It has launched the Vodafone Secure Remote Access service in the UK, but Martin Coates, director of product marketing for the UK operation, said there is a clear intention to offer something similar for global enterprise customers within the next 12 months. He said the service has also been launched by Vodafone affiliate SFR in France, and by the end of the year will be unveiled in at least one other country where it has a network.
The VSRA client is a re-branded version of Fiberlink’s Extend360 connection manager, and benefits from all the additional functionality Fiberlink has been building into it over the last couple of years.
Coates said it carries out security policy compliance checking, even when the laptop is not connected to a network, thanks to the inclusion into the client of technology from BigFix. This means that in addition to charging for access over its cellular network, Vodafone also takes a fee for the client itself, since it provides value regardless independently of the connection manager function.
In terms of the connectivity options available, VSRA is multi-bearer. In addition to cellular, users can access their corporate networks over public or private WiFi, DSL, dial-up, and ISDN. Though Newbury, UK-based Vodafone itself is still mainly a mobile operator, Fiberlink’s access aggregation activity means that some public WiFi hotspots will be affiliates on its network, in which case Vodafone will also derive revenue from that access option.
Pricing includes a flat rate of 25 pounds ($50) for monthly mobile data access, as well as a 24-hour fee of 8.50 pounds ($17), deliberately priced to compete with hotel internet and WiFi access. The difference being that you can continue to use it anywhere, even if you fly to another country where we have a network for an afternoon meeting, for instance, said Coates.
The new flat rate offer extends to countries beyond the Vodafone footprint. It has negotiated rates with roaming partners that enable it to offer the same terms when corporate customers are in those countries. It is currently available in western Europe, North America, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand.
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The VSRA client is only currently available for laptops, not smart phones or PDAs, and Vodafone says there is no particular rush for it to be extended to those device categories. That said, the company does not block any applications from the laptop, including IM and VoIP, so VSRA could be used for voice traffic as well as data.
At the moment, Vodafone sends in its professional services organization to define a corporate customer’s specific security policy, such as C-level execs may be able to use certain connectivity options that less senior staff may not, or people working in the marketing department may be able to access different parts of the intranet from human resources or payroll. Any moves, adds, and changes thereafter are carried out as part of the managed services contract, and it would seem logical to move some of this basic housekeeping to a self-service web portal. This is already happening with reporting functions for usage patterns and cost, but policy configuration would make a natural next step.
