“VMware, with their innovative multi-cloud roadmap alongside BT’s managed services expertise, was a perfect match from day one,” Rigas says. “VMware provides a great ecosystem for us to deliver digital transformation services to our customers on their journey to the cloud.”

In fact, VMware worked hand in hand with BT to develop its single-vendor SASE strategy for customers. It starts with understanding the customer’s future ambitions, implementing and testing components at key milestones, and finally, assessing the total cost of ownership before the customer moves forward on their journey to cloud.

Rigas notes, “Our partnership with VMware helped us to shape our SASE strategy regarding a single-vendor approach, which was quite unique at the time and is now seen as best-of-breed.”

Delivering Excellence in Managed Services

BT’s current SASE solution is a managed service offering, which includes L1 to L3 support to assure customers of high service levels. As Rigas points out, this level of expert support requires the right tools and the right people. “The tools come from VMware; the expertise comes from BT,” he says. “The combination of the two provides the best managed services experience for our customers.”

The efficiency gains are significant. For example, Rigas reports that by using VMware tools, BT is typically able to reduce the time it takes to manage a customer by up to 30%. And the time needed to solve a customer problem can be reduced by as much as 50%. Rigas goes on to say that “with fewer people needed in support, this means less cost for the customer, and we’re actually providing better service for them.”

BT proved the value of its managed services approach for a company in the transportation industry. The customer, which had 350 sites and more than 24,000 remote users in six different countries, engaged BT to deliver a fully managed service for SD-WAN. Rigas notes, “VMware provided BT the ability to deploy SD-WAN very quickly and at the scale the customer needed.”

By adopting the fully managed SD-WAN service from BT, the customer was able to move away from legacy MPLS network transports to more flexible and cost-effective broadband. And following on from that success, the customer has since requested co-management services. Rigas says, “VMware has given the customer the opportunity to opt for a co-managed solution with BT, giving them control to make policy changes directly to their network solution as needed.”

Shaping the Future of Innovation

As BT continues to bring transformative capabilities to its customers around the world, the company is working in partnership with VMware to build its innovation roadmap. “Innovation from VMware is incredibly important to us,” Rigas remarks. “We believe in the technology solutions VMware offers because they have the ability to stay one step ahead.”.

At the same time, BT also draws on its industry knowledge and vast experience working with many diverse organizations to provide input into shaping the roadmap. “BT’s ability to understand customer requirements, explain those requirements to VMware who then builds them into future roadmap initiatives, creates a unique relationship and helps us to serve our customers in the best way possible,” Rigas explains.

According to Rigas, this means providing customers with the lowest total cost of ownership, giving them a single pane of glass for visibility and control of their infrastructure, and offering the flexibility to co-manage their environment if needed.

Rigas concludes, “VMware’s partner program has provided BT with access to all the right tools, and all the right experts within VMware, to deliver the capabilities and value that matter most to our customers.”