O2 to launch business broadband with landline service

Broadband provider, O2 has signed a five year deal with BT Wholesale to launch a new service – ‘The Joined Up service’ that will offer landline, broadband, mobile and consultancy services on a single pack. O2′s new service targeting small businesses would be launched next month, it was reported.

By entering land-line market, O2 internet provider thinks that it can provide better service to their customers. Ben Dowd, Business sales director for O2, said:

“By moving into the fixed-line market we are now able to provide our business customers with a genuine end-to-end service which incorporates landline, broadband and hi-speed data as well as the mobile and consultancy services we already offer,”

According to Evan Kirchheimer, principal analyst at Ovum, the deal would enable mobile operators like O2 to ‘generate a significant amount of their business from value-added services in the future’.

He also said that getting all telecom services from one provider would offer more benefits to small businesses when comparing to big corportations as ‘ the small businesses often lack a dedicated IT team to manage agreements with multiple operators. so going with one provider would probably be attractive to them.’

It should be noted that Vodafone, one of major mobile operators and mobile broadband ISPs in UK had also signed with BT Wholesale to launch ‘Vodafone One Net’, new business broadband offer which also includes landline service.