British Telecom has announced that its Concert ''frame relay system'', launched in India in partnership with Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd in February 1998, has emerged as the country''s largest ''managed data service'', both in terms of customer numbers and market share.

British Telecom claims its Concert FRS holds a market share of 60 per cent in a market estimated at Rs 100 crore. It says it has installed over 90 systems so far and has a customer base of 200 in India. The system, a fully-managed communications solution that supports high-speed, LAN-based data applications in dispersed locations without requiring large, uneconomical bandwidth reserves, mainly targets multinational companies.

"We are targeting companies with high telecom expenditure, which require flexible invoicing and have a need for managed end-to-end telecom services," says Richard Bagley, director - channel sales, BT. "In an era when India is opening up its economy, Concert provides a state-of-the-art communication service to globally competitive companies planning to do business in India. It also equips Indian companies with a powerful communication tool they can use to gain competitive advantage in the international market place."

In India, Concert counts among its customers multinationals such as Arthur Andersen, J P Morgan, Nokia, Whirlpool, British Airways, and Indian companies such as Ranbaxy, Reliance Industries, Larsen & Toubro, NIIT and Crompton Greaves.

According to Harpreet Duggal, vice president - marketing & sales, BT India, "India has been among the fastest growing markets for managed frame relay services, with a growth last year of over 100 per cent." The big drivers of growth have been the increasing adoption of enterprise resource planning solutions by Indian businesses and growth in Indian software exports.

The year 1998-99 saw a large number of ERP installations going live, creating the need for economical sharing of data. Software exports grew 40 per cent, a large portion of them through offsite development, creating the need for high-speed, seamless trans-border communication.

Mr Duggal adds that sales of the Concert system has grown at twice the rate of the market on the whole. The reason, he says, was BT''s accent on customer service.

"Concert services have reduced lead time from 300 days to 60-70 days, and link availability and uptime has been improved from 85 per cent to 99 per cent," says Mr Bagley. The system is based on an ATM backbone, a high degree of redundancy to ensure alternative communication paths and high levels of service guarantees.

Concert has also been the first to offer on-web reporting and tracking to its Indian customers. The tie-up with VSNL is a distribution and supply agreement. "BT has a long-standing relationship with VSNL, and the alliance has focused on delivering reliable and economical means of trans-border communications to businesses and individuals in India," says Arun Seth, managing director, BT India.