du partners with EMC to enhance customer service

As convergence of technology and content gains pace in the region, du will offer a complete range of telecommunication and entertainment services - mobile and fixed line telephony, broadband internet, TV, video and business solutions. These services will in turn generate a tremendous amount of information, including customer records, that need to be stored in a reliabile and cost-effective manner.

The new EMC-based system will enable du to secure and protect all of the information generated by its expanding subscriber base, including call records, billing details, and customer service requests.

"We see our new EMC-based strategy as a very straightforward way of managing what we know will be a rapidly-growing amount of customer and internal data," said Osman Sultan, CEO, du.

"With a wide range of integrated and customized offerings, it is important for du's customer service agents to have easy and on-demand access to subscribers' data such as locations, new line connection requests, call records, and billing information. With the EMC system in place, we can react more quickly to customer needs,"

Sultan added.

As the first company in the Middle East to deploy the EMC InvistaTM virtualization solution, du will now be able to pool resources from throughout its IT infrastructure to meet customer demand as its subscriber base grows. EMC has also deployed an information lifecycle management (ILM) strategy that grades all information generated at du in order of business importance and stores it cost-effectively based on its perceived value.

The EMC system installed by du also includes a reliable backup and recovery solution to enable business continuity in case of an unexpected system outage. "Customers need to have access to telecoms service during events like power outages, and we believe that working with EMC will enable us to deliver more consistent service even during outages or other unforeseen events," Sultan continued.

"Having an EMC business continuity solution in place gives du's executives and subscriber's greater peace of mind about information and system availability."

While du is the region's newest telecoms provider, its EMC deployment is similar to systems used by global industry leaders such as Vodafone and Verizon.

"While du's thousands of subscribers will never actually see the company's new information management system, this EMC solution will keep their information at the fingertips of du's customer service staff, to help enable faster and more personalized service," said Mohammed Amin, general manager, EMC Middle East.