British Telecommunications Plc, which has rebranded its Customer Systems Division – otherwise its systems integration business and extended its focus from the UK telecommunications business under the Syntegra name (CI No 2,288), says it will focus on the distributed systems integration market, which British Telecom estimates to be growing at 35% per annum to $55,000m in 1996 from $15,000m in 1991. Syntegra’s business organisation will be divided into eight sectors, covering the wholesale and retail finance markets; transport; manufacturing; retail; leisure and media; utilities; the public sector; and defence. According to a spokesman, its target customers will share three characteristics: they will be multinational with distributed organisational processes and international corporate assets; they will be increasingly adopting a distributed approach to their information systems; and they will be among the largest users of voice, image and data. Syntegra’s director, Bill Halbert, acknowledges that the unit is a key component in British Telecom’s future strategy, saying that the company needed to move more and more towards the provision of services and consultancy skills. A Syntegra spokesman said that there were unlikely to be complications arising from British Telecom’s tie-up with MCI Communications Corp, as MCI’s system integration interests were limited to the US market.
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