Verizon Business' managed services hold key to its future

Verizon Business has a number of initiatives it considers crucial to its future but perhaps none may be more important than its managed services offerings.

The cash the company is making with its services, the investments it is putting money into and likely future products, such as mobility management, indicate how important this area has become for the company.

Verizon Business, which was born out of the Verizon merger with MCI two years ago, says that sales from its strategic services, which include managed LAN and IP-based packages, generated $1.4 billion in the third quarter of 2007, an increase of 28.6% from its third-quarter 2006 strategic services revenues, which totaled $1.09 billion. The revenues generated from its services in the third quarter of 2007 accounted for more than a quarter of Verizon Business' overall third-quarter 2007 revenues, which totaled $5.3 billion.

And in order to improve its managed services capabilities, Verizon Business has invested over $150 million in its Impact management platform, one of its major assets in managing customer network services, over the past two years.

Currently, Verizon Business manages over 3,700 customer networks in more than 140 countries, as well over 250,000 customer communications devices worldwide. The company has rolled out several new management services over the past two years, including telecom management services, a managed WLAN service and a WAN optimization service. And just last week it rolled out VoIP migration services for business.

Additionally, the company has acquired Cybertrust, a global security firm that specialized in services such as identity management, managed security services, vulnerability/threat management and security certification programs.