The Polish operator Netia and Ericsson have agreed an exclusive five year managed services partnership. Under the contract, Ericsson will be responsible for the management of Netia wireline networks and service deliveries to Netia customers. Ericsson will be responsible for operational activities currently performed by the Netia Network Operational Department and Network Inventory Department. Netia will remain owner of the network. Under the scope of the managed services agreement 300 employees from the Netia Network Departments will be transferred to Ericsson.

Cassatt Corporation, a provider of enterprise software and services to enable IT infrastructures, and Tata Consultancy Services, the global IT services and consulting firm, have formed a joint software and services offering, the Data Center Optimisation Solution, as part of the partnership between the two firms. Recognising the need to save money and enhance IT services within the data centres, the firms believe that a new approach is required using automation to deliver desired application service levels.

ancotel and HKCOLO, two neutral colocation and network interconnection providers, have announced that virtual meet me room services are now available at HKCOLO. ancotel's optical-level services groom and convert SDH, SONET (DS3) and Ethernet services for more flexible Asian connectivity. Demultiplexing of optical circuits to E3/DS3 and/or E1 handoffs inside the VMMR and into the HKCOLO meet-me-room now allows the provision of circuits within hours.

1-Net Singapore, a wholly-owned subsidiary of MediaCorp Technologies, has launched NexMedia, a one-stop service for managing content distribution for content owners, aggregators and service providers, with the support of Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA). With the advent of new content platforms like Video-on-Demand (VOD) over broadband, IPTV, Broadband TV, 3G and Digital Cinema, content owners are confronted with challenges of dealing with complex technical and business issues.

The business customer division of T-Systems will offer "Powered by SAP" outsourcing services for personnel management and billing following a 5-year cooperation arrangement with SAP, the software vendor. The contract applies to Europe, the Middle East and Africa. T-Systems will employ a specialised SAP application that is designed for billing processes. Currently, T-Systems processes around 450 million invoices per year and together with printing and shipping. Altogether, T-Systems manages over 40 million customer accounts and administers around 460 million billing processes.

NuXo Technologies Inc., the outsourcing company specialising in email filtering technologies which guarantee that no legitimate emails are lost, has expanded its operations in Europe. Although numerous anti-spam legislations are in place, countries in Europe have seen the amount of spam dramatically increase in the last few years. As spammers invent new ways to defeat existing methods of fighting spam, it becomes even more crucial for companies to implement technologies and solutions capable of adapting and eliminating all spam.

MessageOne has launched new Email Archive, Recovery, Encryption and BlackBerry Continuity products. With nearly two million seats under management, its Email Management Services (EMS) platform for end-to-end email management now includes security, archive, recovery, encryption and the industry's first service for BlackBerry Continuity. The potential for email failures still remains very high and according to MessageOne, 75% of email systems will fail in the next 12 months.

Schlumberger and BT have formed an alliance targeting the communication needs of the exploration and production (E&P) industry. The companies have signed a five-year, US$47 million (£27 million) contract for BT to provide global network services to Schlumberger. As part of the agreement, BT will assume responsibility for the management and operational delivery of Schlumberger's core MPLS backbone network, spanning 18 countries.

Quality Technology Services a provider of data centre facilities and managed services in Suwanne Georgia, has launched several new managed storage service offerings designed to reduce capital expenditures and operating costs, while providing highly available and redundant storage mediums. New storage options include fibre-attached Storage Area Network (SAN), Network Attached Storage (NAS) over 100/1000Tx Ethernet or iSCSI over Copper Gigabit Ethernet. The systems are monitored and managed 24x7x365.