BT wins contracts

BT Group PLC 25 July 2002 BT WINS £200 MILLION WORTH OF BUSINESS BT today announced that it has won contracts with four major companies. The deals, worth £200 million, were signed with banking giants HBOS and Barclay's, BAA, and the leading plant and crane hire company, Hewden Stuart. BT's biggest ever voice services contract has been signed with high street bank HBOS. A second major voice services deal worth £50 million has been struck with the world's leading airport company, BAA. The three year HBOS contract will cover the whole of the bank's voice telephony service, guaranteeing the bank's targeted efficiency savings. HBOS awarded the complete package to BT to ensure a consistent level of service from one company and the ability to upgrade to 'new wave' technology in the future. The bank, which was formed by the merger of Halifax and the Bank of Scotland, will benefit from a substantial group saving across the whole range of BT products and services. The deal with BAA is to supply and manage all voice communications at Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports and BAA's corporate headquarters in London. As part of the five-year deal, BT will deliver and manage voice communications and paging services to BAA's 8000 employees. This innovative outsourcing contract covers more than 15,500 extensions in areas including Customs and Excise, the emergency services, retail outlets, check-in desks and baggage handling. BAA, together with its business partners, will benefit from one point of contact for all voice queries across its different offices and airports. BT is providing a 24/7 helpdesk service for all users, which can be used to place new orders as well as report problems and clarify billing queries. In addition to HBOS, a second banking giant, Barclays, has agreed a £39 million contract with BT to manage the company's core local area network - BT's biggest LAN deal to date. Under the contract Barclay's entire LAN infrastructure will be outsourced to BT- allowing Barclays to concentrate on its core business. The deal, which has taken two years to come to fruition, will initially provide 24,000 LAN ports spread over 16 locations including the bank's London head office. The win is an important one, as traditionally the LAN market has been dominated by other suppliers. BT was chosen over five other bidders for the contract, having already successfully won a deal to supply wide area network (WAN) services to Barclays. The contract opens up a huge potential for further growth, including extending the LAN to Barclays' 2000 branches. In addition, Hewden Stuart, the UK's leading plant and crane hire company, has entered into an outsourcing contract with BT worth £13 million. BT are now responsible for the delivery of Hewden Stuart's UK infrastructure, IT services and systems maintenance. BT has supplied Hewden Stuart with Agile Office and Contact Central packages. Contact Central, which is a call-centre solution, has allowed the company to consolidate five customer databases down to two, which means searching for customer information is much quicker. Agile Office, developed in partnership with Microsoft, means BT has assumed responsibility for all of the Hewden Stuart's computers and maintenance allowing them to focus on their core business. BT are continuing to work closely with Hewden Stuart in helping to develop their e-business and applications to support the growth of Hewden Stuart core business. Pierre Danon, chief executive officer of BT Retail, said: "We are delighted to announce these new contracts, won against stiff competition which are further evidence that BT is able to provide the communications solutions that the UK' s major companies want to help them be successful in their own sectors. "The HBOS deal is the biggest voice contract BT has ever won. These 'wins' highlight the fact that we are continuing to focus on defending our core market voice products, as well as making great strides into 'new-wave' market, which is a key component of our revenue growth strategy." BT Ignite - BT's business services and solutions division, serving customers worldwide - developed the technology-driven initiatives. Neil Rogers, president of BT Ignite Solutions, said: "Businesses across the UK are choosing to work with BT owing to our expertise in both voice and data technology. Through our work with existing customers, we have proved that we can deploy and manage sophisticated technology solutions that will deliver measurable financial benefits to a business." Inquiries about this news release should be made to the BT Retail Press Office. Contact Michael Jarvis on 020 73566045 or Jonathan Carter on 020 73564523. This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange

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