BT 2009 Annual Report Download - page 16

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION FINANCIAL STATEMENTS REPORT OF THE DIRECTORS BUSINESS AND FINANCIAL REVIEWS OVERVIEW
BUSINESS AND FINANCIAL REVIEWS BUSINESS REVIEW
14 BT GROUP PLC ANNUAL REPORT & FORM 20-F
opt for the subscription ‘unlimited views’ packs and subscribers’
viewing of the service has more than tripled.
In December 2008, we announced a partnership with the BBC
and ITV to launch a new digital entertainment platform (subject to
any relevant approvals). The new platform aims to build on BT
Vision and Freeview and will bridge the gap between two
previously separate technologies, bringing TV to broadband and
broadband to the TV. It will combine free digital channels with free
on-demand content from the public service broadcasters as well as
pay-TV delivered over the broadband line. We aim to launch the
service in mid 2010.
BT Business
Voice
In the business voice market, we aim to simplify the management
of communications, give better value for money and drive
innovation so that customers get more benefit from their
investment in communications. We have seen strong take-up from
customers for packages that bring together calls, lines, broadband
and mobile, with consistent service (BT Business One Plan). At
31 March 2009, BT Business One Plan had more than 460,000
locations, and accounted for 35% of call revenues from business
customers.
We have seen an increased take-up of voice over IP (VoIP) and
are developing services that use the internet to integrate voice with
other business applications.
We have seen strong growth in conferencing, with customers
using communications to reduce business travel costs.
We have made ‘communications-enabled applications’ a reality
with the launch of Ribbit for salesforce.com. This service makes it
easy for sales professionals to update key customer relationship
management (CRM) systems using seamless voice-to-text
technology, both from the desk and on the move.
Broadband
BT Business remained UK SMEs’ preferred internet service provider.
During 2009, we enhanced this service to include mobile
broadband. Customers are provided with a plug-and-play 3G
dongle, enabling them to connect and work wherever they are. We
also reduced entry-level prices to support customers feeling the
impact of the recession. When we sell broadband to customers, we
also offer them value-added services and now have an attachment
rate of 113% (ie on average we sell a little more than one
value-added service every time we sell a broadband service). We
have seen strong growth in web hosting in particular, as customers
recognise the benefits of seamless business-grade service for
hosting and internet access.
Mobility
We have seen strong growth in mobile sales. Our focus has been on
helping customers work on the move rather than just making
mobile phone calls and this approach has driven strong growth in
mobile messaging especially in the sale of BlackBerry™ smart
phones. We have also seen growing sales of business applications
and are seeing strong growth in telemetry solutions.
Other services
The creation of BT Engage IT (incorporating Basilica and Lynx,
which we acquired in September 2007) enables us to offer
customers a wide range of IT services, including data centre
virtualisation, unified communications and managed services. We
have seen good growth with mid-market companies and are also
growing our customer solutions business to provide fully managed
and outsourced IT and communications solutions.
We see great potential in the development of ‘cloud computing’
as a way of delivering IT services to SMEs at significantly lower prices
and with considerable benefits of simplicity, security and agility. We
are leading with business applications, exploiting the growing trend
towards ‘software as a service’ whereby SMEs access and use
applications over the internet as and when they need it rather than
paying to have the applications permanently on their own
computers. As an example we are working with salesforce.com to
enable our SME customers to access customer relationship
management (CRM) systems of a sophistication previously only
available to very large companies, with support and service from BT.
We continue to grow BT Tradespace, our online trading
community that brings businesses and individual sellers together
with potential customers and partners. At 31 March 2009, there
were 338,000 members of the BT Tradespace community, and we
were adding around 2,500 each week. Towards the end of the
financial year, we launched a number of enhancements including
tools that enable service businesses to take bookings over the web,
and support SMEs in search marketing.
BT Ireland
BT Ireland operates across Northern Ireland and the Republic of
Ireland.
We are one of the leading communications providers to
consumers and SMEs in Northern Ireland. We are also one of the
leading networked IT services partners of government and major
customers and are responsible for providing regulated wholesale
access via Openreach.
In the Republic of Ireland we are a leading provider of networked
IT services to government and major businesses, and one of the
largest and most successful providers of wholesale network
services. We are one of the largest DSL broadband providers to
consumers and SMEs.
We gained significant traction in the private and public sectors
and secured a number of the largest managed services contracts
awarded in the market. O2Ireland outsourced its network
operations to BT in a seven-year deal, while 3 Ireland selected BT as
its principal subcontractor to support the delivery of the National
Broadband Scheme. The Scheme is run by the Department for
Communications, Energy and Natural Resources with the aim of
achieving broadband availability throughout the Republic of
Ireland. Other key contracts were won in the banking, engineering
and public sectors.
0
2,000
4,000
6,000
8,000
10,000
12,000
14,000
16,000
34% 35% 34%
65% 66%
66%
BT
Other ISPs
2007 2008 2009
*DSL + LLU installed base
BT Retail broadband market share* year end (000 lines)
BUSINESS AND FINANCIAL REVIEWS