BT 2000 Annual Report Download - page 13

Business review
12 Annual report and Form 20-F
For provision of services, 74% of business customers
and 86% of residential customers stated that they were
satis¢ed with BT's performance. These performance levels
were delivered against a background of increasing demand
for services, particularly for second lines in support of the
increase in internet usage.
Our repair services came under pressure at times
during the course of the year. However, the impact on our
customers has been limited, as a result of a number of
initiatives we have taken: we have recruited more ¢eld
engineers and call centre sta¡ and introduced programmes
to reduce the number of repeat faults experienced by our
customers and improve the quality of our workmanship.
Key issues for our customers are how quickly we
complete their order or repair their fault, how well we keep
them informed during this process, especially if delays
occur, and how easy it is to contact us to place an order or
report a fault.
There has been a steady improvement in the reliability
of our access network since October 1999 as a result of our
continued investment in network improvement.
We continue to give our customers an improving level
of payphone service, with 96% of our payphones working
at any one time. The percentage of customers who are very
satis¢ed with the public payphone service rose to
almost 87%.
We aim to answer all operator assistance (100) and
number information (192) calls within 15 seconds and,
during the past six months, 94% of operator assistance and
95% of number information calls were answered within
this timeframe.
Ignite ± our data business
Ignite, which will operate our broadband IP business, will
deliver a range of services, in particular data transport,
web hosting, customised e-solutions and packaged
applications software. Ignite will combine our broadband
IP networks in the UK and continental Europe, with the
aim of opening the way to signi¢cantly faster and more
e¤cient on-line communications for our business users,
ISPs and other carriers. Our solutions businesses,
Syntegra and BT Syncordia Solutions, will continue to
operate globally.
Together with our joint venture partners, BT has an
inter-city ¢bre network connecting 100 cities in nine
countries across Europe. We also have city ¢bre rings in
the UK and nine continental European cities resulting in a
combined total of 50,000 route kilometres of ¢bre cable in
our network. Our IP network in the UK has over 100 points
of presence. We plan to grow our European backbone
network to 70,000 kilometres in 2001. By the end of 2001,
we expect our IP network to connect 250 cities in 16
countries. Ignite's connection to Concert's global IP
backbone, described below, will give it reach to virtually
all major commercial centres across the globe.
In South America, BT has a stake in ImpSat, the
Argentinian-based network services company which
operates a satellite and ¢bre network covering the whole
of South America.
Among the value-added services Ignite will o¡er is
web hosting, that is running customers' websites on our
own servers. Ignite will take in the seven data centres in
Europe from which this service is currently run, and there
are plans to increase the number of data centres to 19 by
the end of 2001. We also plan to launch an applications
service provider business, making software applications in
areas such as payroll, human resources and customer
relationship management accessible via the internet to
small and medium-sized enterprises and divisions of
major corporates.
Ignite will also include BT's international solutions
businesses, Syntegra and BT Syncordia Solutions, two
distinct but complementary businesses, which between
them had turnover of »1.5 billion, including work done
for other parts of BT, in the 2000 ¢nancial year. As a
global consulting and information business, Syntegra is
a market leader in creating new systems, which, through
the use of the internet and associated technologies, are
transforming business to business relationships around
the world. Its acquisition for »213 million of Control
Data Systems (renamed Syntegra (USA)) in August
1999 extended Syntegra's global capabilities and reach,
and Syntegra now has customers in more than 60 countries.
BT Syncordia Solutions is a leading provider of
integrated information and communications solutions.
Underpinned by the internet and associated technologies,
these solutions are based on end-to-end managed
IP networks and the provision of e-business and
e-CRM (electronic customer relationship management)
applications on these networks.
Ignite will be responsible for the rollout of broadband
technology using ADSL (asymmetric digital subscriber
line) technology in the UK and continental Europe. ADSL
technology turns an ordinary copper telephone line,
connecting a customer's premises to the local exchange,
into a high-speed digital connection. This should
signi¢cantly enhance services such as fast internet access,
videoconferencing, on-line education and information