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British Telecom India sees
growth opportunity in crisis
By Arjun Sen
New
Delhi, Nov 19 (IANS) With cost-cutting becoming the key mantra
for corporates tackling the current crisis, British Telecom
sees new growth opportunities in India by offering communication
solutions that will help lower expenses, BT India chairman
Arun Seth said here.
“Our
customers are looking at how to cut costs. We see this as
an opportunity as we can offer solutions that brings down
costs,” Seth told IANS in an interview.
“We
are telling our customers that instead of looking at the cost
of what you are asking us to do now, let us manage your entire
communication network, then we can cut your costs significantly,”
he said.
“We
are saying, if you are now spending, say, Rs.10 on different
vendors or solution providers to manage your communication
network, of which you are spending Rs.3 on us, we can give
significant cost cutting if you allow us to manage the entire
network,” he said.
“It
is difficult to reduce cost on Rs.3 but it is much easier
to cut costs on the entire spend of Rs.10,” he said by way
of explanation. “Scale helps.”
“We
are saying we will also take over your assets and use the
same people to do a lot more, not only do your work but for
other customers as well... it is a kind of sharing to bring
down costs.”
Elaborating,
he said that IT and telecommunication can be used as tools
to increase efficiencies and cut down on resource use.
Echoing
his views, BT Asia Pacific's President Allen Ma told IANS:
“We don't think the current crisis will have much impact on
our business because people will still need communication
solutions that reduce costs.”
Video
conference and web conference solutions, for example, can
bring down travel costs, Seth said.
Citing
an example, he said BT uses an automation algorithm developed
by Indian software companies to send its field force to people
requiring delivery or repairs in its telephone business in
Britain.
“This
has reduced the travel kilometres of our trucks as the automation
makes sure the trucks move only once when customers are available
to take the delivery or allow repairs. Otherwise, they often
end up going more than once as the customer was not available
the first time."
Then,
to emphasise that his company is on a strong platform, Seth
said: “Every one has the need to grow, so for us there are
many opportunities despite the current downturn.”
Indo-Asian
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