Tata, BT Connect Via Telepresence

LONDON -- Tata Communications and BT today announce an agreement and associated customer trials for the industry's first commercial service to allow customers on either of their existing video exchanges to establish conferences with customers on the other's video exchange. The collaboration will provide each organization with open access to a much broader network of businesses.

This represents a major step towards open, ubiquitous connectivity between Telepresence endpoints, regardless of their parent network. The service will help enable Telepresence users to reach more partners, suppliers, customers and prospects at public and private end-points and will facilitate globally distributed, real time face-to-face virtual conference meetings that drive greater value to the collaborating businesses.

Using the intercompany service that both organizations are launching, any Cisco TelePresence customer of BT's Global Video Exchange or Tata Communications' Global Meeting Exchange can invite clients of the other service provider to join them in multipoint Telepresence meetings. The meetings can be hosted on either the Tata Communications or the BT Telepresence Exchange.

"Trials with current customers across both exchange networks have been strongly received", says John Landau, Senior VP, Global Managed Services, Tata Communications. "We are excited that two of the world's leading Telepresence service providers have come together to open up this unprecedented collaboration opportunity for our existing and future customers. Cooperation was easy because BT Conferencing and Tata Communications share a common goal to provide our customers open video conferencing sessions with any other business around the world."

Tata Communications Ltd.

BT Group plc (NYSE: BT; London: BTA)