Unisys Corp reckons that the world has not yet recognized just how big a network integration company it now is. Unisys has now been split into three roughly equal parts: Information Services for outsourcing and software, Computer Systems for hardware, and Global Customer Services for support, and the network integration business now accounts for 55% of $1bn or so of business done by Global Support. Maintenance, the other main business of Global Services, currently accounts for 40% of revenues, but is declining by 15% per annum while network integration rises. Unisys has launched a new Network Enable portfolio of network integration services worldwide. According to Unisys, the networking side is nearly all IP-based, with databases and legacy data accessed via browsers on personal computers, and Microsoft Corp’s Windows NT at the center of everything. It regards Unix and Novell as dead in the water. That’s the reason behind the company’s recent enterprise services and support agreement with Microsoft (CI No 3,280), under which Unisys will be developing vertical market applications for NT to some of its key vertical markets, providing it with worldwide support and integration services, and helping to make NT more scalable so it can host larger databases and support high volumes of transaction processing and better security. Microsoft joins Unisys’ other key partner, Cisco Systems Inc, in what Unisys illustrates as a complimentary triangle. Unisys believes it’s largely solved the desktop problem of administration, asset managment and cost control of large numbers of personal computers, and that there is now a need to provide services comparable to those traditionally offered by the like of Alcatel NV, Siemens AG, MCI Corp and Ameritech, coupled with its own multi-user computer support skills. It dismisses other support agreements Microsoft has set up with Hewlett-Packard Co and Digital Equipment Corp, saying that, other than IBM Corp, it is the only organization that can offer support across the globe.
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