The UK's Yorkshire Building Society has signed a five year contract, worth an estimated £10 million, with Cable and Wireless for the supply of an Internet protocol virtual private network with quality of service (IP-VPN QoS).
Yorkshire Building Society says the deal is the first step in its plan to migrate to a fully converged IP infrastructure. The new network and will connect the Society's 150+ sites across the UK, including its headquarters, data centre and retail branches.
Under the contract, Cable & Wireless will manage both the Society's legacy infrastructure and migration to IP.
Mike McCluskie, network services manager, Yorkshire Building Society, comments: "Our new IP infrastructure will give us a competitive advantage in the UK market and the migration to IP will reduce the overall cost of our voice and data infrastructure."
Installation at branches is due to start in mid April and the whole project is expected to be completed by autumn 2003.
Once the network is installed, Yorkshire Building Society says it plans to pilot IP telephony with a view to implementing it throughout the organisation.