Windstream Packages Business Continuity, Connectivity Into One Solution For Partners And Customers

Windstream is making its business continuity solution, Diverse Connect, officially available to customers and through its channel partners, the telecom provider revealed on Thursday.

Business continuity is basic table stakes today. But up until now, many solution providers and businesses have been forced to cobble together a range of connectivity options to ensure network reliability and resiliency in the face of network outages or service issues.

Diverse Connect brings together multiple connectivity offerings, managed routers, and a service level agreement (SLA) into one solution. The offering is especially useful for midmarket businesses that depend on cloud-based applications, such as voice, video, and file-sharing apps, Mike Kozlowski, vice president of product management for Windstream, told CRN.

[Related: Windstream To Acquire Broadview For $227M To Boost Its SMB Unified Communications Offerings]

Windstream's solution provider partners that were offering business continuity services before Diverse Connect needed to piece different solutions together from multiple providers to ensure their end customers would have full-time access to their critical business functions, even in the face of a service disruption. Now, partners can sell the entire business continuity package, bundled together from Windstream, Kozlowski said.

"The goal of this offering is its a simplified and concise [offering] that lets customers consume it in an effective way," he said. That contrasts with the way customers and partners had to solve the business continuity issue in the past, he added, which led to t by them "navigating the large public operators, in an a la carte way, that doesn't always guarantee diversity in the end."

Diverse Connect ensures that cloud-based applications will stay up and running, despite any disruptions, though varied connections that don't share the same points of failure, Kozlowski said. Windstream and its partners can design Diverse Connect to work with customer environments, including available connectivity options – such as fiber and fixed wireless – and points of presence. The solution is backed by an SLA, and customers are given performance tools that they can use to monitor and validate Diverse Connect.

The solution will save end customers dollars while ensuring business continuity, Kozlowski said.

"These customers typically have limited resources, and they need to rely on partners who can basically package this for them and make [business continuity] economically feasible for them," he said.

For solution providers, the solution gives Windstream partners another recurring revenue avenue, Kozlowski added.

Diverse Connect is widely available now to all customers within Windstream's service areas.

The Little Rock, Ark.-based telecom provider has been offering Diverse Connect in a limited fashion since December, but channel partners and end customers will now have full access to the solution.

Windstream will be offering specialized training on business continuity and specifics on its latest offering for its channel partner community, Kozlowski said. Windstream said the solution would be immediately attractive to several select verticals, including finance, healthcare, retail, and professional services.