Saxony chooses BT as its Partner for fixed voice and mobile services

BT has won a significant contract for fixed voice and mobile voice and data services from the Federal State of Saxony. This makes Saxony the third German state – after Bavaria and Rhineland-Palatinate – to source communications services from BT on a large scale.

All telephone calls to and from the Saxon Administrative Network (Sächsisches Verwaltungsnetz – SVN), used by around 60,000 employees of the state government, will in future be carried via the BT network. For this purpose, BT will install and operate two resilient gateways in Leipzig and Dresden through which all national and international voice traffic will be routed. The technology is based on the Internet Protocol (IP), so at the same time it provides the foundation for later migration of the administrative network to state-of-the-art IP telephony. Thanks to the two independent gateways the solution is remarkably failsafe, even in crisis situations. This is an important criterion, bearing in mind that the police and disaster relief services use the network.

BT is also taking over all the state’s mobile phone contracts, which until now are provided by different suppliers. In future a total of 5000 employees will use “BT Mobile” for their mobile phone calls, and initially about 1000 SIM cards will be supplied for mobile data applications.

“The fact that with BT, we obtain both fixed-network and mobile services from a single supplier, offers us a number of advantages,” explains Dr. Hans-Peter Seddig, head of the IT Coordination and Advice Centre in the Saxon State Chancellery. “We have a single point of contact for all issues, and also cheaper call costs when employees phone each other on their mobiles or when they make calls from their mobiles to the SVN fixed network.”

Billing is also simplified under the new contract. BT issues a single bill for all services, which can then be broken down by individual authorities and institutions. BT also has a simple and easy-to-use solution for private phone calls made by staff of the state government. All employees can, if they so wish, obtain a “Calling Card” which they load with credit. The calls are made using a toll-free 0800 number, so that the State of Saxony does not incur any expense or administrative costs. This service, offered in partnership with the company Median Telecom, is also delivered via BT’s network.

Jan Geldmacher, CEO of BT Germany, explains: “I am absolutely delighted that, so soon after concluding a contract with the State of Rhineland-Palatinate, we have been able to win another federal state, namely the Federal State of Saxony, as a customer. This order once again underlines BT’s competence as a partner for the public sector.”