OCC leads charge on telcos

Office Centre Central is planning to offer resellers the chance to sell airtime to their customers following the acquisition of telecoms specialist Techtel this week.

Office Centre Central (OCC) is planning to offer resellers the chance to sell airtime to their customers following the acquisition of telecoms specialist Techtel this week.

The reseller-funded purchasing group, which is changing its name to OCCgo, is setting up Techtel as a separate division. Financial details of the acquisition were not available.

Established in 1998, Techtel has agreements with a number of mobile and fixed-line telecoms companies, including Vodafone. It claims to offer customers big savings over BT's rates.

The deal will allow OCCgo resellers to offer these lower rates to customers, install a call adapter and receive monthly cheques based on customer usage. The scheme is available to resellers immediately.

"Telecoms is a market resellers have wanted access to for a long time," said Bill Hill, managing director of OCCgo. "Resellers need a steady monthly revenue stream to compensate for falling margins in today's competitive IT market, and Techtel's products fulfil that need."

"Our vision is to become a one-stop shop for small to medium sized enterprises where all their IT and communications needs are fulfilled," he added.

Hill would not dismiss further company link-ups in the near future. "We are constantly looking for partnerships opportunities with businesses that will add value to our business strategy," he said.

Chris Steele, an executive director at Techtel, said: "Overnight, our market has increased significantly through the OCCgo channel. We are getting a degree of market penetration which we could only have dreamed about before."

Mike Sherry, managing director of Bluebell Associates, a reseller in the OCCgo scheme, was excited by the opportunity of expanding into the telecoms market.

"I expect significant take-up from our customers and it opens up a new market. It will give us regular income from an area resellers have not previously had access to," he said.