NEWS
LETTER TO THE EDITOR Dear Sir,
I am ex-BT Local Business and started a small reseller telecoms company and purchase my minutes from bigger resellers. We are constantly growing but can’t go direct with larger suppliers until we reach certain volumes, so we have to suffer the pain of the resellers we are with.
The big problem with telcos is that the larger they become the less interested they are in their loyal base. Telcos only become bigger and better by looking after their existing base, so looking after resellers is key. It’s fine having a large war chest of cash to purchase new businesses, but if you don’t take care of the business you already have then you will lose it and end up losing your war chest.
In the good days resellers we worked with were great and understood our every need. Service levels were perfect and account management was great. Since opening the war chest and rapidly expanding, all of the service went downhill. It’s about time larger telecom companies look at what they have and take more interest in their existing business. All I want is for the big guys to remember how they got big, and this is by working well with the little guys.
Yours sincerely Sean Reynolds, Director, IP Phone Solutions
STAR has unwrapped its WorkLife Productivity Suite, a modular range of integrated communication tools available as a managed service for a fixed, per user, per month price. The suite offers email, instant mes- saging, presence, collaboration, conferencing and telephony and is based on familiar Microsoft applications. Hugo Harber, Director of Convergence and Network Strategy, commented: “The WorkLife suite of services now makes it possible for companies to enjoy the substan- tial productivity benefits of using a UC platform, without any of the hassles normally associated with implementation and management.”
GLOBAL 4 Communications has topped NEC’s reseller league table in EMEA, picking up the vendor’s Best Reseller 2009/10 award at its Partner Conference held in Istanbul, NEC’s first international gathering with all major partners in EMEA. Global 4 boasts the largest installed and maintained NEC customer base in the UK and is a long-term premier NEC business partner with full accreditation. Nigel Barnett, MD of Global 4, commented: “Our commitment to NEC ensures that our clients receive the latest future proofed business solutions.” See page 40
NEC award for Global 4
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Union Street’s big CRM push
UNION Street Technologies has selected QGate as implementation partner for Microsoft Dynamics CRM integration. QGate is a Microsoft Gold
Partner specialising in CRM. The company can provide the licensing, implementation, cus- tomisation and training required to integrate Microsoft Dynamics with Union Street’s aBILLity bill- ing platform for customers. Integration with aBILLity
allows users with CRM to view billing data and tariff information within the CRM application. Rowland Dexter, MD of QGate, commented: “Working with Union Street has enabled us to break into a new vertical market. Telecom CPs operate in a competitive market
Tony Cook
and good customer management and prospect development can be vital. Union Street has worked hard with us to deliver a solution that is tailored to this sector.” Union Street MD, Tony Cook, added: “CRM integration sup- ported by QGate is part of Union Street’s policy of developing a raft of back office solutions for the CP community, including integration with third party applications.”
Retell unveils FMC solution
RETELL has introduced new fixed mobile convergence capabilities to its Sense recording systems. This enhancement enables mobile and fixed line recording to be integrated into a single system. The development follows a
partnership with Voxsmart, a pro- vider of mobile call recording solu- tions and a BlackBerry Alliance Select member.
Azzurri prepares for fresh growth with management team revamp
AZZURRI Communications has strengthened its management team with a number of new appoint- ments and internal moves. The appointments follow Mark
Quartermaine’s recent arrival from BT Global Services as Azzurri’s CEO on September 6th 2010. John Cruickshank joins as Dir- ector of the newly formed Specialist Solutions and Major Bids team. His career includes roles at
Equant, C&W and most recently Hughes International. Craig Wellman joins from
Vodafone as Business Development Director, encompassing the prod- uct and marketing team. His focus
now heads up Azzurri’s Account Management team. Azzurri’s Products and Services
Group and its Operations team will now be overseen by one newly cre- ated role, Director of Operations. Steve Clark, currently Product and Service Group Director has been appointed to this role. Mark Quartermaine, CEO,
Mark Quartermaine
will be on developing Azzurri’s market proposition. Existing Azzurri staff changes
see Martin Flick become Director of Mobility and Converged Sol- utions, while Jonathan Arnold
Azzurri Communications, stated: “Azzurri is an exciting place to be. We have recently delivered a num- ber of large and innovative projects for our customers, but we can do more. That’s why I’ve strengthened the senior management team to best position us for growth.”
The Voxsmart solution per- forms as middleware, securely link- ing together the mobile network, the smartphone, the BlackBerry Enterprise Server and the Retell recording system. Retell’s MD, Richard Herman, commented on the reasons behind the new launch, saying: “Our cus- tomers’ working patterns are chang- ing and we need to serve them with
recording on both landlines and mobiles, with all recordings eas- ily accessible from within Retell’s Sense interface. “Whether recording is for
remote working, continuity plan- ning, FSA compliance or for faster dispute resolution, Retell now offers the same protection on recorded mobiles as we already provide on recorded landlines.”
GRIFFIN has restructured its management team on the back of high demand for its networking and hosted solutions and in preparation for further growth next year. Lee Broxson takes over as Head of Sales, Cherie Everett as Head of Marketing, Rob Stevens as Head of Customer Services, Michael Cox as Head of Provisioning, Simon Day as Head of Operations and Michael Streeter as Head of Programmes. Andrew Dickinson, MD of Griffin, commented: “Our partners have been much more successful than we had anticipated this year in winning complex networking and hosting contracts. We needed to streamline processes and restructure the business to deliver this increase in volume and to prepare the business for the launch of our new hosted desktop products early in 2011.”
18 COMMS DEALER NOVEMBER 2010
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