BT's Global Services division is to focus on providing
managed network services across users' wide and local area
networks.
Gary Bullard, managing director of BT Global Services, said the
company's aim was to offer services that would make it attractive
for users to offload operation of both their external and internal
networks to BT. "We are seeing more customers looking to outsource
their networks," he said.
During a presentation to analysts earlier this month, Andy Green,
BT Global Services chief executive, said the company had decided to
focus on networked IP services through a concept it calls "the
digital networked economy".
Clients including Unilever, Reuters, BAA, HBOS, Astrazeneca and the
Department of Work and Pensions have hired BT to modernise their
global IP networks, he said.
In terms of business transformation Green said BT would concentrate
on government, health and financial services. BT plans to draw the
line in application service, Green said. "In the application area
we are very precise in what we do. It is all about communication
and collaboration."
This covers messaging, conferencing, real-time collaborative
working with Microsoft, customer relationship management, supply
chain, mobility and security.
"For a large scale piece of work like a SAP implementation, we will
almost certainly partner with someone else," he said.
Among its most significant contracts is Visa International, which
signed a network services contract last year with BT covering
central and eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa. Brian Huckett,
chief information officer at Visa, said the contract covers
security and the availability of the network, and BT is required to
provide comprehensive management reports.
"If availability targets are not met, BT suffers financial
penalties," he said. Unusually the service level is flexible. "It
is a five-year term and BT did not establish service levels for the
term." Instead he said Visa will benchmark what is happening
elsewhere among other service providers and expect BT to match that
improved service level.