Seacom and BT in joint enterprise offering to Africa

BTโ€™s software and services to be sold by Seacom

Continental subsea cabling pioneer Seacom has allied with UK telco BT so it can offer new networking, security and comms services to its enterprise business clients across Africa.

Seacom claims to have Africaโ€™s most extensive ICT infrastructure and will use BTโ€™s services, vendor relationships and global expertise to expand its portfolio. Since the launch of its own business division, Seacom claims it has grown its customer and partnership base substantially and now needs to complement its offerings and reach customers beyond its existing markets.

The pact gives Seacomโ€™s customers access to BTโ€™s Cloud Security Incident Event Management (SIEM) platform, which is becoming increasingly critical as more of the workforce operates outside the office. SIEM tools promise instant visibility and monitoring across an organisationโ€™s entire IT environment. Seacom says it needs this security overlay for its existing ICT solutions.

BT claims to protects some of the worldโ€™s largest organisations from a myriad of fast-evolving cyber threats with a global network of dedicated 24/7 Security Operations Centres (SOCs). It employs 3000 cyber security experts to help customers detect, analyse and respond to cybersecurity incidents as they happen.

Seacom Group CEO Oliver Fortuin enthused about the extra value that the pact brings to each companyโ€™s respective market. โ€œWith Seacomโ€™s global network and local presence and BTโ€™s global reach and expertise, we can deliver a comprehensive portfolio of cloud, security and connectivity services that are reliable, scalable and at the cutting-edge of industry,โ€ said Fortuin.

Secure multi-cloud connectivity, next-generation networking solutions and collaboration services are the sweet spot where SEACOM and BT will combine their respective strengths, according to Alessandro Adriani, director of system integrators and telecom service providers at BTโ€™s Global unit.