B2net Launches New Platinum and Gold Levels to its Umbrella Support Service

Published 1st May 2008

IKANO signs up for B2net’s enhanced support service

Chesterfield, 30 April 2008 – Leading vendor-independent storage integrator, B2net, today announced enhancements for its Umbrella Support service – a complete support solution that guarantees end-to-end support and a single point of ownership for customers’ infrastructure problems. Responding to the success of the service, B2net is reinvesting in people, processes and tools to further enhance its value to customers.

Key enhancements include the introduction of two service levels. “Gold” customers will receive support during normal business hours, whereas “Platinum” customers will benefit from round the clock support. In addition, customers will also benefit from 24x7 infrastructure monitoring, monthly reports detailing B2net’s performance and system health, as well as regular service reviews to ensure each customer is getting the best value.

IKANO Financial Services, provider of innovative and bespoke financial and related services, has already signed up to the Platinum level.

Sam Ludlow, Head of Technical Services, IKANO Financial Services comments, “Having a single point of contact for multiple vendors has been one of the biggest benefits of B2net’s Umbrella Support service, and we chose to upgrade to Platinum level as the 24 hour support gives us added confidence that our systems are consistently running at 100 per cent performance. Many of our customers are high-street chains and consumer brands, placing heavy demands on the financial systems we provide them, and the Platinum level enables us to guarantee fast support and response at any time of the day.”

Mark Butcher, B2net’s Divisional Sales Manager, comments: “Businesses make significant investments in complex IT solutions, but often only purchase product support from individual vendors. Our Platinum and Gold levels mean customers benefit from B2net taking control of their existing vendor and independent software vendor agreements, so that they have one single-point of contact working to ensure their IT service level agreements (SLAs) are consistently maintained. These enhancements guarantee response times, and remove the need for the customers to be passed between vendors who invariably want to avoid ownership of a problem rather than resolve it.”

Both Platinum and Gold levels are based around ITIL processes for incident management, and will be operated from B2net’s new operations centre in Chesterfield, where Remote Diagnostic functionality enables cost-effective delivery of fast, high-level support.

B2net has deployed over 400 infrastructure solutions across the UK to date and is achieving year-on-year growth of 80 per cent.

About IKANO Financial Services

IKANO Financial Services Ltd is part of the IKANO Group and in the UK, is a major player in the credit and loyalty services market. The IKANO Group was created in the 1980's by Ingvar Kamprad, the founder of IKEA and is active in the areas of finance, real estate, asset management, insurance and retail. The Financial Services division operates throughout Scandinavia, UK, Germany and Russia. www.ikano.net


About B2net

B2net is a vendor independent storage integrator with extensive experience in designing, deploying and managing enterprise server, storage & virtualisation solutions. The B2net Group has grown by over 80% this fiscal year and now has reached a turnover in excess of £30 million and employs 90 people in the UK. Few other integrators have B2net’s in-depth understanding of systems and data management. Founded in 2000, B2net acts as a trusted advisor to many leading corporate and public sector organisations, assisting in their entire storage lifecycles. For more information on B2net and its solutions and partners, please visit www.b2net.co.uk

ENDS