CENTRAL TELECOM AWARDED MICROSOFT GOLD PARTNER STATUS
Communications specialists Central Telecom, recently presented with Microsoft European Award for Innovation in IT, has now been awarded Microsoft Gold Partner Status, a mark of excellence in competence and expertise.
The company, whose headquarters is in Burton-on-Trent and has regional offices in Guildford and the City of London has been a Microsoft Certified Business Solutions Partner since 2004. It has now been awarded Gold Partner status in recognition of its expertise in the fields of CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and Microsoft Information Worker Solutions.
Gold Certified Partners represent the highest level of competence and expertise with Microsoft technologies, and have the closest working relationship with Microsoft. As well as technical competence, Gold Partners are required to have access to the resources and support they need to stand out in the marketplace and to expand their business opportunities.
This latest accreditation followed a thorough examination of Central's operation and a rigorous assessment of its skills, expertise, training and after-sales support. Central Telecom was also required to achieve a series of competencies set down by Microsoft and supply examples of customer activity and supporting testimonials.
Over the past few years, Central Telecom has developed an unrivalled level of understanding of the Microsoft product portfolio. The Company works closely with its clients to define their needs and then designs and implements effective solutions that address key business and technology issues, delivering real business benefits.
"Central Telecom is unique in the channel, both in our skills and depth of knowledge in the field of convergence and VOIP. To be awarded Microsoft Gold Partner status reflects the strength of our relationship with Microsoft and demonstrates the high level of our technical expertise and exceptional commitment to quality and customer care," commented Managing Director Andrew McDougall.
"Under current market conditions, not only have we managed to sustain our current level of growth, we have increased it significantly. Turnover is on target to top the £25 million mark in 2006, which is a tremendous achievement for an independently owned company.
"We have achieved this growth by providing our customers with independent advice on both fixed and mobile solutions, backed by our commitment to quality and customer care."
Central Telecom continues to develop strategic alliances with the global names in the telecommunications world in a bid to stay at the forefront of industry advances. It already holds many of the industry's highest accreditations and is also an Avaya Platinum Partner, Mitel Platinum Partner and Nortel Gold Partner.
The company's activities in the market are wide and varied and include the design and implementation of dedicated business solutions across both public and private sectors. It now boasts more than 500,000 end users across the UK, ranging from SME's to blue chip and public sector organisations.
Over the years the company has diversified its interests and has established itself as a specialist provider of CRM, IP Technology, call centre, convergence and flexible working solutions. It was the first in its sector to develop a genuine CRM strategy - in the form of a bespoke Microsoft CRM application, developed and extended by its development team.
As well as employing Microsoft CRM itself, the company has now added Microsoft CRM to its own product portfolio and is focusing on selling CRM solutions to SMEs. The company has established its own CRM team, which will support system sales as well as generating pure CRM opportunities.
It also has its own Software Development Services department, which assists in the development of Microsoft's vanilla CRM product to suit Central's own internal needs and provides development support to external implementations of CRM.
Over the past 12 months, Central's achievements have been rewarded with a number of industry and business awards. Its financial performances was recognised for the fourth successive year with a listing in the 2005 Deloitte Fast 50 Technology Awards and European 500 Fastest Growing Companies.
