when a carrier falls short of what it sold you. There is no handoff to an account team you have never met.
Most businesses are quietly overpaying, and nobody is watching the meter.
How We Work
Your consultant runs a structured discovery — how the business actually operates, applications, locations, headcount, growth plans, compliance posture, what is working and what is not. Nothing gets quoted before this is finished.
Requirements go back to our internal team and to engineering resources at the providers themselves — real solution engineers in every category. The design gets pressure-tested before it ever reaches you as a quote.
Working through Intelisys, our master agency, we identify every provider that clears the minimum qualifications for your requirement — serviceability at your addresses, technical fit, and compliance. Providers are scored on service and reliability, so weak performers never reach your shortlist.
Qualified providers price the requirement. You receive two to three competing proposals compared side by side — real pricing, real service levels, total cost across the term — plus demos where the platform decision warrants one.
You choose, and you contract directly with the provider you select. Gateway never sits between you and the agreement, and never marks up your rate.
The provider performs the site survey and the physical install. We manage them through it — then stay on escalations, billing disputes, moves and changes, and the renewal before it auto-renews.
Why Work With Gateway
Gateway's consultants each bring a minimum of two decades inside the industry — with the largest national and regional carriers as well as UCaaS, CCaaS, SASE, and cloud providers — across voice, network, security, and cloud. That is why we know how providers price, how they position, and what is actually negotiable.
Through master agency relationships, Gateway sources across the entire stack. No quota pressure means recommendations track to your goals — not a rep's number.
The right outcome starts with the right questions. Two to three competing proposals with transparent pricing, SLAs, and total 36-month cost — not headline rates.
Most reps disappear after the contract closes. Gateway stays — through implementation, escalations, true-ups, and the next renewal. Built like a long-term partnership.
Every one of these is a real failure mode in the buying process. Going direct does not prevent them. It just means nobody is on your side of the table when they happen.
You only ever see one carrier's pricing.
Competing providers bid the same requirement, and you see the losing bids too.
Nobody tells you which carriers can actually serve your address.
Serviceability is verified building by building before anyone quotes.
The rep recommends whatever clears their quota.
No quota on any single provider changes what gets recommended, and why.
Quotes arrive in different formats and cannot be compared.
Apples-to-apples comparison on price, term, SLA, and total cost.
The headline rate hides install fees, taxes, and surcharges.
Total cost across the full term, not the monthly teaser.
You have no idea what is actually negotiable.
Two decades on the carrier side tells us exactly where the give is.
The auto-renewal fires before anyone notices.
Renewal dates are tracked and worked months before the window closes.
Contract language locks you in harder than you realized.
Contract review with red flags identified before signature.
The SLA sounds strong until you try to enforce one.
We read the remedies and the exclusions, not the marketing.
You buy more bandwidth, seats, or features than you use.
Right-sizing based on what discovery actually found on the ground.
You never hear about the regional or wholesale provider that fits better.
We source providers that do not sell direct at all.
Your rep changes every twelve to twenty-four months.
One relationship for the life of the service.
Once the order is booked, attention moves on.
Post-sale advocacy is the job, not a courtesy.
Multi-site projects mean coordinating several carriers yourself.
One point of contact across every provider in the project.
Trouble tickets stall at tier one with nowhere to escalate.
Escalation leverage that a single account does not carry on its own.
Billing errors go unnoticed for months.
Invoice auditing and billing dispute support.
Disconnects never get processed and you keep paying.
Moves, adds, changes, and disconnects managed through one relationship.
Nobody owns the migration off a legacy platform.
Migration planning built into the requirement up front.
Redundancy and failover get assumed rather than designed.
Continuity is planned as part of the design, not discovered during an outage.
There is no leverage the second time around.
Aggregate volume across 200+ providers, rather than one account's spend.
A representative scenario, assembled from buying patterns we see repeatedly across multi-site businesses. It is not a specific client.
A fourteen-location services company. MPLS circuits from a single national carrier, with the master contract auto-renewing in ninety days. Voice still runs on an aging on-premise PBX at headquarters. Two locations have opened since the original agreement was signed and were added at whatever rate happened to be available that month.
The point is not that the incumbent is always the wrong answer. Sometimes a competitive bid confirms they were right all along — and the difference is that now the client knows it, instead of assuming it.
Leadership
Founder — Gateway Telecom Advisors
Rick founded Executive Technologies in the early 2000s and has led the firm through every shift since — from enterprise PBX to cloud voice, network, security, and the full portfolio Gateway sources today. Two decades of enterprise telecom leadership, now applied on the client's side of the table.
St. Louis-based, working with clients nationwide. The model is simple: bring carrier-grade discovery and negotiation to the buyers who don't have it in-house, and stay engaged for the long term.
Reach us directly at contact@gatewaytelecomadvisors.com — or book a 30-minute call below.
Book a 30-Minute CallThe fastest way to find out if Gateway can help is a 30-minute call with a real bill or a known renewal in front of us.
Book a CallTell us what you're running and we'll bring competing bids from 200+ providers — at no cost to you.
No cost, no obligation. Gateway Telecom Advisors is paid by the provider you select.