Will mobile business support benefit from a broader network?

Vodafone and UK O2 will now be sharing the assets of their mobile network, with the company saying that it is “actively exploring opportunities to cooperate in related areas such as the provision of transmission services,” following Vodafone and Telefonica joining forces as was widely predicted.

The merge is expected to save the companies large amounts of money and is considered to be a necessary, smart although possibly a bit of a late move on their part in the midst of this current economic climate.

The question experts are currently asking is what these changes will mean for customers and will this combined network offer more than the two telco’s could individually. This issue has been raised particularly in the case of mobile broadband and mobile business in general. This co-operation will mean that over the long term they will be able to offer an enhanced quality of service according to the promise given by the two companies.

Both companies will have far more money with which to offer higher levels of customer service within the network footprint in order to improve the mobile experience of its customers and also supporting service delivery like mobile broadband over a wider coverage area to a larger number of users by reducing the network costs, in theory.

Whether this is going to happen within the current mobile broadband plans’ service level agreements (SLAs) is another question that has been raised.

The launching of a standard Service Level Agreement (SLA) that will guarantee levels of performance by the Vodafone division that manages the communications needs of worldwide multinational companies is one example of this.

The ability to meet specific needs such as improved service levels for mobile workers, key executives and business critical functions by customising a free of charge offering as standard for just a small additional charge will be created by this deal.

As an indication of Vodafone now recognising that a mobilised workforce is becoming increasingly important all seems to be very sensible.

The global enterprise director of customer services at Vodafone, Walter Kok said “Our customers have told us that there is a need for consistent global service levels in the delivery of devices, performance reporting and incident handling.”