Telstra Launching UC Service Globally

By Oliver VanDervoort
Contributing Writer

It wasn’t that long ago that Australian service provider Telstra (News - Alert) was announcing the launch of a new low latency service that offered numerous applications and destinations access to the web with a single connection. Now the company is making the next move to rise to the top of the Communications-as-a-Service (CaaS) heap with a global UC solution. The cloud-based unified communications (UC) enterprise market is now available for more than just a few markets and is available to any customer who wants to use it virtually worlwide.

Telstra actually launched this particular service in Australia last year in partnership with Cisco (News - Alert) and now that same service is being made available in four continents and 25 countries. The solution is actually based on Cisco’s Unified Computing platform is going to be delivered using Telstra’s existing cloud infrastructure. That infrastructure is one that now extends it services to seven locations that are located throughout the US, Europe and Asia-Pacific.

This new offering will be available to countless more clients by the end of August and is going to be offered on a monthly, “per worker” basis. Telstra is saying that this particular agreement is one that is unique in the market.

Nathan Bell, Telstra Global Enterprise and Services, Director of Marketing, Portfolio and Pricing, commented about the impending release of this solution in a recent statement: “Our new global service been designed specifically for today’s dynamic workplace where employees use the web, video and voice to drive innovation and improve productivity.

Considering that the hosted PBX (News - Alert) and UC markets are set to see some serious growth in the next few years, it appears that Telstra is getting in on the ground floor. The company has also made moves such as selecting Ericsson (News - Alert) to supply the firm’s optical network equipment. All of these decisions put together indicate that Telstra wants to be the provider of choice not just down under but globally.