12 februari 2004 - Equant (NYSE: ENT) (Euronext Paris: EQU), erkend marktleider op het gebied van wereldwijde IP- en datadiensten, heeft een miljoenencontract getekend met STMicroelectronics, de toonaangevende aanbieder van semi-conductors. Onder de voorwaarden van het hernieuwde contract, dat een looptijd van drie jaar heeft, zal Equant STMicroelectronics van een frame relay-oplossing migreren naar een converged IP VPN-oplossing. Het nieuwe netwerk zal 100 locaties omvatten.
Dit 1.000ste IP VPN-contract onderstreept wederom Equant’s strategie om wereldwijde, maatwerk en geïntegreerde communicatiediensten te leveren gebruikmakend van de high-end IP VPN voordelen.. Hiermee neemt Equant een duidelijke voorsprong op vergelijkbare, concurrerende diensten.
Voor meer informatie volgt hier het volledige persbericht:
EQUANT CONFIRMS ITS IP VPN LEADERSHIP BY SIGNING STMICROELECTRONICS AS 1,000th IP VPN CUSTOMER
Under three-year, multimillion dollar contract, STMicroelectronics chooses innovative IP VPN solution for 100 sites, 40 of which are VoIP-enabled
Feb. 12, 2004 – Equant (NYSE: ENT) (Euronext Paris: EQU), an industry leader in global communications services for multinational businesses, has announced that STMicroelectronics, the leading semiconductor company, has signed a three-year, multimillion dollar renewal contract with Equant to migrate from frame relay to a 100-site converged IP VPN.
This 1,000th IP VPN contract demonstrates Equant’s strategy to develop global, customised and integrated communications services, leveraging upon its high-end IP VPN strengths, and confirms its clear lead over similar competing services.
The move to IP VPN technology helps STMicroelectronics to significantly expand its corporate reach into new markets, to better manage a dispersed and mobile workforce and to optimise costs with convergence capabilities. An Equant Professional Services team is co-ordinating each stage of the expanded network design for STMicroelectronics. Implementation of the 40 VoIP sites is complete. In addition, the project team successfully migrated 95 sites on target in only nine months. The entire implementation is now complete.
STMicroelectronics, headquartered in Geneva, is a leading global semiconductor company for microelectronics applications with global manufacturing and distribution capabilities. Employing more than 45,000 people worldwide, STMicroelectronics was faced with growing business challenges. To help meet them, Equant designed a customised IP VPN solution integrating data, IP, voice and video over a single, converged, IP-based network. Five classes of service allow STMicroelectronics to prioritise its mission-critical applications, and end-to-end network management ensures high service levels.
The key benefits of IP VPN for STMicroelectronics are:
- Convergence capabilities: Connecting more than 40 sites with VoIP will bring STMicroelectronics the advantage of IP convergence, including having all types of traffic on the same infrastructure. Moreover, at a later stage, mobile services can be fully integrated into the solution.
- Cost effectiveness: Converging voice and data on a common IP infrastructure creates economies of scale, allowing STMicroelectronics to optimise its telecom budget and provide an improved service to end-users.
- Traffic prioritisation: Equant's MPLS-based IP VPN solution with five classes of service enables STMicroelectronics to prioritise video and voice traffic, its mission-critical applications, as well as Internet and intranet browsing.
- Flexibility: The "plug-and-play" capability of Equant’s IP VPN will allow STMicroelectronics to easily interconnect new sites as the company expands.
- Geographic reach: Equant's good geographic coverage allows STMicroelectronics to offer the same services in almost all countries where it is present.
"STMicroelectronics will see the benefits of this migration through performance improvement thanks to the new topology, bandwidth management, cost reductions and moving to a new technology allowing further integration such as IP Telephony," Bruno Billard, IT director of STMicroelectronics. "This new contract was finalised as a result of a bid process during which Equant demonstrated very cost competitive positioning. Moreover, the excellent experience we had with Equant during our 40-site VoIP installation and the positive positioning of Equant by a well-known independent analyst company in a pre-contract benchmark report convinced us to move forward with the full IP VPN solution."
"We are pleased that this successful contract enabled us to reach the 1,000th customer milestone for our flagship product," said Detlef Spang, Equant’s senior vice president of Sales and Marketing, Europe, Middle East and Africa. "This contract is the result of the confidence that STMicroelectronics has in Equant, due to a long-term, high vision approach to meeting their needs during the past few years."
NOTES TO EDITORS
About Equant
Equant (NYSE: ENT) (Euronext Paris: EQU) is a recognised industry leader in global communications services for multinational businesses. Equant combines its network expertise – including unmatched seamless network reach in 220 countries and territories and local support in more than 165 countries – with its expanded services capabilities to provide global, integrated and customised communication services to enable its customers key business processes. Equant serves thousands of the world’s top companies, with the industry’s most extensive portfolio of communications services and network solutions, including the market-leading IP VPN used by 1,000 global businesses today. Equant, a subsidiary of France Telecom, was named Best Global Carrier 2003 and Best Managed Service 2003 at the World Communication Awards and consistently leads industry surveys in corporate user satisfaction.
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