NEWS EXTRA
COLT opens door to franchising scheme
NETWORK operator Colt is rolling out a new franchise scheme and is actively seeking new partners to extend its reach across Europe. The new franchising model will sit alongside its
existing
reseller and direct sales chan- nels selling cloud, voice and data to the SME market. North Region Sales Director
Jatinder Sispal told Comms Dealer that he is looking for licensees in the UK, France, Italy, Germany and Spain, and expected to have four or five partners in each territory. Sispal anticipates that most contracts will be awarded to new partners rather than the existing reseller base.
Jatinder Sispal A key difference between the
franchise model and traditional resellers will be that franchises will provide billing and first line support for new custom- ers, but Sispal says that exist-
ing business models will remain unchanged. Rather, it’s a way of coping with increased demands for cloud services. “We expect the number of businesses using cloud services will double over the next couple of years,” Sispal said. “It’s an area we want to be absolutely active in and leading.” The franchise network
is expected to be worth 50m euro within a couple of years, accounting for around 5% of COLT’s total business. “Some of our franchise part- ners will be able to address ver- tical markets that we don’t yet operate in today,” said Sispal. “And they get the power of the COLT brand.”
Hike in service provider revenues
STL Communications staff dashed hotfoot to a Fire and Glass Walk in aid of SpecialEffect, a charity dedicated to using technology to enhance the quality of life of people with disabilities by helping them to play and enjoy computer games. Brendon Cross, MD; Peter Allen, Sales Manager; Peppa Campbell, Billing Co-ordinator; and Charlotte Burgess, Service and Support Co-ordinator all walked barefoot over glass from 2,000 wine bottles and burning flames. Allen (pictured above) said: “It was quite an experience and not what I’d expected at all. Looking at the photos I’m not quite sure how I managed to do it!” Campbell added: “None of us suffered a single cut or burn, which was amazing given the sharpness of the glass and the heat of the fire. The STL team raised over £1,500 so it was all worth it.”
TELCO service provider rev- enues hit $1.9 trillion in 2011, says Ovum, attributing the rise to a recovery in both the fixed and mobile sectors. This com- pares to $1.79 trillion in 2010. Carrier capex also rose in
2011, but late year economic jitters depressed growth rates, according to Matt Walker, a Principal Analyst in Ovum’s Networks Practice.
He said: “Economic worries caused budget cuts late in the year, hitting SP capex. Overall for 2011, capex grew 9% to $306bn due to double digit per- centage growth in the first three quarters. Capex declined 1% year-over-year in Q4 2011. “Among the top 10 capex spenders were two from North America (AT&T and Verizon), China’s three big carriers, NTT,
and four European telcos with multi-national operations (DT, Telefonica, Vodafone and FT). “Signs have emerged in 2012 of a slowly improving economy, and further improvement should help reach the revenue goal and capex growth targets of 3% and 6% respectively.”
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www.comms-dealer.com COMMS DEALER MAY 2012 27
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