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BT sees double business on MEA expansion plan

By Abdul Basit DUBAI - British Telecommunications, or BT, on Tuesday announced its expansion plan for the Middle East Africa and Turkey and said the addressable market across the region was worth a combined £5.4 billion last year.

The telecom giant announced a series of initiatives aimed at doubling its business across three regions. BT already serves around 600 large organisations in the regions, including many of the world's leading global companies.

Global companies investing in these regions, as well as local companies expanding further afield, will be supported by additional highly qualified staff, including professional services specialists, according to BT. They will also gain access to a richer portfolio of innovative services, leveraging BT's network breadth and depth.

These initiatives build on similar programmes in Asia Pacific and Latin America, where orders in the first nine months of this financial year were up over 50 per cent. IT spending growth across the regions is expected to top 10 per cent in 2012.

"The Middle East already hosts some of the world's main business hubs, and is a crucial region for many of our customers. New opportunities are rapidly emerging in the region, and we are now expanding from our thriving base in the UAE," BT Global Services chief executive officer Jeff Kelly said.

Turkey is a key business bridge between Europe, Asia and the Middle East and is growing rapidly. Sub-Saharan Africa remains largely a new frontier for ambitious businesses and is currently showing strong growth rates in a number of countries. "We are extending our network capabilities in that region beyond our strong South African operation, with the ambition of serving our customers wherever they seek new opportunities. We are also seeing the emergence of a new generation of local companies in these regions, eager to expand globally. Our new initiatives show that when we talk about global ambitions, we truly mean global," Kelly said.

As part of the new programme, BT will hire around 170 new employees across the three regions, including highly skilled professional services specialists to provide local support to customers and deliver consulting, integration and managed services. Customers in the regions will be able to access a wider range of "intelligent" network services provided by the BT Connect portfolio. Local companies with global aspirations will fully benefit from BT Connect's ability to provide services in 197 countries and territories. Leveraging this infrastructure, new propositions will be launched in the regions, providing innovative networked IT services.

Network reach and access options are being improved in Sub-Saharan Africa.

These include the recently announced international routing facility in South Africa and a new network connection between Cape Town and Johannesburg. These will make BT the first global operator with its own network infrastructure in the country. Specific interconnection agreements with local partners extend BT's network reach into Sub-Saharan Africa.

Three new network nodes are being launched in the Middle East, while additional network interconnections will be rolled out in Turkey. The announcement is part of a wider investment programme supporting BT's global strategy. Previous announcements include similar programmes in Asia Pacific and in Latin America, improvements to BT's global portfolio and network capabilities, investments in highly skilled professional services resources, and the development of strategic global sector teams to better serve multinational customers.

© Khaleej Times 2012