Telstra scores $50m Visy contract

Telstra announced today that it had won a five-year $50 million contract to provide a network services and cloud computing platform to packaging giant Visy.

Telstra will use its Next G and Next IP to provide voice and data services to Visy's 140 sites in Australia, New Zealand, Asia and the US. A cloud computing platform is nestled in the network to support Visy's critical systems, such as its SAP software. Combining the telecommunications network and computing platform is expected to save Visy 30 per cent of its costs.

Telstra worked with Sun Microsystems and Hitachi Data Systems to meet Visy's needs. The new deal was more about making use of technology than just keeping the lights on, according to Visy CIO Ken Major.

"We challenged our incumbents [HP, according to the Australian] to provide us with our requirements, but the other offerings were in essence hybrids of our pre-existing model. Telstra was the only provider that could deliver world-class wide area network, voice, mobile, wireless, as well as providing us a full utility model for our computer server and storage needs, in its own on-shore enterprise grade datacentres," he said in a statement.

The company now pays a monthly fee on what it uses, not only for telecommunications, but also for computing and storage. "The capital that was earmarked for IT upgrades will now be better deployed into revenue generating assets across the business," he said.