In October the division will be launching a new product to cater to the connectivity needs of small, micro and medium-sized enterprises (or SMMEs – companies consisting of fewer than 200 people).

Over the last year and a half Vodacom Business has positioned itself as an all-inclusive service provider to enterprise customers. The philosophy is a simple one and is based on offering products and services to fulfil all the information technology and communication requirements of clients.

With the enterprise bundles making an impact in the market, Vodacom Business will unveil a modified product for smaller companies to implement Vodacom’s vision to meet the “voice, video and data requirements of all businesses”.

Ermano Quartero, Vodacom Business’ Managing Executive of Products and Marketing, explains. “We have been very successful in the corporate market. In that space we compete very aggressively with large market players like Telkom, Neotel and  Internet Solutions.

“Now we will have an enterprise product that has been adapted for SMMEs and we have bundled products together to make it very attractive for a SMME as these have a number of integrated features.”

The advantage of the bundled product is that SMMEs will be able to streamline their business as internet services, website hosting, email, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) and various applications will all be integrated into one package offering.

SMMEs usually approach a provider for internet access, another for an email platform and another for hosting. But Vodacom Business’ offering cuts out these third parties.

“What we have done is built a bundle to take to market that includes internet connectivity,” says Quartero. “It’s bundled in with a number of wemail accounts, it’s also bundled in with some collaboration services – we use Microsoft SharePoint Portal, some basic hosting to host a website, and we have also bundled it with a VoIP service where wehave a number of options available.”

VoIP is a particularly useful element as SMMEs can make international calls as well as calls to Telkom and mobile operators at cheaper rates. For the slightly larger SMME, Vodacom Business has a Private Automatic Branch eXchange (PABX) feature which allows businesses to create an IP-based telephone switchboard.

But perhaps the greatest advantage Vodacom Business boasts is its own fibre-optic infrastructure. “The last-mile internet access is provisioned across our own infrastructure, so we are not reliant on a third party for support,” notes Quartero.

Regarding this infrastructure, he says: “We have already rolled out 11 metropolitan fibre-optic rings – and we are in the process of rolling out our long-haul links between the major centres.”

In addition Vodacom Business has already made wireless broadband access in the form of WiMAX available in Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg, but Quartero adds “there isn’t really an end time-frame for that until we have got maximum coverage.”

Of course WiMAX is just one of the services Vodacom Business offers, and this will be the beauty of the new SMME bundles – it’s all done through one service provider.

The 3D View – Living Your Successful Life Story by Stephen Blewett

Lessons in leadership are not often presented in African story-telling format, but Stephen Blewett, author of The 3D View – Living Your Successful Life Story, has drawn parallels between learning day-to-day lessons in the bush and learning tips for success in the boardroom.

Simply, the “3D view”, of which Blewett writes, is the “ability and vision to have a solution-driven rather than a problem-driven life”. Leaders don’t dwell on problems, but rather on challenges and solutions.

Using delightful human and animal characters – from Tulungu, the boy who grows up to be chief, to his family and creatures like Leopard and Porcupine, who lament having spots and quills – Blewett shows us how we can embrace the leader within us, weaknesses included. Each chapter concludes with a personal review, for example: “Challenge yourself every day; write your flight plan for life; then land and get stuck in!”

Later chapters are themed, such as “determination” and “aspiration”, and expound upon it. Drawing from experience and the lessons of great leaders as diverse as Mandela, Gandhi and Colonel Sanders, of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame, Blewett demonstrates leadership qualities and principles in action.

“The 3D View takes you into the essentials of effective, visionary and inspirational leadership where the leader achieves the organisation’s objectives by being a servant of the people he or she leads,” writes Mondli Makhanya, editor of the Sunday Times.

Engagingly written, The 3D View draws on anecdote and a distillation of ancient African and Egyptian wisdom, to present these simple
yet effective lessons.

win
A copy of The 3D View – Living Your Successful Life Story

We’re giving away a copy of marketing guru, Stephen Blewett’s, The 3D View, to one lucky Vodaworld reader.

To stand a chance of winning, name one of the characters in the book. SMS “3D” followed by your answer to 34180. SMSs cost R2.00 each.

Conditions: Employees of Vodacom, Vodafone, Interactive Africa and Kima may not enter. Should the winner be a minor, he or she will require his or her parents’ or guardian’s consent before the prize can be handed over. The closing date for this competition is
30 October 2009.