Kuoni and AkzoNobel sign international networking deals

Orange Business Services picks up five-year contract with travel firm and a five-year extension to chemicals manufacturer contract

The future's bright for Kuoni and AkzoNobel

Mobile operator Orange has announced two new corporate contract wins.

Travel firm Kuoni has signed a five-year deal for IP telephony and Avaya-based call centre services, while chemicals manufacturer AkzoNobel is to receive IT services.

The Kuoni rollout will begin in the UK and Switzerland, and take more than 18 months to consolidate telephony and PBX systems using virtualisation.

“We’ll benefit from having predictable costs and an even more reliable performance while our customers will benefit from our even greater ability and flexibility to service them over the phone, thanks to IP telephony’s advanced capabilities,” said Kuoni chief information officer (CIO) Bojan Jokic.

The deal with AkzoNobel is a multimillion-euro, five-year contract extension with Orange Business Services for supplying IT services, which includes management of a worldwide data network connecting more than 1,000 sites in 55 countries.

The agreement focuses on the integration of the European and Asian sites of ICI, which was acquired by AkzoNobel last year.

“With our ICI acquisition, it became essential to gain synergy advantages as quickly as possible. In addition, the consolidation and centralisation of applications is vital to give our organisation an edge, " said AkzoNobel CIO Gerard Helmink.